After spending a couple hours down in the basement after work with the wet vac, it's mostly dry down there this morning, which means it still a little wet, but the dehumidifier seems to have things in hand. The laundry rug and some floor mats are draped over the clothesline outside. There was some damage, although the worst bit was more collateral damage, as I knocked my workshop clock off it's hanger while initially lifting one of the bench carcases out of the water. Both its glass face and plastic body shattered when it hit the floor, so it's totally destroyed. It wasn't an expensive clock, but I liked it. There was also a cardboard box full of bed linens on the floor that got soaked through, along with my hiking boots, and some clothes I had piled on the ironing board awaiting transport to the Salvation Army that got wet, including a suit jacket. I'm not sure how that happened. The ironing board is directly below the window, so it may have been spray from there, or else some of the water ran along a pipe or joist and dripped down. Shrug.
I discovered far worse damage later on when I went to get the big fan from the attic. Turns out I had flooding up there, too. Bozhe moi! I've mentioned before how cheaply made the windows on my house were. The windows at either end of the attic are in especially bad shape. If they aren't latched properly, a good gust of wind can actually blow them them out of their rails, and this is what happened. In anticipation of the storm, I'd taken the fan out of the one window, but forgot to latch it, and it blew in at some point during the night. The rain came in, soaked the rug I have on the floor up there, which drew the water to a couple of boxes of paperbacks I had on the floor. A bunch of books got soaked, along with some old magazines (classic issues of The National Lampoon). Bother. There may be other damage, but I was too discouraged to look further. I opened up the other window to let air circulate, and spread out the books to dry.
Of course, just to put the cherry on top of the sundae that is my life, I was awakened at 2:30 this morning by thunder, so I had to go running about closing the attic windows again in the middle of the night to avoid taking on any more water. Meanwhile, the rug and mats hanging out on the clothesline were getting resoaked. Why in god's name did I ever buy a house?
And to make things perfect, MLB has yet to put up the archive of last night's Dodger game for me to listen to with my morning coffee. Feh!
I discovered far worse damage later on when I went to get the big fan from the attic. Turns out I had flooding up there, too. Bozhe moi! I've mentioned before how cheaply made the windows on my house were. The windows at either end of the attic are in especially bad shape. If they aren't latched properly, a good gust of wind can actually blow them them out of their rails, and this is what happened. In anticipation of the storm, I'd taken the fan out of the one window, but forgot to latch it, and it blew in at some point during the night. The rain came in, soaked the rug I have on the floor up there, which drew the water to a couple of boxes of paperbacks I had on the floor. A bunch of books got soaked, along with some old magazines (classic issues of The National Lampoon). Bother. There may be other damage, but I was too discouraged to look further. I opened up the other window to let air circulate, and spread out the books to dry.
Of course, just to put the cherry on top of the sundae that is my life, I was awakened at 2:30 this morning by thunder, so I had to go running about closing the attic windows again in the middle of the night to avoid taking on any more water. Meanwhile, the rug and mats hanging out on the clothesline were getting resoaked. Why in god's name did I ever buy a house?
And to make things perfect, MLB has yet to put up the archive of last night's Dodger game for me to listen to with my morning coffee. Feh!
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