The Devil Queen

Home Improvement Onceler

2009-06-08T22:24:00.000-07:00

Over the last couple of months, people have been asking me, "what'll happen to the blog if you sell the Devil Queen?"

This question always makes me think of a scene in Pulp Fiction where Vincent asks Jules what he'll do once he quits.

Jules: I'll just walk the earth.
Vincent: What'cha mean walk the earth?
Jules: You know, walk the earth, meet people... get into adventures. Like Caine from "Kung Fu."

I love the idea of this. However, the truth is probably something closer to the Lorax.

Over the last couple of years, I've apparently become a go-to person for information on house moving and cautionary tales of woe. If nothing else, drop a coin in the bucket and see what kind of story gets whispered down the tube to you.

Really though, the posts may not be as frequent, but there is still plenty of material to work with relating to the Devil Queen in particular (a prequel of sorts) and old homes in general.

Housemovers of the World, United in Woe

2009-06-01T21:41:00.000-07:00

A couple of weeks ago, I happened to meet a couple of old home enthusiast. One of them owned four or five old homes, one of which he'd moved. The house in question was his grandparents' old home. His thoughts on home moving?

"Unless it was a really, really special house, I wouldn't do it again. It's just a major pain."
He actually moved this house quite a bit further than we had moved the Devil Queen. As such, they had to fully dismantle the house, move it, and then reassemble the whole thing. That has to be a special kind of hell.

A Visitor

2009-06-01T06:16:00.000-07:00

Yesterday afternoon, I was in the living room when I heard something rustling under the windows. I looked out an saw the tail of something passing by below. I went to Gideon's room and looked out the front window and saw this.

As far as wildlife goes, I'm general a live and let live kind of guy, but coyotes wandering through our yard during the middle of the afternoon gives me pause. Coyotes usually don't attack people, but when they do, they generally attack children. Since I have a five year old and I know there are packs of coyotes in the area, this worries me. Not that I didn't already have reason enough but this gives me yet another to have the yard bush hogged. Soon.

It's A Train Wreck, It's Piling Up One By One (Part 1)

2009-05-22T21:19:00.000-07:00

This post is in response to a question I received in a recent post's comment section. Here is the question:

"Anonymous said... I've read your posts from beginning to end during the last week...it's kind of like watching a train wreck...You can't look away! But I've never seen an answer to this burning question: Did you always plan to sell the DQ? It seems the answer is YES. But then my question is, why are your color choices so personal?? I don't mean to be rude, but how many gigantic yellow houses do you see in Ark. with purple kitchens and orange bathrooms?? Just wondering..."

So, did we always plan to sell the Devil Queen? It wasn't our primary goal, but we always figured sooner or later we'd sell it and move.

Our decision to use "personal" color choices was influenced by our last home improvement catastrophe. Our first house was bought with the idea that we'd fix it up and sell it almost immediately. As such, we tried to make it as vanilla as possible. Lots of white walls, neutral colored carpets and flooring, and bland color and style choices in general.

As our luck usually runs, bad things happened. We finished the house and put up for sale. We sold it. Almost. The buyer died the week of the closing. So, we continued living there until we bought the Devil Queen and moved into her a couple years later. We rented the house and put it up for sale again. We sold it. Almost. Our buyer married a crack whore and moved to Conway to live closer to a rehab facility shortly there after.

But, I digress. What I'm trying to get at and failing to is that we ended up living in this first house a lot longer than we planned. With my luck, I'll end up retiring in the godforsaken turd of a house. White walls are okay for nine months to a year, but after that, it starts to grate on you. Frankly, we hated the vanilla.

So, when we started working on the Devil Queen, we decided that even though we might sell her one day that we'd do her up the way we wanted to since we could be living there for a quite a long time. Besides, a new paint job is pretty easy compared to installing new plumbing, reframing walls, etc. See the rest of this blog for details. Granted, we grossly underestimated most people's willingness to work on their own home, including a seemingly simple task like painting an interior wall. We also failed to realize until much later that quite a few people seem to suffer from a fatal lack of imagination. Confronted with a purple or red wall, they are total incapable of imagining it as being anything else.

