No, not the election.
My family and I are all just fine, and all of our material posessions are fine, if somewhat the worse for wear. About 1PM today, Red called me frantically, and all I could get out of what she said, past the baby screaming and her sobbing, was that the house was on fire.
We are very, very fortunate. The fire started due to a short between the 220v outlet for the dryer and the dryer vent. I think, and the fire marshal agreed with me, that the dryer vent had not had a good seal behind it, and had blown lint up into the wall daily for several years, and that was what actually provided the fuel side of the fire triangle. From there, it went up.
The fire guys got there and got the walls pulled apart in time to prevent the fire from actually penetrating the attic. The stud cap at the top of the wall slowed the spread of things just long enough that they were able to get there in time. It's quite a mess, though - the microwave integrated into the wall was pulled out a tad too fast, and came down on top of the convection oven - both appliances are now casualties of Election Day 2008.
As far as smoke and water damage go - very little of both, except to the kitchen ceiling and back wall behind the stove/oven. Unfortunately, the house isn't habitable, in spite of the fact that the roof is intact, as the wall that contained the fire also housed most of the house's electrical junctions, the air conditioning conduits from the forced air, and the hot water pipes from the water heater. The property manager assures me that they'll get the insurance adjusters out there tomorrow with some luck, and he'll try to pressure them into moving quickly on repairs. It looks to me as though at most 4-5 days of repairs are ahead of us, if all goes well.
I'll post updates as I can - we're at my parents' place at the moment, and their network is working. Remind me later to tell all of you about how the move went last Friday. :-s
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2 comments:
ugh. No fun. It was years ago and the damage was much more severe but I've never been quite so depressed as the night I watched our house burn down.
We were in the country and the fire department got there as quick as they could, but it still took 20 minutes.
One thing I learned was that physical possessions don't mean diddly. I don't regret losing a single thing since my family was not injured.
I do take better care of photographs now than I did 30 years ago.
I'm glad the damage was minimal and especially glad no one got hurt!
Now I'm off to get my husband to check our dryer vent.
Glad you and Red and the rest of the family are all right.
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