Water Water Everywhere

     It probably didn't do more than sprinkle for about a month. It was hottish (about 90 most days) and super low humidity for Massachusetts. It was glorious and I loved it. I was never cold. It was awesome. We have been working on many home repairs, a lot of them being fairly urgent. The 10 day forecast looked good so we opened up the roof on the addition. It has had issues for years, though we did not always know about them. Things got repaired over and over. FInally enough was enough and we took off the old roof and all of the old stuff inside it. Did you know that styrofoam absorbs water? I didn't know that. Did I already talk about that? Anyway, the styrofoam that goes underneath the rubber roof to keep it from getting punctured also apparently absorbs water if water happens to get in. I have never felt styrofoam that heavy in my life. 

     Anyway, forecast was good, roof got taken apart other than the rafters, Ethan had a good plan and went to Home Depot to get the materials. Everything was great other than the fact that I am still scared of heights, still not tall enough for a lot of the jobs, can't use the power saws because I don't want to screw up, and I am not strong enough to lift a lot of the things that need lifting, especially while trying to climb a ladder. But I was ready and willing to try. 

     And then the whole 10 day forecast changed. All of a sudden our clear days had rain and thunderstorms in them. And not just a little rain. A lot of rain. This was a photo I took of our street the other day during one of the storms.This was happening when the hourly weather said there was no rain and peaking sun. Good to know that this is NOT rain, lol. 

     Since the tarp over the roof is great but not magical, we have to go up and drain the water that collects in the trenches in between the rafters. To be clear, Ethan goes up the ladder and I hold the end of the syphon over a bucket. This was the roof after Ethan drained a lot of the water out. It was full to the top before he started. 

     This is our handy muck bucket. We drain the roof water into it and drag it to a part of the yard that is not directly around all of the new things we have done. No need to make the level ground (Ethan worked REALLY hard to make everything level) a soggy mess. That is how things fall out of place. Trailer living is just fine usually. But there are definitely some things that are different than house living. Some trailers are built on concrete slabs (for good reason). Ours is not. Every time Ethan has put in new skirting he builds supportive framing, levels the ground and puts down stone dust and...something they use in doing patios, and he makes sure things are as they should be. We can't go back and pour a concrete slab, but we can keep our home from sinking into the ground. 

     So anyway, life has been a bit of an adventure lately. What should have been clear weather for a nice long stretch, that would have given us more than enough time to finish the roof has turned into ALL the rain coming RIGHT NOW. Things are soggy. I check the weather obsessively to see when there might be good weather for us to get back into the roof. There needs to be at least 3 days in a row of no rain. Saturday, Sunday and Monday are the soonest in the forecast. I can't help Ethan at all on Sunday because I have my live sale. I can't throw away 3 months of work. I can help with the rest of the demolition on Saturday and hopefully Ethan's friend, who offered to help, can come on Sunday. Hopefully we can keep the inside of our place dry (mostly dry) until we can get the roof back on. Hopefully I can find another hour or two to finish judging the MEPSA division I am working on. And I really hope that my live sale goes well on Sunday. It can stop raining any time now.