I'll be the first to admit that not all of our experiments in interior painting have gone well, the Pee Wee's Playhouse Laundry Room is case and point. However, most people who actually come and see the house in person love the color schemes. The master bathroom & bedroom, the living room, and the kitchen are favorites. Most people are overwhelmed by the orange and blue bathroom, but I still like it anyhow.

As for the yellow exterior, I'm really not sure how much of a consideration that is. Granted, it's not really finished and the first two painters we hired ass-raped it. I would argue the Joseph's Coat of a roof and the Amazonian jungle that is our yard probably deter more people than the yellow. I would also argue that while yellow might not be a traditional or period appropriate color for a Victorian, it is not entirely unheard of even in Arkansas. An image search of Google Images yielded these two houses.

I've seen more both here in Arkansas and elsewhere in the US. We also reasoned that most people who would be in the market for an old Victorian house would probably be okay with a certain amount of flamboyance.

Anyhow, I somehow still have more to say about this, but that will have to wait until after the long weekend.

Do It For A Dollar?

2009-04-28T20:45:00.000-07:00

Well, here it is for all interested parties. In my personal opinion if you just want an old house find one you don't have to move. If it's the family's homestead or a one of a kind gem, maybe. I wouldn't recommend it though. Click to enlarge the story, it's mostly legible then.

Would You Do It Again For A Dollar?

2009-04-22T07:25:00.000-07:00

By the way, the Devil Queen ought to be appearing in the press soon (provided my interview was used). Old-House Journal is running a story about $1.00 houses and whether they are a good idea or not. I think it will be in the May/June issue. We'll see.

So, what do you think I told them?

Feeding the Whirlwind - Wicked Fugling Freak Bestiary and More

2009-04-21T18:19:00.000-07:00

Hello all. As you may have guessed from the flurry of posts here, there is a lot going on now. As is often the case, much of what we're doing requires money. After years of feeding the Devil Queen pretty much everything we have, our money tree is looking pretty sad. So, since I'm all I have, here it is: if you would like to buy my art, make me an offer.

First of all, I am still selling Home Improvement Monkey Tees shirts ($20.00 each). Tell me what size you'd like and it's yours. If you want a shirt in something besides gray or white, let me know. Blue? Green? Magenta? If I can find it, it's yours. Next week I should be rolling out the 3.0 Home Improvement Monkeys. Evil never looked better.

Second, I'm selling some of what I call "Devil Queen Art." Over the years, any number of illustrations have appeared here. If you want them, you've got them. If you want an ode of doom and destruction emblazoned upon the reverse in blood, you'll have to pay extra. Most of these are in pen & ink and watercolor. Some are more modest. If you need more details, please let me know.

$50.00

SOLD

$50.00

$35.00

$15.00

Third, if you would like to commission a house portrait, I have room in my schedule for some. There would be about six week turn around for oil on canvas measuring between 18" x 24" to 24" x 30." If you are interested, please let me know.

Email me here if you are interested in any thing here. Thanks!

Finances In Pictures

2009-04-21T17:36:00.000-07:00

Here is the short version (in pictures) of why we're dumping the Devil Queen after this torrid romance of ours.

First, our finances before the Devil Queen:

While not exactly a lush jungle of vegetation, there are signs of life in the landscape. In the year leading up to the Devil Queen, I'd started a new, better-paying job, we'd refinanced our starter house, and were on our way to paying off all our debits. We'd invested in some land and started a retirement fund. Things were looking good.

And, here is how our finances are now:

No obvious signs of life. Just despair and the rats who gnaw upon it.

Here is a figure to consider. Admittedly, this is an approximation, but over the years we've spent an average of $3,750 a month on this house. And, we weren't working on it for the entire time we've had it. We burned through over $30,000 just getting it moved and set up on the mountain. I can't remember the exact time scale, but there was a $20,000 week in there somewhere.

Anyhow, a more detailed explanation of our decision soon will follow if you have the stomach for it.

Really though, what the fuck were we thinking?

