Friday the 13th

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Generally speaking, I am not a superstitious guy.  So, when I woke up this morning and realized it was Friday the 13th, I didn't think too much about it.  In fact, the day started pretty much with out incident and it seemed like it was going to be just another day.

There was nothing unusual in my commute to the office.  There were no major catastrophes waiting for me when I got there.  Things went pretty smoothly through the morning.  Most days, I eat lunch at my desk, but they were having a party in the office for one of our coworkers who is getting ready to be married.  That's when things took a turn for the worse.

After I finished eating my sandwich, I was sitting and talking with one of my friends in the office while the guest of honor opened a few gifts.  The phone rang, and it was the wife.  She called to inform me that there was a gaping hole in the ceiling of the closet in our bedroom and thought maybe that we had a leak in our roof.

Now yesterday, two sets of hellacious thunderstorms rolled through the DC area.  One hit during the morning rush hour, and of course, the second hit during the evening rush hour.  This morning, when I got dressed for work, I didn't notice anything amiss in the closet.  So, I told the boss I had to leave, and I headed home to assess the damage.

I got home and headed upstairs with the Shop-Vac and some heavy duty trash bags.  The entire ceiling (mostly drywall) above our closet and caved in.  There was insulation everywhere, and I could see a hole about the size of a brick in the roof.

I filed a claim with our home owners insurance and should hear from an adjuster in the next few days.  I called my father in law to see if he had the number of a reputable contractor, and fortunately he did.  He came out to put an emergency patch on the roof and assess the damage.  It doesn't look good.

He said the entire roof needs to be replaced due to the type of plywood the builder used when constructing the roof.  His estimate for the new roof, $3600.  He also said that based on the plywood, it might be a situation where it might not be completely covered by insurance.  He did say that there was the possibility that the insurance company might know of some class action suits that might defray some of the cost.

This latest disaster comes just a couple weeks after my car died.  As I said previously, I have never been a particularly superstitious person, but I am starting to wonder if I was born under a bad sign or something.  It is not that I have it so much worse than everybody else, but I just don't seem to have much luck when it comes to financial matters.  Hopefully, knock on wood, we will make it through this latest incident without too much hardship.