Day of Reprieve

Today is sunny and warm. A day where I actually broke out into show tunes "Oh what a beautiful morning! Oh what a beautiful day!..." when I walked out the door taking Andrew to school. He of course was mortified. I kept wishing everyone a happy sunny day. Andrew, again, was embarrassed. Isn't this why we have kids? :) Anyway, it's also a day of open windows and open doors (ALL doors - see photo) in an attempt to dry out everything before the next set of storms hit later this tonight or tomorrow. Yesterday, Susan & I had the worst case of cabin fever. We packed up the kids in all their foul weather gear and headed into town. She & I wanted (read needed) professionally made coffee, and we ALL needed the exercise. The most common site along the route around town was hoses and various sump pump paraphanelia. We feel very fortunate to be as dry as we are. Susan keeps saying that she has the only dry basement in all of Exeter. I told her to hush because she's going to jinx herself. Our dehumidifier is working well, and hopefully the open cellar doors will help also. I can't figure out where the water is coming from. I've attempted to follow a trail from the floor to various places on the wall. I even did a full walk around the house this afternoon looking for standing water and possible places of entry. Couldn't find it. Thankfully, it's a manageable amount of water. Hopefully it'll stay that way. Well, I'm back outside while it's still sunny!

Exeter Big Dig & Flood of 2006

Ok, so some people might know of the "Big Dig" completing in Boston. Well, we had our own
version of this on Garfield Street last week. Now known as the Exeter Big Dig, or EBD for short. Andrew had a blast "helping" the guys. The reason for EBD was that I got to replace my sewerline from the house to the street. Nothing like having to spend large sums of money before procuring proper employment. Also, who ever thinks they'll need to do such a major repair within the first 6 weeks of living in their new home? When/IF we ever move again, I'm going to insist on the camera shoved down the pipe in the inspection. The brightside of this all is that it reared its ugly head BEFORE the deck was built. That will hopefully be done this summer. You can see these photos at www.nancyrehfeld.shutterfly.com.

Big Dig turns into Big Pond.

Many people have had to evacuate their homes since they live near the river or on low ground. I feel very fortunate to be on high ground a mile from the river. Due to EBD, my basement is a bit damp, but isn't that why the make shop vacs and dehumidifiers, right? Oh, that reminds me, I need to go check on that. It might be full already. A neighbor went for a walk this morning into town to take a look at everything. She made an AOL photo album. I'll see if that can be added to the shutterfly account also. Susan & I took a walk this evening in a rare moment of light sprinkle, however towards the end of the walk, the rain was coming down again pretty hard. The thing that hit me the most was the sound of the water. What power it has. We need to harness that power as a renewable energy source. Save Mother Earth speech will be later. The poor houses along the river. The "Loaf and Ladle" had a sign on its window "Gone Fishing." They are the yellow house nearest the bridge. Some of the windows were open. We don't know if that is because of a quick evacuation - although temps have been hovering around the 47 degree mark - or the power of the water pushed them open. The water is to the top of the underpass of the bridge. It was replaced after the flood of 1996, and residents are worried about its strength now. It is currently the only way into and out of town in any direction. Glad I went to the market on Saturday. News this evening was school is closed again tomorrow, and we are not to drink town water. Andrew is scared, and I'm a bit unnerved, yet I need to be strong for him. He has been wonderful through all this. He has put himself in charge of ALL the flashlights in case there is another power outage. We have had 2 or 3 already today, and I'm sure there are more to come. I am thankful that we still have our home, and we are able to eat and drink safely.

Still job hunting. Thanks for hanging in there with us.

til next post....

Nancy & Andrew