Ever see that show "Dirty Jobs" with Mike Rowe? It's a good show because it gives you a good idea of how nasty things get done without the viewer actually having to do it.Well, I had two nasty jobs to do this morning. They're the kind of thing home owners have to do from time to time unless they want to spend a fortune hiring people to do them.
The winter weather and unusual amount of snow has created ice dams on the roof of our house. The problem has gotten to the point that there are some water leaks in the house as a result of the ice melting.
The partial solution is to shovel the snow off the roof so that it won't melt and then refreeze causing the ice dam.
So that's what I did-carefully because you don't want to damage the shingles. I didn't do this on the upper roof-just the lower one you see in this picture. That was bad enough.
The second job was to go for a long term solution. That is, make sure the attic is properly insulated and vented.
This is a nasty job because we don't have floors in our attic and it's not very big. There's exposed fiber glass insulation and A/C equipment all over so there was a lot of crawling in close, unpleasant quarters.
I salvaged a bunch of old shelving boards to lay down so I wouldn't step on insulation and wallboard. Then I ventured toward the eaves to make sure the vents were 'free'.
Problem was, when we had the house vinyl sided, the installers covered the soffit vents! That, I'm sure, is a big part of the problem.
Now I have to hope getting rid of the snow is going to be good enough and then wait until spring to see about the vents.
Ah, home ownership. It has its downside.
In the meantime, there's snow forecast for Tuesday. Where's that January thaw?
3 comments:
You can expect the January thaw late in February.
Ok, George! YOU ARE NOT SUPPOSED TU BE UP ON AN ICE BASED, SNOWY ROOF. You could become part of an avalanche and then we could read about you in the newspaper.
"Retired teacher, plummets 15 feet from the top of his first floor roof. Neighbors report hearing a loud scream and his wife found him head first in the grandkids snow man.
George was quoted as saying, "The trip down was a blast, however, the snowman was frozen solid. I still have ringing in my ears that, strangely enough, sounds a lot like 'Frosty the Snowman.'
George is doing fine but the snowman did not survive the incident.
kt
That was great! Hilarious. You should turn it into a short story. Fortunately, I made it down safely.
Good one KT! - Becky
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