Pilgrimage

2009-04-15T09:35:00.000-07:00

This summer my Dad’s family may be making a pilgrimage back to our ancestral homeland, Chicago. If this comes to pass, I will be in Chicago sometime in late July or early August. If any of you Housebloggers would be interested in having dinner or a drink, let me know. After years of watching you from afar, I’d love to meet you all.

A Long Time Coming . . .

2009-04-14T21:43:00.000-07:00

Easter came and went without too much fanfare. Cold rain, power outages, all the teenage cousins being herded through an inter-dimensional portal to China by a five year old, and coffee with a parole officer. Really, it was a pretty tame affair.

Anyhow, I finally got around to taking a picture of the new front door. While a full twenty some percent of you think that I will be burning in hell, it really doesn't look as bad as I imagined it. The fact that it opens and closes with ease is a bit seductive too.

And, for the astute few of you out there who are wondering what in the hell is hanging from the doorknob, that would be our real estate agent's lock box.

That is right. If you want an old Victorian possessed and brimming with a full century of evil, this house is for you. Also, we're already done all the hard work. Finish the paint job, refinish a few floors, and mow the lawn and that is it. Enjoy old evil with all the modern amenities.

For those you who are wonder how or why we could put the Devil Queen up for sale, that is another story which I'll tell soon. However, until that time, here is a little bit for you to think about: $4.00 a gallon gasoline.

Nothing Says Home Sweet Home Like . . .

2009-03-24T18:20:00.000-07:00

Nothing says "Home Sweet Home," like your Entergy Arkansas Nuclear One Emergency Manual.
The only perk to moving the Devil Queen 16 miles out of Russellville is that we're outside of emergency zones above. Zone J is closest to us. According to the instructions, we should proceed to Morrilton incase of an accident. That would put us about 30 miles directly down wind from the reactor. Does anyone besides me remember Chernobyl? Do you think huddling 30 miles down wind was really all that safe?

Scarlet use to work with a girl who was a military brat with her family in Germany during Chernobyl. She said they were ordered to stay indoors for weeks because of the radioactive fallout. And they were hundreds of miles away from Chernobyl. And, she still developed thyroid cancer when she was in her early 20's.

My favorite line in this manual is, "radiation is naturally occurring . . . " They omit the fact that it is naturally occurring in small amounts unless you live in a uranium mine. I'd say that there is a pretty big difference between naturally occurring background radiation and nuclear reactor undergoing an emergency "situation."

Hoodoo

2009-03-24T16:38:00.000-07:00

Speaking of crime, a friend of mine inherited some property from an aunt in rural Conway County, Arkansas. Their aunt's old single wide is still on the old homestead. It's certainly nothing fancy. And, the trailer is next door to her cousin who has a well deserved reputation as a crazy bad-ass. This has not stopped people from kicking in the front door twice and stealing some of the appliances.

My friend's solution? They found some magic voodoo signs in a book and drew them on the trailer with red spray paint. They also wrote, "I do Hoodoo, steal from me and eat live things," beside the glyphs. No one has touched the trailer since.

Miniature Disasters - Part II

2009-03-20T06:17:00.000-07:00

It was a long night. Two very nice gentlemen from the Pope County Sheriff's Office came out to the Devil Queen. They toured the house, took photos and dusted for prints. Unfortunately, except for the foot print on the front door, there were no prints of any sort. According to the deputies, wood (in general and painted in particular) and door knobs don't hold finger prints very well. After they'd finished their work and left, I jury rigged the door and cleaned up enough to have some place to sleep. It was 2 AM at that point. The bedroom was still a mess, so I passed out on the couch.

Fortunately, I had Tuesday off since it was Veterans' Day. I spent most of the day cleaning up the wreckage.

While cleaning, I found the following items were missing from the Devil Queen:

1) A compound miter saw
2) An electric drill
3) A Skilsaw
3) Two guns (one a very expensive Dan Wesson revolver)
4) A DVD player
5) My digital camera
6) One pair of sterling silver, Edwardian cufflinks
7) A 14 carat gold tie tack with small rubies and emeralds.
8) Around 200 CDs.

