Go to hail...

Miki and I moved into our house about 21 years ago.  Most of you have seen that we have attempted to make it our own, by making over each room, one at a time to some degree. About 12 years ago we decided that our roof needed new shingles and we would tackle it ourselves too.  One hot summer day, we started prying up the old and preparing the roof for a facelift.  We got what we thought were decent shingles that would last, so we would only need to re-roof one more time for our lifetime or as long as we would be in this house.  About a week after we began pulling up the shingles, we nailed the last one in place.  Well, the shingles we picked out that I thought would last 25 or so years, and they may have, but they began streaking, curling, and had other signs of aging.   Of course at that time, I said that would be the last time I do that.  I'll do almost anything once, well... maybe not even almost, but a lot of things, and this was one that I felt I could pay good money to have someone else ruin their knees instead.


Last fall, during our newly retired state of travel frenzy, we were out of town when our neighborhood got a visit from a hail storm.  Unbeknownst to us, when we came home to roost, our neighbors were all getting new roofs.  We inquired, so as not to be left out, and discovered their roofs had gone to hail.  Long story shorter, we were approved for a new roof last December, but the waiting list was long, due to winter and others who had gone to hail before us.  


On Tuesday morning, it was our turn for our roof to get its dermabrasion treatment and I must say it looks years younger.  It started without warning though,  as a car door slammed at 5:30 am Tuesday morning in front of our house.  Maybe I should say Monday night, because in my book, it ain't morning yet.  I jumped out of bed, as I do when unusual sounds awake me, due to being a light sleeper.  Imagine my surprise when I saw a young Hispanic man standing with his head in the trunk of his car, digging around for something in front of our house.  I have been know to have a stereotypical thought now and then, so I threw on some clothes and went to investigate.  We have a psuedomulticultural diverse neighborhood...sort of, so I wasn't at a 9-1-1 call level yet.  By the time I was down stairs, a truck bearing the roofing company's name was backing into the driveway.  My threat level diminished and returned to exhaustion and the crew got crackin' on the roof.


What took Miki and I about a week to do, these guys knocked out in one day, not even a long day.  The results were very favorable to us.  Below are some before "Wallie was really awake" pictures and some "now I can think relatively clearly and am fully dressed" pictures.

We got a new roof and I didn't have to abuse my knees to get it.  The insurance company was very generous and we got some kick ass quality shingles that will hopefully out last our time at this address.  And the moral to this story is (actually two), as all my stories have morals (you just have to hunt for them), ... leave town often and when you really don't want to work hard towards a goal and you don't care about the self satisfaction being the inner peace that is the real reward of the job you didn't do with your own two hands... eventually you will go to hail.  You too may find hail is not the bad place you learned about sitting in the back pew on Sunday.  Hail can be a good thing, in fact, I welcome hail into my life.  To hail with you!