Saturday, January 18, 2025

A New Year Catch-Up Post

Happy (belated) New Year! Since I haven’t blogged in a while, this will be a catch-up post to wind up 2024. 

First of all, we have heat. I initially wrote this post (the part below in green) when our heat was first fixed.

 We have heat, we have heat, we have heat! 

I wasn't going to go under the house to photograph the furnace, so enjoy this picture of Mortimer. 

Okay, I promise the whole post won’t just be the same three words over and over again.  It’s just so wonderful to have heat again! 

They finished installing the new furnace/HVAC system around 3:00 the Wednesday before Thanksgiving.  It didn’t make my Thanksgiving Thursday 13 because I wrote and scheduled that post ahead of time.

We’re still not finished dealing with everything.  I think I finally managed to successfully update our application with FEMA.  I received an email last week about updating our application if there was additional damage.  We’ve only been trying to do that since mid-October. 

Anyway, this time, I was transferred to a different department that I was told is the one that handles application revisions.  I started off as caller number 207 and spent about an hour and fifteen minutes on hold.  Oddly enough, that gives me some hope.  A lot of people have had to revise their applications, so waiting makes me think that maybe, this time, I talked to the right department.  We shall see.  In the meantime, we aren’t getting our hopes up too much. 

We’re still in the process of getting the HELOC loan.  It’s taking a long time because they’re backed up because so many people are doing HELOC loans to pay for Helene repairs due to not getting any or enough FEMA aid and no SBA funding.  It’s like a never-ending loop of delays and problems. 

We were lucky that the cold weather held off as long as it did, but in looking at the extended forecast, we knew we were running out of time.  So, we made the difficult decision to put a large portion of the cost on a credit card while we wait for the HELOC loan. 

Putting that much on a credit card is a sickening feeling!  And it may sound irresponsible, but it really seemed like the best option.  We’re 14 years into a 30-year mortgage, and our house has more than doubled in value since we bought it, so getting a HELOC isn’t really a gamble. 

The biggest issue so far is that the credit union won’t underwrite a HELOC loan for a house with no heat.  That’s another thing that has been very frustrating.  Ordinarily, that seems like a very reasonable rule.  However, people here aren’t getting HELOC loans for anything fun or frivolous.  We’re getting them to repair the damage from a natural disaster that was so unlikely to happen here that no one could even get insurance for it.  I’m normally very much a rule person, but this has just added one more problem for people to deal with when everyone is already at their breaking point. 

So, we paid for what we could, used the money generously donated to our GoFundMe, and put the rest on a credit card.  Now, we’re desperately hoping that the HELOC closes before interest begins to accrue.  Even if we do end up accruing interest for a month, we still think it was the best decision in the circumstances we’re dealing with.  We’ve had days of the temperature dropping to the low teens and not getting above freezing, and we’ve had our first dusting of snow.  We were concerned about the potential for pipes to freeze and create yet another set of problems to deal with.  The new furnace was installed just about 24 hours ahead of a big temperature drop. 

I know I’ve shared a lot of personal information in this post, and I’ve written, deleted, and rewritten it a few times.  Ultimately, I decided to go ahead and share details since so many people (and before September 27th, I was one of them) don’t understand how long and complicated the recovery from a natural disaster is.  I know I’m paying a lot more attention now to how representatives vote for things like funding SBA loans and disaster relief.  It wasn’t that I didn’t care before.  I just had the very mistaken idea that between insurance and FEMA aid, people were at least able to begin the recovery process fairly quickly.  From some of the comments on some of my other posts, I don’t think I was alone in thinking that.  So, even though my blog isn’t huge or popular, I think it’s important to document what average people are dealing with after Helene. 

And, I want to say thank you again and again to everyone who donated to our GoFundMe.  It means so much that people, in some cases people we’ve never met in person, helped us.  Thank you.  

