Just when you think things can’t get any worse, they can!

You read the post title correctly.  Just when you think things can’t get any worse, they can, and they have.  No, no, no.  I’m feeling weak (and cold!) and seriously can’t take much more!

Yesterday I came home to a house that felt cooler than usual.  I chalked it up to having turned the furnace down too much when I left for work.  When it didn’t come on, I thought that perhaps the vent pipe was buried in snow.  Nothing that I wanted to tackle in the dark, plus knowing I’d need to dig through at least eight feet of snow (with a depth of 4+ feet) then hop over a deck railing, well, this didn’t appeal to me at that late hour.  I stoked up the fire some, prayed the furnace would do its magic, grabbed a heating pad, and went to bed.

4:00 AM.  I woke up freezing and added more wood to the stove.  Tried my best to keep warm with the heating pad and go back to sleep until daylight.  It wasn’t happening.  At 49 degrees, the house was too darned cold.  Dreading being out in the cold, I put it off as long as I could and then started digging.

I chose the shortest route to the furnace vent which is from the slider in our bedroom.  After clearing a foot or so, I stepped off onto the deck.  A passing thought went through my mind that I didn’t recall the step down to be so steep.  After a lot of digging which also meant coming back indoors several times to warm up (well, the best I could given how cold it was inside!), I reached the deck rail.  I shoveled what I could (from where the pipe protrudes) and then brought out two ladders from our garage.  I needed one to get over the deck and then another one for the other side.  The gymnastics of it all was likely not a pretty sight. Thought it was odd that the pipe wasn’t overly obstructed but went ahead and did more clearing.  Came back inside, hit the reset on the furnace, and nothing happened.  Nope, nothing.

The first thing I needed to do was call for driveway snow removal.  With all the heavy snow we had, I wasn’t able to clear the entire driveway.  The drifts were 4+ feet deep and compacted.  Adding to my woes, all I was able to do was clear a path to walk out to the road.  The blizzard was too much for our snowblower to handle. I am still waiting to hear back from that call.

My next call was to the guy that installed our new furnace.  Given that we have a boiler system and our temperatures are going to plummet, he came within an hour.  The first thing he noticed was that the pipe in the basement leading to the outside being dislodged.  He then went outside, grabbed a shovel and cleared an area to get underneath the deck.  What he could then see was that our deck was partially collapsed, completely crushing the pipe.

What to do, what to do?  It is far too dangerous to work underneath the deck. A temporary fix will be to remove the snow, cut the decking and add a new pipe from the top.  Granted, this is a bandaid until the snow melts.  I am also running space heaters in the basement to keep the pipes from freezing.

I have also filed a claim with our homeowner’s insurance, but per our agent, we need to prevent further damage.  We have $1,000 deductible.  I’m praying they cover this.  I am also (per our agent) documenting everything and taking pictures.  Now I need to get through the rest of the day and night.  The furnace bandaid will be tomorrow, with a cost of $500.

Please, let this be the end of things getting worse.  Sigh.

What the blizzard delivered