In case you’ve been wondering why I’m still not back to blog business as usual, five weeks after Irma’s dastardly sweep through the islands and Florida, it’s because my life is still upside down. The good news is, progress is being made. Slowly, but still. ANY progress is a good thing. That’s my story, an’ I’m stickin’ to it!

For those who are curious about what happens when a gargantuan tree falls on your garage, smashes through your roof and attic, and lands on your vehicles, here’s the latest installment. You’ll have to scroll back a few posts to see the pictures from the earlier stages, of course, but this week’s phase dealt with cleaning out every single item in the garage and attic.  It was dangerous, back-breaking work, so of course, you call in the strongest clean-up crew you can find. Ta-da!

I will say, I was surprised when I met our contractor’s clean up crew, but they were a force to be reckoned with! Unstoppable for two full days of dirty work in 90 degree heat, they jumped right in. Even when the garage door was taken apart, revealing this, they didn’t hesitate:

Mark stayed home to help direct, since determining which things were junk and which weren’t is an art form only HE has mastered. This is about the halfway point, with all wall shelves on the left already removed, and much of the attic stuff taken down.

These ladies not only carried a ton of stuff out of that mess, they cleaned every salvageable piece before packing into the big, carefully labeled boxes. (Did I mention they were awesome?)

Then, they started stacking things in the 20’x10′ pod, from the back, all the way to the front, top to bottom, until not another thing would fit!

Keep in mind that every trip into that garage was risky. Note the large box hanging down through the broken rafters. Those continued to slide down and fall through from the night of the hurricane until the last one was retrieved.  Some of the boxes contained Christmas decorations, and were relatively light. Some, like this one, contained auto parts, and were not!

Shovels and wheelbarrows were employed, as well as brooms, and brute strength.

Progress WAS made! (After two long days!)

And eventually, the garage was emptied.

What wasn’t salvageable ended up in my new front lawn ornament, a 16’x8′ construction dumpster, which, I might add, is full. It will have to be emptied before demo and repairs even begin.

Yes! Both the 20′ long pod and the 16′ long dumpster are full. Of things that were once in this garage! Do not ask me how they all got squeezed in there. I’m only responsible for the Christmas items in the attic. The rest were all Mark’s. I swear it. But I also swear that all that stuff isn’t going back! Nope. We will be adding a new shed or other storage container in the backyard, way over in the north forty, where it will never fall on anyone again. Probably.

Next step? Demolition of roof and rafters, and portions of the concrete block walls. Stuff has to come down before it can be rebuilt.

Meanwhile, rain pours straight through the torn up tarp, but there’s no longer anything in the garage it can damage. And the yellow tape now replaces the trashed garage door, since there’s nothing left to steal. And besides, what Irma did here (and so many other places) is a CRIME if I ever saw one!

Next on my mind–how I’m going to decorate the pod and the dumpster for the holidays. I’m thinking paint the pod red and put our yard reindeer in front of it, and voila. Santa’s Very Big Sleigh! But the dumpster is more problematic. Perhaps I should just string lights all over it? 😀 😀 😀

Ya gotta keep on laughing, you know. Otherwise, you might as well just give up and quit. 😉