Friday, September 23, 2011

The task that never ends has ended... but you'd never know it!

So after a few weeks of logging, tabulating, and sorting, and spreadsheet-making, the inventory was completed. It was then submitted to the insurance adjuster, who promptly managed to sit on his hands and not do anything with it in the last several weeks. (Thus, I have had little to report.)

After meeting with him earlier this week, he finally admitted that he hasn't really been proactive about dealing with the 23 page single-spaced inventory. He did approve the expense for the new furniture that had to be ordered, (and not a moment too soon because the furniture has been selected for a couple of weeks now, and we've been waiting on approval to order it, because I don't know if you've priced out quality furniture lately, but that stuff ain't cheap! And apparently it takes 8 weeks for construction and delivery... So the earlier that order was submitted, the better!)

The adjuster also cut the checks to our contractor, so progress on the house has proceeded nicely. He did mention that the Christmas deadline might have been a little long, and that at this point it is looking like a Thanksgiving housewarming at the latest. The roofing, re-framing, electrical work, and insulating is all done. The siding and new trim on the upper portion of the house is mostly complete, and the sheet rock has all been delivered. That really only leaves hanging the sheet rock, painting, hanging new light fixtures, refinishing the floors, and moving all of the furniture and nonsense back in... And unpacking everything. I have been slowly assembling a workable wardrobe with what little money the adjuster has elected to throw my way so far and I am uncharacteristically optimistic about how things will go from here on out. I wholeheartedly admit that while the insurance adjuster has dragged his feet so far, he has been good in every other regard and even told the furniture store to just let him know if there is anything else we might need. He has had a pretty good sense of humor and been pretty willing to be reasonable on most any request that comes to mind. (Taking care of the hotel expense directly, handling questions from and paying for the crews that did the emergency work of collecting all of the clothes and other soft goods for cleaning the day after the fire happened, etc.)

I have busied myself with shopping, (a task I used to enjoy, but now find to be a bit of a chore,) office work, and clearing out the crap that was left behind in the basement... (Probably left behind because pretty much anyone can see that it really was crap.) Hauling damp boxes and moldy fabrics up out of the basement and out to the trash has been a nasty pain in the ass, but it was something that needed to be done even before the fire, so now that a lot of the nonsense was cleared out for treatment of smoke and water damage, it has been just a little easier to work with the extra space on hand.

That's really all that has been going on... Sorry it isn't more interesting or amusing, but that's my life at the moment.