Home Repairs

Nuria and I had some excitement in bed last night. No, not that kind of excitement. Get your mind out of the gutter!

Nuria and I were lying in the bed, in complete darkness except for the flickering light from the electric firelogs, when suddenly a noise like the firing of a gun startled us. 

For a few seconds, neither of us moved. Then I got up and walked around the bed to the window. One of the half dozen small panes in the window had a hole about 5 to 6 inches in diameter. It looked (and had sounded like) someone fired a gun through the window.

I knew what had happened. My brick house was built 77 years ago, and during its lifetime the house has settled—just a little, and a little bit unevenly. This has caused enormous stress to build up on the casement windows. The frames are made of steel and will deform a little bit under sufficient stress. However, glass is very inflexible, so when the stress became too great, it shattered. 

There were pieces of broken glass below the broken pane, both inside and outside the window. Nuria and I rushed to cut out a piece of cardboard, wrap it in plastic, and tape it over the broken part of the window. (You can see it in the photo. That pane is one of eight in the window.) The cardboard stopped the gush of cold air pouring into the house. We went back to bed, but I couldn't sleep and finally got out of bed and went to my computer. I looked up the website for Window World and placed a request for an estimate. It's time to get all the downstairs windows replaced.

I followed up my midnight request with an 8AM call to Window World and made an appointment for 3PM today. I have a dental appointment scheduled for this morning so I requested an afternoon appointment with the window guy.

Nuria is at work, but she will get off at 1PM today. She seems to love her job, although being on her feet all day is tiring. She'll be here this afternoon to,  no doubt, ask a few questions of the window salesman. It's going to be a sunny week, with a chance for showers Friday. Replacement windows are usually made to order, so I doubt they can replace the windows this week. 

So far these last few months, I've replaced the big garage door and a patio door on the house. Why not replace all the first floor windows? I have a feeling that I will have to replace all the Venetian blinds, too. I can hardly wait to see what's going to break next.