Pour yourselves whatever you fancy, today is an open bar! I'm having a bottle of champagne while we contemplate our future - not your future and mine, just mine! We had a visit from our insurance assessor's today and it's looks very much like the house will be pulled down and rebuilt (rebuilt when, we have no idea).
So. Here's to all of you who, you have all made my life just that much brighter by being in it. Thanks. Sincerely.
Here's a photo I took on the way to work yesterday morning - such a foggy day, with it's cheeky -2 degrees to ice up our car windows!
Can you spot that hunk of beef? (Simon, not sure if you still visit but take that grin off your wee face - that's NOT what I meant!! :-)
I do love a good fog, something about the silence and the damp...so to add to your Tuesday treat, what do you think of this spot of Kiwi music?
14 comments:
Now, on to designing your dream (earthquake-proof) house. Are you supplied with interim accommodation?
WV = undead
Having your house pulled down sounds awful... do hope you have some kind of consolation to look forward to in having an input in the redesign of the new one. How does a pub-annex sound?
I love a foggy dew too. Can't imagine how we'd feel if our beloved home was pulled down; even if was to be rebuilt. Bit like a much loved friend having a major breakdown.
Congrats on the 502ndth posting. I’m about 503 years behind you at the mo, and the gaps still widening.
When you eventually get around to appointing your architect for the re-build – consider tasking him or her to: comment on/paste up a plan and some realistic costs - to include an internal steel skeleton structure to be incorporated within the internal walling/ceiling surface areas – independent of the outer walls and roof support structure. This too would include self contained floor, door frame & ceiling joists in either timber or steel.
Even if you only looked to having this in the bedrooms and living room it shouldn’t add significant cost to the build budget at all (steel is cheap & quick to install) and it would thus provide you with a lot of additional protection from falling ceilings, overhead structural collapses and similar dangers in a violent quake situation. Bit like building a bunch of relatively simple, steel framed, interlinked, caged table style frames, that you never actually see because they are hidden within the inner walls, partitions and ceiling surfaces. But you have the peace of mind of knowing they are there to help protect you and your family when everything else is shaking itself to bits around you in a worst case scenario.
Your architect will be up to speed or at least familiar with earthquake resistant structure engineering, independent ‘rocking frames’ and so on, but they don’t always communicate all the options available to you at domestic property level. None of my business I know – I’ve just seen one too many missed opportunities to make vast design and function improvements without necessarily incurring significant extra cost, in re-build projects such as yours here over the years. Milk it for all its worth this time around – that’s all. You can go now.
Nic foggy moo cow pic too, by the way.
I think tee-pees may be the best option (as in structures native Americans lived in, not as in what you do after drinking too much tea !). They don't have too much that can come crashing down on you.
I'd almost forgotten that it's now winter down your way... you may be wanting some hot tea in fact...
Onward through the fog !
Jeez, where will it end? one day we'll be laughing about this in the old folks home. We will, we will. Love the pic!
Beautiful pic, sad story. Never ending, aye?
Open bar??? Are you and I the only ones drinking here Saj?? I might as well take a bottle of champers to keep you company. At least the freezing foggy weather provided a beautiful picture with which to amaze your blog friends in the opposite season of the world.
Holy crap: the whole shebang having to come down. Well, look at it as a new beginning, I guess. Meanwhile, back at the teepee, any burgers to go with the champagne? That frozen beef has whet my appetite.
WV: packbin
I think you'll be needing some of these to store your belongs in while your house is being rebuilt.
(bloody wv's--they're watching us, Saj!)
Oh, Saj! You're in for a long haul. I hope you're able to plan it so that you can store items in one section and then transfer them into the new rooms (instead of having to pack everything up and live somewhere else for a while). You'll need tons of drop cloths so the construction residue doesn't make you crazy. And ear plugs. And a good bathrobe for those 6am arrivals. A good approach might be to concentrate on envisioning--now given the opportunity--how you would like everything to be, down to colors, wainscoting... We did some major renovations to our house, so I'm speaking from that experience. I still think staying home for the duration was best for us. You may not have the choice, though. If you get a one-time stipend for this, that's your chance to get some cool stuff like a hot tub and a deck!
That photo was amazing! Forgot you were in winter and thought the field was a flooding river! With the "beef" barely invisible in the fog.
Champagne works because it's straight from the bottle to the glass: Ahhh... delicious, elegant, festive!
Are they predicting that the fault lines, earthquake radar are calmed down now? I do hope so, Saj.
Love and best wishes, Margaret
I remember running to work through Latimer Square on days like that!!
Hi everyone, and thanks very much for the thoughts and advice...we are currently waiting for the house to be 'made safe' by being 'propped up' - it's taking forever and we worry about more big aftershocks before it gets done. We're boxing on taking each day as it comes, and yes we're hoping to have a lot of input into the 'new' house when we get it. We get temporary accomodation only for a certain period of time so at the moment we're staying put as we will need to move out when the house is either demolished or repaird. xx
Pulled down and rebuilt. Wow! A chance to design a dream home. Where will you stay meanwhile?
Hi Jenny, at the moment we have been put into a motel. We hope it's short term while the place is made safe for us to live in until the rebuild can start.
Saggitarian, I am so sorry to hear the news about your house. How awful for you. Certainly puts my home maintenance issues into perspective. You've had such a battering in the last year, I do hope the worst is behind you now.
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