Dateline: Thursday, October 12, 2023

It is a time of home improvements at the Todd household. After years of delaying, I finally pulled the trigger on replacing the flooring on our upper deck. It was 36 or more years old, and had lots of deterioration. The men have been working on it since last Thursday, and will finish tonight—except for some final clean-up tomorrow. It will be nice to have a truly usable deck.

But, as they tore old boards away, at the edges of the house, the found water damage. A gutter wasn’t installed properly and was dropping most of its water on the deck. Two doorways are damaged. I called a mold inspector, who came out today. He tested those areas, did some air samples, and tested a dark spot on an outside wall that Lynda noticed just a few days ago. He’s pretty sure that has active mold, but we won’t get the report until tomorrow. If we do have to make repairs, it will mean removing built-in bookcases. I’m not looking forward to that.

Then, in the master bathroom, one interior wall is finished at an angle, creating a dead air space between it and the two exterior walls that come to a right angle. We’ve had water come in there, apparently, and in the basement beneath the dead air space we can see the floor boards up above, and they are rotten. The mold guy tested that area as well. Whether there’s mold there or not, for sure we’ll have to do some remediation work. I’m not looking forward to that either.

Also, I’ve decided to replace the old gutters and downspouts. They either weren’t attached properly years ago, or the roofers did something back in 2020 to slightly detach them from the house. I am looking forward to that, though not to the money it will cost me.

Consequently, I’m not sure how much writing I’ll get to do while I’m overseeing these projects, as well as getting ready for Thanksgiving at home. But who knows? Maybe I’ll find a way to adjust my writing schedule and still get things written.