Totaled with the damage to the door and the cost to replace it, we were left with a $4,000 insurance claim. Our insurance company, Traveler Insurance, was very pleasant. I'd never filed any sort of insurance claim in my life, so I wasn't sure what to expect. Like most, I'd heard horror stories. Fortunately, I have none to share. The only thing that sucked about the whole insurance experience was the $1,000 deductible. So, even though we got a new door and decent chunk of money, a lot of what was taken has not been replaced. The man-jewelry was all antique and one-of-a-kind so replacing it isn't really possible.

I spent Wednesday faxing and emailing descriptions of all of our stuff to every pawn shop and antique store I could find in our area. Nothing that was taken has shown up to date.

I heard from my in-laws a month or two ago two guys, one 18 and the other 21 or 22, were arrested for burglary in Pope County. If they were in fact the ones who broke into the Devil Queen, they certainly haven't volunteered any information. I can't help but wonder though.

In any case, the whole experienced sucked. Shocking, I know. Scarlet and I both find it ironic that we've been robbed twice at the Devil Queen. In our years together, we've lived in Washington, D.C., Rockville, Maryland, and a slummy area of Savannah, Georgia. I spent most of my life in Little Rock while it was over run with gangs. We've lived other places too. Everyone was so worried when we moved to the big city, but we never had much of a problem anywhere. We move back Scarlet's ancestrial home, and we get robbed twice in two years. It makes you wonder about all that horse shit about how small communities are safer and more family friendly places.

Miniature Disasters - Part I

2009-03-19T22:31:00.000-07:00

November 10th last year, I came home late. I'd eaten dinner with my sister and brother-in-law and didn't make it home until just after 10 PM. As I walked to the front of the house, I noticed the ladder that I'd left leaning against the porch posts had fallen over. I thought that it was a little odd, but I figured the wind and storms we'd been having must have blown it over. Then, as I rounded the corner, I saw that the front door was standing wide open. For a moment I thought that the wind had blown the door open too, but the splintered wood and broken doorknob proved me wrong. The door had obviously been kicked-in.

At this point, most people ask me what I did, and when I tell them that I went into the house, some of them are mortified. "What if they'd still been there?" To be honest, I didn't consider it much at the time because I was pretty sure that no one was still there.

We live in the middle of nowhere, so any thief with hopes of taking more than they could easily carry and walk with for a few miles would have to bring a car, truck, or four-wheeler at least. The house was dead silent too. The Devil Queen reverbs with sound like an acoustic guitar. Any significant noise is amplified and projected. When I'm out in the garden, I can easily hear Gideon's footsteps as he runs from one end of the house to the other.

It took a while to figure out what happened, or what we think happened. Our guess is that some time during the day, probably between 10 AM to 3 PM, two young men between the ages of 18-22 drove out to the Devil Queen. They probably live in the area (Atkins, Crow Mountain, or even Russellville) and have friends or know people in our neighborhood. They probably drive by on a semi-regular basis. They know everyone's schedules and knew that not only would we be at work, but that most of our neighbors would be too. The front door is hard to see from the road, so they were sheltered from view once they made it to the porch.

The industrious little bastards that they were, they apparently tried to disassemble the lock with a screw driver and some WD-40 that I'd left on the porch with all the junk for installing the storm windows. I'm not sure what they hoped to accomplish with the WD-40. Aside from making the front door slick, it looks like it just made a mess and pissed them off. They broke the doorknob off, and at this point, they just kicked in the door.

Things get strange at this point. Who ever had the WD-40 was either:

a.) Very nervous and forgot they were spraying WD-40 in all the excitement of breaking and entering,
b.) Was hoping to obscure their fingerprints with the WD-40,
c.) Was a vandalizing jerk in addition to being a thief, or
d.) Some combination of all of the above.

Personally, I believe that it was a combination of b.& c. as did the Pope County Sheriff's Deputies.

In any case, the dick with the WD-40 ran from the front door to the chest of drawers in the foyer, from the chest of drawers to the armoire in the hall, and from the armoire to the master bedroom. They went to the dresser, the two night stands, and the small armoire in the corner. All piece of furniture above and the floor in between were coated in WD-40. This included the mirror on the dresser. Not only did they probably spray off the entire can, but they apparently took it with them since we never found it.

Aside from the front door which was ruined, the master bedroom was the worst. A pillow case had been stripped from the bed and used to haul off the loot. The mattress was slide off to one side, our clothes were all over and with WD-40 on them, the contents of my armoire were thrown all over the room, and everything was a mess in general.

Another odd bit about this robbery was Gideon's room. Someone went into his room and threw the closet door open. The closet only had some old clothes and shoes, so they didn't take anything. Then they ran over to Gideon's night stand which is really a small cabinet. It's about 2 1/2 feet tall and has two hinged doors on the front. They are held closed by a simple, light-weight hooked latch. The doors were thrown open without out opening the latch, and the hook portion was torn out of the wood. What they found inside were four of Gideon's favorite Matchbox cars and a story book which he'd placed there himself Sunday. Apparently, they had a moment of conscious and turned around and left. They didn't have the heart to rob a four year old, which as Scarlet said, "almost made it hard to totally hate them." They didn't take his 13 inch TV, his DVD player, or video game. They left the movies and games too.

The rest of the house was hit or miss. They stole power tools from the junk room at the front of the house. They took the DVD player from the built-in in the living room, but left the record player, the speakers, and the receiver. The dining room was untouched as was the kitchen. The pantry at the very back of the house was torn to pieces, but nothing was taken. The were obviously in a hurry.

Anyhow, it made for a long night. I'll try to finish up Part II and post it tomorrow.

Side Projects

2009-03-13T20:23:00.000-07:00

Here is one on the projects that have been keeping me so busy this year. I am now offering limited edition prints of this painting, 100 prints total. The print image is 16" x 22." The prints are individually signed and number by me and are being sold for $75 a each. If you are interested, please email me here. I hope to have more details on these prints posted next week

Making the Grade

2009-03-11T21:21:00.000-07:00

It has been brought to my attention that the Devil Queen has made another Top Ten list. We are officially the poster child for what can and will go wrong in home improvement. Definately fitting, no?

2009-03-06T19:51:00.000-08:00

Hello All.

I have a few minutes, so I thought I'd try to catch up some here at the Devil Queen.

First, I'd like to thank everyone who voted on the front door, even my mother who voted for "burn in hell." And, special thanks to Boy141 and the Home Improvement Ninja for trying to hook me up with some affordable door options.

Second, I would like to thank Janine for the outstanding links, particularly for bringing F*** My Life (Fmylife.com) to my attention. It is lovely reading which kept me occupied for hours.

Third, I think I'll try to start catching up on the last few months next week. It'll probably make the most sense if I start at the beginning, so I'll start with a more detailed telling of the night of November 10, 2008, and everything that came after that.

Until then, enjoy the weekend. I plan to do so.

I Am Not Dead

2009-02-16T20:20:00.000-08:00

Hello all.

I just checked the comments section and thought that I'd let you know that I am not dead. Nothing horrible has happened to me. I have not been attacked by wild dogs. I have not been turned into a zombie. I did not drive my car down a remote ravine and have survive off a diet of urine and beetles until I was discovered hypothermic and insane a week later.

The front door has been taken care of since the last post. Otherwise, nothing has been done on the Devil Queen. I've been busy with a number of non-house projects and obligations, and to be honest, I really haven't been feeling any home improvement mojo.

I will give you all a more detailed post soon and respond to the slew of comments I've received on the last post. Cheers.

Will I Burn in Hell?

2008-12-30T06:37:00.000-08:00

Ladies and gentlemen, I need some hand holding. What do you think about a door like this for the Devil Queen? Since her original, 118 year old door was done in by some morally degenerate thief, I need a replacement. And, I need it soon because what is left of the original door is falling apart. So, waiting for months or years for the perfect, period piece is not an option.

Odd Finding

2008-12-09T22:34:00.000-08:00

A couple of weeks ago, Kenny was out to give a quote for fixing the door. While we were talking, he asked, "So have you ever found any Indian stuff here?"

"Nope. Not a thing."

"Years ago, before all these houses were here, a friend of mine came up here to do some hunting. He said there was stuff all over the place up here."

"Really?"

"Yeah, this creek," Kenny said pointing to the creek behind our house, "is year-round. They were up here all the time. If you go down the creek a ways and past the waterfall, he said there were caves. He said the floors of them are covered in arrow heads, hatched, and spear tips."

"Wow."

"I asked him if caught anything when he got back, and he said, 'no.' I asked him if was gonna come up here again and he said, 'hell no, there Indian stuff all over, I ain't goin' near it,'" Kenny said.
We talked a bit more, but I never got a straight answer about it. The conclusion I came away with is that the Indian stuff is cursed or bad mojo, and no one with any sense would mess with it. A lot of the people in Pope County, particularly the long time residents (4+ generations) are at least a little Indian (Cherokee for the most part), which could have a lot to do with it. Something to think about, a cursed house on cursed land.

The 2008 Dumbass Award

2008-12-05T18:44:00.000-08:00

Things have been a bit miserable around here lately: break-ins, a demon plague of blowflies, and a serious case of the flu. In an attempt to shrug off the oppression and misery, I thought that I'd post this year's Dumbass Award. For those of you not familiar with this fine, time-honored tradition, click here.

To be honest, I'm not sure if it's the dumbest thing anyone has done for the award. I'd argue that my mother-in-law nearly cutting her little toe off with the pressure washer was a probably a dumber thing to do, but it wasn't as wild of a story. If I've learned anything from the Dumbass Award, it's that bribery works and that the telling of the story is almost more important than the story itself

Anyhow, the 2008 Dumbass Award goes to Aunt Candy and her daughter Alicia for spending two days on the side of the road looking for an eye.

Of course there is a back story.

Candy's older daughter, Misty, was working at the Pancake House in Conway, Arkansas. As is typical for Misty's luck, the Pancake House was being robbed, and an irate young man was holding a gun to her head as he bagged all the cash he could find. The owner of the Pancake House, a friend of the family (distant enough that I don't know his name) heard that his restaurant was being robbed on the police scanner (some people listen to these for fun apparently).

Distraught, he jumped in his car a drove off to the Pancake House. This resulted in a traffic accident which was serious enough to eject his glass eye through the car windshield.

A little later, Candy and Alicia were at his bedside in the ICU. He was unconscious. Neither was aware that he had a glass eye or that it was missing. All they knew was that there was a huge, caved-in hollow in the middle of his face. Alicia stood looking over Candy's shoulder at their friend.

"Mamma. Mamma."

"What is it?" Candy said.

"Look," Alicia said.

"At what?"

"His eye. Mamma, where's his eye?

About this time, their friend woke up. He was very distraught to discover that his glass eye was missing, and they vowed that they'd find it for him.

They spent hours over the next two days wandering up and down the shoulder of the highway near the scene of the accident, looking for his eye. People, mistaking Candy and Alicia for stranded motorists, would stop and ask if they needed help.

"Yes, we need help. We're looking for an eye." Some drove off, but a surprising number of motorists stopped and helped them look for the eye, including an entire crew of electricians from a local power utility at one point.

Lamentably, no eye was ever found.

The only bit of drama came when Alicia found a small, rubber ball. "Momma! Look! The eye! I found it!" Then she threw it at Candy. Candy did the typical movie slow-motion scene: the sprint, the dive, and the accompanying "Nooooooooooo!!!!"

At the end of the story's telling on Thanksgiving, Candy said, "Really, though. Only this family has crazy stories about stuff like this! Does anyone outside us have stories about glass eyes?!"

Debbie, a cousin of my mother-in-law's and a parole officer, said, "Sure, it happens all the time. My friend X----- was at the Western Sizzlin, and this guy choked. Well, she has her certification, so she did the Heimlich on him. Saved him, but she sure popped that glass eye right out of his head."

What is even better, is that after telling the story to my Dad and sister over lunch, my Dad asks my sister, "So, do you have any glass eye stories?" I think he meant this rhetorically. My sister says, "Actually, one of Matt's aunts has a glass eye. She had cancer."

My Dad looked momentarily shocked, I just laughed.

Would You Do This for $100?

2008-12-05T11:45:00.000-08:00

So, what if someone offered you $100 to spend the night in your house because they thought your house was really cool and totally haunted? Would you let them? What if it was for their Honeymoon?

Curse of the Blowfly

2008-11-25T11:20:00.000-08:00

I hate flies. Most don't bite and they don't sting, but I still hate them. They are the personification of filth and putrescence, Beelzebub's vile minions. Blowflies are particularly odious since their favorite foods are shit and decomposing bodies. Rotting meat and foodstuff will suffice though.

About four weeks ago, the Devil Queen started filling up with blowflies. In the few years that Devil Queen has defiled our life, she has experienced a number of infestations and invaders: wasps, king snakes, bats, scorpions, mice, more wasps, moths and even more wasps. Sure, an occasional fly has made it in from time to time, but we've never been overrun with them. What makes it even stranger is that the Devil Queen is sealed up better than she ever has been since we've had her.

It started with a couple of blowflies in the laundry room which I promptly killed. The next day there were a few more which I also killed. This pattern continued for a couple of days. After another orgy of fly crushing, I remember thinking, "wow, this has got to be a bad omen."

The day after that, I came home from work to find all the clocks flashing since the power had briefly gone out. For Russellville, Arkansas, this is not an odd occurrence. I've lived all over the US and traveled around the world, but Russellville (Pope County in general) is the only place I've been where the electrical service was intermittent. No thunderstorms, acts of God, or accidents are required. The power will randomly go off for a few seconds and surge back on with no preamble. This happens at least once every couple of weeks, and it has done so for years. Entergy Arkansas, thank you for the rate hikes and the poor service; you have made my dream of living in a third world county a reality.

One of the great things about these outages, is the power surge that follows when the current returns. Light bulbs, appliances, and other electronics have fallen victim over the years.

I think you probably see where I'm going with this. Later that night, I went to wash some clothes for work, and the washer wouldn't power up. You could hit the power button all you wanted, but nothing happened. That is what everyone wants out of a $650, two-year old machine, right? Yes, the warrantee has expired. We checked.

I also checked the breaker box and the outlet. It was definitely the machine.

After that, the blowflies kept coming and things got worse. The bay window room was randomly swarmed by wasps after a few freakishly warm days. Then the house was broken into and we were robbed.

The flies got even worse after this, but I suspect this was because our front door was standing wide open for at least a few hours. Really, I was probably lucky that pack of coyotes or a mound of hibernating rattle snakes hadn't moved in by the time I got home. Even so, I was getting very tired of killing 10, 15, or 20 blowflies every day. What is even weirder is that they didn't go for any of the stuff you'd think they would. I never saw one anywhere near the cat's liter box or the kitchen trash can. They seem to like the windows in the laundry room, the living room, and the bedrooms.

And now, just over two weeks later, I'm still finding the occasional blowfly, one here, one there.

I'm hoping the curse may be lifting though. Sunday, just for the hell of it, I went and hit the power button on the washing machine. It turned on. I was too suspicious to try it out though. I have visions of it shutting down mid-load with a drum full of water and the door lock, which I suspect is 100% electric, jammed shut. Forever.

I asked Jack, our electronics guru, about it. He said that a lot of new appliances have thermal switches which automatically turn the machine off when they get too hot. His theory is the power surge tripped the switch and it hadn't reset by the time I came home. So far, that sounds good to me. I certainly don't have any answers.

Maybe if the blowflies are all gone by the weekend I'll try running a load.

Or maybe not. I'm not feeling lucky.

Insurance Claim Complete

2008-11-24T06:22:00.000-08:00

I think that I have finished all of my insurance claim paperwork. Never filed on before in my life, anyone have any idea how long it usually takes for it to be settled? I'd love to have a new front door.

Claims Adjustor Porn

2008-11-18T06:44:00.000-08:00

Here are some of the photos I'm sending to the claims adjustor today. Special thanks to my in-laws for loaning me the camera.

Will I burn in hell for replacing our kicked-in front door with something like this? This door is new, solid wood from National Home Center.
	Yes, there is a special place for people like you.
	Yes.
	Maybe.
	No, but it still sucks.
	No.

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Would you let them spend the night there alone?
	No.
	Maybe.
	Yes, but I'd want more money.
	Yes, but not for their Honeymoon.
	Yes, no questions asked.

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