My mother thinks it would be a good idea to put up a year in review. My facebook year in review looks beautiful - all sunshine and light. Happy outings. What it doesn't show is the myriad of phone calls, sleepless nights, stress, STRESS and (well I'm not going up a font size) stress.
Having a part of your property burn is challenging.
No one was hurt, this is fantastic. But losing ones possessions is hard. Losing photos and some books that I won't replace is hard. Jamie losing most of his stuff... hard.
Saturday April 2nd - night of the fire, this was documented below.
Sunday April 3rd - Ben's fifth birthday, we had a party at a park planned. This went ahead. Two of his school friends, and family. Jamie's parents came down from the country, but my parents had started their long holiday. This was a welcome spot of happiness. We were able to digest what had happened the night before. Then most came back to our house and we surveyed the MESS. At this stage everything stank. He stench was horrendous.
Monday April 4th - I took the day off to consult with the insurance and the saga of the insurance commenced. In all we had three claims. The motorbike (which was unceremoniously dragged down our driveway and hoisted onto a towtruck) I got a phone call from the vehicle insurance surveyor to ask what was the licence plate of the motorbike, as the one he was looking at was burned and you couldn't read it... well then knowing the licence plate isn't going to help you buddy.... it was char cooked. I think out of everything Jamie was the saddest about his bike. It was still quite new and still in perfect condition.
That day I got some stabilising supports for the doorway of the garage and a temporary fence put in by two building companies - to this day I have no idea who the fence came from.
The building assessor came that week. She was young, disinterested and well not very helpful. She barely answered my calls - and I didn't make many.
Our claims assessor was South African - and in South Africa. This was the most tedious part. We took about two weeks to formulate our list of what was in the garage and the approximate purchase price of it.
Our home has very little in the way of storage, so almost everything was in the garage. Photo albums - 10 scrapbooked albums of Mark's childhood. Irreplaceable. Computers, camping gear and tools - Jamie is pretty much a tool hoarder. All his aircraft tools, gardening, renovation, car maintenance tools. Then there was the Commodore, and the full extra body kit for it and full second interior for it and some extra stuff as well. None of that was covered by insurance as we didn't have the car insured as it wasn't drive-able. Mark and Jamie were starting to do it up for Mark to have for his 18th birthday :(
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