A Little Excitement

We have not had the chance to put together the rest of the party photos because we had to take care of the mini-disaster we had the night of the party.

You see, at around 10 p.m., while guests were imbibing at our bar, water started dripping from the ceiling. Rodney and I immediately ran upstairs and found that the 5-stage reverse osmosis system installed under the kitchen sink has cracked and water has been steadily flowing to the kitchen floor. The floor has been flooded for about half an hour (or maybe even less). While people were enjoying the Seaworld Fireworks from our balcony, some came over and helped by throwing towels and blankets on the floor. I turned off the water valve to the kitchen while Matt immediately turned off the shut-off valve to the main house.

For a few minutes, people stared at the ceiling, pondered at the extent of the water damage and wondered how much it would cost to fix it. We grabbed several thick blankets from the garage (the kind one uses for moving furnitures), covered the bar and tried to shoo people out of the room. There really wasn't anything else we could do. Friends debated whether we should get the insurance company involved in it. It is well known that once you have a "water damage" report in your insurance record, it will be difficult to get insurance in the future.

But...the party must go on so Matt started serving whisky and wine and we all sat outside while we listened to different opinions and suggestions. Eventually, Matt turned the shut-off valve back on to the main house (after all, people needed to use the bathroom!) after repeated assurance from me (and everybody else) that it is safe.

So... the Monday following, this is how our downstairs rec room and my kitchen floor looked like: You can see the bar covered in plastic. There were two huge fans inside that were left to run for two days to dry out the ceiling. The insurance people sent this wonderful guy Micah to test for moisture on the floor and ceiling and dry it out to prevent molds. Two days later, they removed the plastic cover and started scraping the popcorn ceiling and ripped off the part that will be replaced -- mainly the ones above the bar and the pool table. In the kitchen, they place the same industrial size fans/blower (really, really noisy) to dry out the floor. Micah eventually decided to replace the wood floor.

   

   

   

It has been a noisy, busy couple of days. Nikita didn't seem to mind the noise and slept under the kitchen table while the fans were humming overnight. A week and a half later, this is how it looked like: