Tag Archive | ice dam

Dam Break

Mar9

I’m grateful that it’s been warm enough for the past few days to substantially melt the ice dam that melted the mudroom wall, and that Wilson had time to come break it up and knock it off with a shovel. He tried to move the chair, which I accidentally left open in the fall, so it wouldn’t get smashed by falling ice… but it had frozen to the ground, and we afraid it would break if we tried too hard.

We should have tried harder to move the chair! But he works in a furniture repair shop, and told me to keep all the pieces and he’ll put it back together again–I hope it’s not as badly smashed as Humpty Dumpty. At least we’ve got the roof clear before the next ten-day snowstorm due to start tomorrow, and I can climb up and brush off snow from this dangerous corner before it undergoes a melt-freeze-melt-freeze-melt cycle again.

The Right Tools for the Job: Ice Dam Edition

Mar3
A beautiful scene in the sunroom
An ugly scene in the mudroom… I noticed this leak yesterday. No wonder it smelled damp in the house. The original damage was done in a rainstorm during home construction in 1995, but I never patched the mud, just as a reminder of impermanence. I don’t look up enough, I guess! I didn’t notice the problem til there was water on the floor…
I’m grateful for the right tools for the job–or at least adequate. I should have taken a picture before I started working on it: there was a thick ice overhang of about six inches along the whole roof.
After some precarious balancing on the ladder and whacking with the maul and scraping with the shovel, I liberated the ice dam where I think the leak was coming through, right at the angle where the left gutter starts. We’ll know more later! And that was all I could manage. I’m grateful I still have the physical wherewithal to tackle a project like this.
After a hot shower (always grateful for that!) it was time for a snack and some computer work. I am grateful for retrospect: Once upon a time these jalapeño cheese puffs tasted hot to me. They tasted so bland today that I had to double check the bag to make sure. I’ve made progress on my ‘getting-into-the-hotness’ project over the years since I started trying to understand peppers.
While I wasn’t thrilled to see more snow falling this afternoon, it sure was pretty.