HILLBILLY HACKS

     I live in a house that was a former horse stable, turned into a church meeting house and much later a deer hunting camp. My property only had three owners- the Methodist Church, the Accerra family and me- over a period of 150 years. Old postcards from 1913 show the posts and beams of the open walls where carriages parked for church services. When the church sold the property in the 1950's the Acerras built a screened porch and cut the place up into little bedrooms. When I bought the place in 1995 I gutted, insulated and made the place livable......sort of.

    I was at the top of my game as a restoration carpenter in 1995, but looking back there's plenty I did wrong. In a hurry, as winter approached, I jacked up the house, dug footing drains by hand and put in a laid "dry" stone foundation. Mistake #1- I should have used mortar. Mistake #2-  I left the old fir flooring (with no sub floor) and was unable to properly insulated under the house. The ceiling was insulated with 3" "fluff" and 1/2" foam core. I should have paid for rigid to be blown in. Everything was done ad hoc, in a hurry and on a very tight budget.

     26 years later here I sit, wrapped in sweaters, long johns and overalls as a blizzard blows out of the Northeast. My feet can be so cold it feels like I'm sitting in a tree during deer season, not on my couch. Yesterday I awoke to a smoldering wood stove. I threw on another log as I made coffee with gloves on. Then I noticed the smoke pouring from the stove pipe where it exits through the roof. It was 10 degrees outside. For the next three hours I battled the clogged stove. The fire was too hot to clear the pipe and the house was filled with smoke. Eyes burning, coughing up my lungs, I shoveled out the hot coals and dumped them in the snow, hoping none fell on the bone dry floor. The battle was on.

    By the time I had climbed the roof, opened all the doors, unclogged the stove pipe that was stuffed  solid with ash, it was after noon. Now the danger was frozen pipes....and finger tips. It wasn't my first rodeo.  As the storm approached I kept at it. This morning the pipe is clear and the stove is cranking. 10 inches of snow has already fallen. The house is warming up with the snow insulation. I have two yoga mats under my feet and an electric heater warming my tootsies. Per Shewho's suggestion I purchased two dog collar cones. These are the kind you put around your pet's neck to keep it from licking a wound. I put one around each shin. Now the heat is trapped by the cone allowing my feet a warm plastic vessel to reside in. It's a little tough to walk around the house and the plastic high water bell bottoms freak Cheeky out, Nonetheless it's working. Cheeky looks at me as if to ask, don't they make those cones small enough for a cat's feet? I don't think so. Duct tape and yoga mat booties are next. You gotta do what ya gotta do. It's a long winter.