Unfortunately, it has gone out so many times since then that I’ve lost track, so I took the post down.  We think we’ve finally addressed all of the urgent issues, and are hopeful that it won’t go out again for a very long time.  In addition to the entire HVAC system and all of the ductwork, we also had to replace the sump pump, replace the crawl space door (it was destroyed in the process of getting the old system out and the new one in), have some electrical work done, and work on some drainage issues.  We haven’t finished everything with the drainage project since the ground has been mostly frozen, but it’s something we will have to take care of before the house is back to its pre-Helene state.   We haven’t started on replacing the broken screen door because there have been bigger issues to deal with. 

We closed on our HELOC loan right before Christmas and were able to access the funds right before New Year.  We’re still waiting to see what happens with FEMA.  Honestly, at this point, I don’t think we’re going to get any FEMA aid. 

Since my last post before this was right before Thanksgiving, here’s how the rest of the year went.

Thanksgiving was a little different.  For the first time since 2016, we didn’t take Thanksgiving dinner to the hospice house.  I still feel a little bad about that, but I also think it was the right choice.  The HVAC company was here all day the Tuesday and Wednesday before.  The breaker box is in the kitchen, so I really didn’t have access to the kitchen until Wednesday night.  I barely got everything made in time for our Thanksgiving.  We still hosted a big crowd at our house; our neighbors and several other friends.  It felt normal and good, which was absolutely wonderful.

Christmas was also a little different.  We normally go to my sister and sister-in-law’s, but Nick and I were both sick with what we’re pretty sure was the flu.  Obviously, we stayed home rather than share that.   Our awesome neighbors dropped tacos off for us on Christmas, which was really sweet. 




We were both feeling better by New Year’s Eve.  We never go out for it, but I made a lot of little appetizers and snacks for dinner, and we burned the 2024 calendars.  We started burning calendars in 2016 anytime the year had more bad than good.  It feels good to watch the calendar from a not-so-great year go up in smoke.  Here’s a video of the calendar burning. 


At my job, our vacation time (over 240 hours) rolls over on January 1st, so there’s always a big push to make sure all of our time is entered and up-to-date by the end of the year.  We’re encouraged to print out time statements to make sure everything rolls over properly.  We also aren’t paid overtime, instead, we earn comp time.  I worked on some extra projects and worked a lot of overtime in 2024.  So much, that, for the first time ever, I didn’t use any of my accumulated vacation leave.  I did take vacation time (close to four weeks total throughout the year), but I had enough comp time to cover all of it.  And I still have some comp time hours left going into 2025.  I’m hoping not to do that this year!  I didn’t lose the accumulated vacation time.  It rolls into sick time, which we can use to retire early if we don’t end up taking it as sick time.  And, speaking of retirement, I’m officially halfway (without using any accumulated time) through my 30 years for full retirement.  I’ve only been in my current job for five years, but the ten years before are part of the same retirement system.  Realistically, I can’t imagine that I will stop working in 15 years, but it’s kind of weird to think that I could retire (at least from this job) then. 

Some other 2024 numbers are:

I read 27 books, which is a little embarrassing; my goal was 52. 



It was my second-lowest blog post year since I started in 2012.  2021 remains the year with the lowest number of posts. 

I posted more videos (74) and shorts (23) on YouTube than I ever have before. 

I didn’t crochet much in 2024.  The biggest project I finished was making little purses for the neighbor girls. 



So, how was 2024 for you? 

I hope 2025 is shaping up to be a good year for everyone!  

2 comments:

  1. I’m so glad to hear you have heat again—what a relief with those freezing temps! The decision to use a credit card for the furnace makes total sense given the circumstances, and it’s clear you’ve done everything you can to protect your home and family. Reading this while waiting for my leather cleaning in austin tx and it’s a powerful reminder of how tough disaster recovery can be. Thank you for sharing

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  2. I am so glad that your new furnace was installed and you have heat. What a blessing!

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