Synopsis: This is a cautionary tale. A seriously disturbed couple find the charming, old ruin of a Queen Anne Victorian in Russellville, Arkansas, and buy it for $1.00. They tore the roof off, cut it in half, and had it moved to some land they owned sixteen miles away because they didn't know any better. Since then, they have hired and fired contractors, had all of their tools stolen, re-wired, re-plumbed, insulated, and essentially rebuilt the entire house. Their only problem is that after four years it still isn't finished. Now they are tired, broke, and wonder what in the hell it is they've done to themselves. And, it's haunted.
(Last updated on April 3, 2008)
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Back When I was a Kid . . .
Complain about the cold and you'll get one-upped in no time. I got this email from my mom regarding this post.
"
Read your blog entry on turning on the heat. You might find it interesting to know that we had no heat at night when we lived in the apartment building in Chicago. They had a coal fired furnace (steam heat with radiators). The heat went off at 10 and didn't come back on until 6 or 7. The janitor wasn't going to get up and shovel coal at night. Also, there weren't any storm windows. It got mighty chilly!"
I also seem to remember my mom or one of her siblings complaining about waking up in the morning and having snow on the inside of the window sill. Nice.
Labels: woe
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Complain about the cold and you'll get one-upped in no time. I got this email from my mom regarding this post.
5 Comments:
Not to one-up you, but to commiserate and share my own family history....When my dad was a small child, his family lived in a little frame house in Aullville, Missouri. My dad remembered sleeping in the same bed with his great-grandfather in order to stay warm, and waking up in the morning to see frost on Grandpa Ben's beard. Ben was a Civil War veteran who passed away in 1929, so my dad must've been no older than 2 when this happened. Your post reminded me of that story. Thanks, and I won't be complaining about how chilly my house is again. :)
Oh dear, weather stories bring out the "when I was a boy..." stories, don't they? And here's mine.
Before I bought this place nine years ago, my previous residence for 22 years was a large, converted paper bag factory in an industrial building. Heat was 7am-4pm, Mo-Fr. No night or weekend heat unless the outside temp was below 17 degrees, which was arbitrarily determined to be the temp when the sprinkler pipes would freeze.
Holidays were even more fun: no heat from Dec 24-Jan 2. Add a dozen, old, rattly 9' foot windows and, yeah, it got a bit outdoorsy. But, you know, you get used to it. And you have a story you can bore your grandkids with.
My father (born 1920) grew up in a house in Bloomfield, NJ. There were 8 children in a 4 bedroom 1 bath house. The three boys slept in the uninsulated attic, freezing in the winter and broiling in the summer. At least in the summer they could sleep on the porch.
I was only born in 1984, and I can remember growing up "part-time" in a 100+ year old house that had no insulation, no storm windows, a small window a/c unit (for the downstairs), and a floor grate that wasn't very effective against our cold winters. We would have at least one pipe burst every year--guess that's the one good thing about our screwed up well system, when it reached a certain amount of flow, the breaker would trip and shut the pump down. We always cursed it because you couldn't run bathwater and flush the toilet at the same time or you'd be making that trek down to the well house to turn the water back on for the whole property. Gotta love old houses and all their charm though, eh?
OY! I have lots of stories along this line. All I'll say for now is that we are lucky today aren't we?
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