Our House Just Tried To Kill Me

Despite having lavished tens of thousands of dollars upgrading it's deck, our house just tried to kill me. This was some what surprising, a bit like an aging, friendly neighbourhood Labrador suddenly deciding to bite the postman: Once it happens, you are never quite again sure if it was a one-off incident or the beginning of some deep psychological change heralding a descent into matching Cerberus as the pup you'd least like to house-train.

Taking one of our dogs outside this morning, I did notice that the new Trex deck, covered as it was with a light coating of dew, did seem pretty slippery, a fact I subsequently decided to - almost - completely ignore, an oversight for which I paid a bit of a price.

We are due for a rain storm tonight so I wanted to have a quick check around the gulleys and gutters up on the roof just to make sure I could sleep soundly. Apart from finding that a squirrel somewhere had concluded that one of the roof gulleys was the perfect place to stash acorns, all was well. To do this inspection, though, I have to set a ladder against the side of the house and clamber up one story in order to get up there. Climbing it, I did pause to think, "hmm, slippery, ladder, donuts, deck, tea, something-something, leaves, dog-food etc." This stream-of-consciousness lack of insight was a bit Homer Simpson-ish, I agree, and so I suppose I deserved what happened next.

As I was coming back down the ladder, right after I had my full (well, as full as I get, which isn't saying much) weight on it .... the feet started to slide away from the house. Oh ...... crap .....

The ladder slid rapidly down the side of the house until it lay horizontally on the deck; I slid much more quickly through thin air, landing straight on top of it, mostly horizontal. Nope, it didn't happen in slow motion, and yes, it probably was very funny, so long as you were watching from somewhere else and not participating.

Just in the interests of trying a scientific test, I started to see if I could get up. Fortunately, most things - limbs, brain, internal stuff - seemed to still work. My right foot though seemed to bee an immediate issue because it was hurting already, but this was soon overshadowed by my left kidney shouting at me to please stop whatever it was I was doing because it was leading to there being no fun at all going on in here under my rib cage thank you very much. So I did, and lay still for a bit.

Help arrived in two forms: a) Susan and b) dog; a) was useful, b) was not.

After a wee while staying still, contemplating the error of my ways and generally fretting about whether or not I'd damaged the deck, I was able to get up and hobble around, just to see if anything more worrisome came to the surface.

So here we are, a few hours later, and I think the damage is relatively minor. Some chips knocked off and a few scrapes. The house and deck will be fine, in fact. Me? Well, my right foot got a bit twisted and a couple of toes were bent back, but my kidney/rib area is pretty knocked about. If I breathe too deeply it hurts like hell, so this is something I now avoid at all costs. Sitting in comfy chairs is anything but, and lifting anything more than a cup of tea is a non-starter. Still, I seem to be passing the pee test: nothing red is coming out, so being a doctor and all, that is of course everything I need to prove that I'm fine.

Course, if I never post again then at least you will all know why ....

Perhaps houses do have feelings? Maybe having the deck replaced was like us having dental work without any anaesthetic?

Either way, we now have a problem. One more unprovoked attack and we'll have to have the old girl put down. Sad, but it's in the public interest.