I had to wait two weeks for the insulation company to schedule my job, but finally today was the big day. I was nervous – all the other house repairs hinge on this one.<\/p>\n
I kind of knew something would go wrong.<\/p>\n
A young guy from the\u00a0crew checked in with me a couple times, first to let me know they were running late, and then to say they were 30 minutes from my house.<\/p>\n
Thirty minutes passed, then 40, then 50.<\/p>\n
He\u00a0called again. “Ma’am, well, we can’t make it up that big hill. The truck just – stopped. We’re looking for another route.”<\/p>\n
They were driving a big-box truck, and it was loaded with all the materials for all the insulation jobs today. Very heavy. Uphill.<\/p>\n
My house is at 2000 feet elevation. There’s no alternate route that doesn’t go uphill – either steeply, or on sharp curves.<\/p>\n
The truck broke down completely trying to find another way.<\/p>\n
By mid-afternoon the company had cancelled the job.<\/p>\n
I was irritated, to say the least. \u00a0The salesman had driven to my house, so he knew the terrain. The company has done jobs here before; I’d seen their trucks and that’s why I called them for the estimate.<\/p>\n
Now I’m back in the swamp. I have to start the whole process again of finding a company, getting estimates – and delaying the painter and carpeting and repairs.<\/p>\n
It was a bad day for me. The insulation being cancelled\u00a0was just the biggest in a long string of house and work problems that made me feel\u00a0like I was\u00a0wrestling an alligator.<\/p>\n
The house is a mess. Downstairs is unusable. Working\u00a0from the couch<\/a> is getting old fast. I really am not able to keep up with my project responsibilities; it is hard to concentrate with all these distractions and workers to manage. The time suck and money drain is\u00a0driving me crazy.<\/p>\n When things are crappy, Tom and I will sing a song to each other from the old TV show Hee-Haw because it makes us laugh – especially the moaning at the end of each line.<\/p>\n Gloom, despair, and agony on me [oooooooh],<\/em><\/p>\n Deep dark depression, excessive misery [whoooaaaa],<\/em><\/p>\n If it weren’t for bad luck I’d have no luck at all [ooooowwww], <\/em><\/p>\n Gloom, despair and agony on me.<\/em><\/p>\n I thought of that young kid driving the truck. Of the salesman who made the estimate. Of the company losing money trying to get my insulation up to me. I felt bad for all of them.<\/p>\n And then, researching other insulation companies, I learned something.<\/p>\n They were going to blow in fiberglass insulation. But with basement walls that back up to the cement foundation, there’s a risk of mold when you do blown in fiberglass, since there’s no vapor barrier.<\/p>\n I might have just been saved from having to tear the walls apart later on.<\/p>\n If it weren’t for bad luck, I’d have no luck at all.<\/p>\n Today’s penny is a 2014. That’s the year I originally got the estimate for this insulation job.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I had to wait two weeks for the insulation company to schedule my job, but finally today was the big day. I was nervous – all the other house repairs hinge on this one. I kind of knew something would go wrong. A young guy from the\u00a0crew checked in with me a couple times, first … read more Uphill and alligators<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":6788,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[316],"tags":[36,865,866,164,864,95,786,1385],"class_list":["post-7533","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-improvisation","tag-36","tag-gloom","tag-hee-haw","tag-house","tag-insulation","tag-luck","tag-repairs","tag-serendipity"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lisaschnellinger.com\/pennies\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7533","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lisaschnellinger.com\/pennies\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lisaschnellinger.com\/pennies\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lisaschnellinger.com\/pennies\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lisaschnellinger.com\/pennies\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7533"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.lisaschnellinger.com\/pennies\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7533\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7536,"href":"https:\/\/www.lisaschnellinger.com\/pennies\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7533\/revisions\/7536"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lisaschnellinger.com\/pennies\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/6788"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lisaschnellinger.com\/pennies\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7533"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lisaschnellinger.com\/pennies\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7533"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lisaschnellinger.com\/pennies\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7533"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}