It's the deshit.

The deshitting (decluttering) continues apace.
I have just about an entire plastic tote's worth of tea. Seriously. It's a bit out of control. I had no idea how much I had. And I tossed anything not sealed or that I knew was freakishly old, and anything with caffeine. I had an entire cupboard full of tea in my tiny kitchen! Ridonkulous.
Part of it is the amount of knitting swaps I do. I get a lot of tea in them and it's always good and then I get a new swap and have a new favorite.... I kept 5-6 varieties out in a red gingham tin I unearthed and the rest is into storage for now! Also in that tote was a big ass cast iron dutch oven and lid, though. So it's not wall to wall tea. And some metal mixing bowls, and some recipe books.

And from the garage The Man has removed a reel mower (we had two, do not even ask), that was snatched up. Our kitchen table? Spent 2 days outdoors. It was super cute handpainted by me when I was really in a whimsicle fuckery (props to regretsy) phase, but the table was free from a friend's basement and was really too large for the breakfast bay, so it gots to go. It went today. Our electric snow blower (oh,the Wisconsin snow laughed at that one!) that the starter sort of caught fire when I was using it? Someone started to look at it, but when hubs walked by they ran away. So we put a sign on it saying it was broken and free. Gone.
Garbage pickup is Wednesday for us, and the city will take a LOT of crap, so we just put stuff on the curb and if it's gets taken, sweet. If not, the garbage guys will deal with it.

I just went out and helped figure out some keeping/tossing stuff and guess what I realized. Ok, so remember how when this "500 year rain" happened, I wasn't even home? So I never actually SAW my neighborhood in the worst of it? I saw many neighborhoods near mine that were terrifying, but not mine. Well, MY GARAGE FLOODED. That is so fanfuckingtastico. It looks like 2 inches of water at the front of the garage judging by the water line on the things I had stored there. I know, it's been a month, but I avoid my messy garage, it's the manly domain and he likes it to be ferociously slovenly. He walks in, takes whatever tool, power equipment, mulch, dirt and drops it 2 feet in front of the door. A huge pile of shit builds up and then he complains that he can't find anything. So he was sorting through the junk and came to get me to rule on a few items. He held up this little table I had out there to say "keep or toss" and I just looked at the legs thinking "where did that come from? it was in the house up until a few months ago? What did I spill on it to go exactly two inches up every leg of this table? And cover it with grass and yuck?" and he kept asking me where to put this stupid table while my mind was just trying to absorb all of that at once and process how bad it must have been and then I just stood there looking around and seeing that everything has a 2 inch water line on it. A second table, a bookshelf, a carpet steamer, my plastic bin of calcium chloride for the roof, the wheels on the garden cart.....the whole damn thing flooded.

It is completely amazing that we did not end up with more than 4-5 feet of water in our basement now, we could have been flooded all the way up to the first floor and then some. Because it took us so long to get home and the gates were opened so dumping into the lake could begin, the street was empty when we got here. I knew it had been up over the curb, but ...wow. I'm pretty glad I didn't know until now....I think.

But there appears to be no real damage, it was all crap stuck in a nasty garage so it must not have meant too much to me. Aside from possibly the starter on our electric mower which went out about 2 weeks ago...... The transformer was probably sitting in water and gave the mower a jolt while it charged and after a few charge, use cycles..kaput on a 1 year old mower. Black and Decker already replaced the starter for us with a better one, so now I feel guilty. But only slightly.

But mainly, OH MY GOD HOLY BALLS OF SHIT, MY GARAGE FLOODED. It's a shitty, tiny gross bare studs detached building. and it's elevated maybe 4 inches on a concrete pad. You have to step carefully over the threshold or take a header into sharp, oily, dangerous yard implement hell. And it's set back from the street further from my house, ON A HILL and my driveway? Is like 5 car lengths long. Not big cars, but we very comfortably parked three there for 2 years when we had three cars and had plenty of room left. The water was THAT FAR UP PAST MY WHOLE DAMN HOUSE!
It kind of gives me the vapors. I have to get the hell out of here before I end up in a curled up in a corner pulling my eyelashes out.

Yeah, I'm still here

1. FEMA basically told us all to suck it. They count basements only if they are sleeping spaces, mine is obviously barely suitable as a "most expensive appliances storing space" since it is a "turd collection and festering space". So, yeah. That's nice.

2. I guess I'm moving. I don't now when, or where or anything, but we can't do this anymore. We can't afford to do this anymore. I have no idea how the hell I am going to sell this house, but I'mma try to do it. We are painting and sprucing like a pair of mofos right now. Kitchen is going from applemint to sky blue (called bubble) and pretty blue bedroom is half painted "steamed milk" with "extra white" trim. Yeah, it's exciting. I may very well have to sell it to a house flipper. I don't feel great about that, but I also don't know what to do. The Man? Is all for selling it to the first bastard who will agree to buy it for any price. So we will finish the painting projects, but we will get some feedback from an investor or a realtor before we embark on fixing the plaster ceiling in the living room. From the roof leak that seems fucking impossible to ever fix EVER.

3. I am basically freaking out about all of it. All the time.
it's not helping that he decides to paint the kitchen while it's still dirty, does not pack anything up and just carries it all to a clean room and farking leaves it, all piled up precariously, and then walks away. Like this:
This does not make me happy, not even a little tiny bit. It makes me bitchy. A whole LOT.

You can haz updates!

1. Servpro was just here to pick up their 4 huge ass fans and 3 huge ass dehumidifiers. If you want to feel better about your carbon footprint, rent a few of those puppies in the summer and see what a real big foot looks like. So glad we do the budget pay so I won't feel it all in this month's bill.
The total damage was...gulp.....$2600.73.
Oh that sucks. But you know my saying, it beats a lake of shit in the basement!

2. Hot water, coming soon! Maybe it's my Pisces mojo, maybe it's just me but I love water. Looking at Lake Michigan calms me, swimming thrills me, if it didn't make me have to pee ever 5 minutes I would probably have a tabletop fountain. My morning shower is very important to me. If I feel bleah, tired, cold, cramptastic, achey, even sad, I take a nice hot shower. I have felt all of those things since July 22 and I canot just go hop in the shower! Some people drink (or knit obsessively...ok, I do that too) I shower! Wait, not like 23 time a day, but I really miss that easy once a day shower. And even though I can wash with hot water, you can't just stand under it and let it relax your back muscles when you have to be bending over to scoop it up with a rubbermaid food storage container, you know? I cannot wait for hot water again!

3. Washer and Dryer: yah, we're going to get them again. We did laundry over the weekend and it was $25!! That's 1200 a year, which is $400 more than a new set, not even counting damaged clothing from washed tubs with snags in them from people washing work overalls and stuff. Also, we have found ONE laudromat that isn't scary. And it's actually pretty nice, it's behind the CVS on 76th by Park Bank. but it's always jam packed!! And it's still $25 a week to do the wash there!!

4. my cursed afghan continues. not cursing, but growing. This is the afghan I had the ucontrollable urge to make when the flooding hit. it was not raining or even looking like rain when I left mah house! it's way bigger now, but Erma already seems to approve. I'm not too sure about it the more I see of it, but The Man loves it and it does seem to be nice and warm. and will hopefully soften up with a vigorous washing and tumble dry. I realized i was doing half-double crochets for the center, so switched to double crochets which helps it not feel quite so much like an X-ray blanket now. Good times.