Why Won't Snoop Dogg Return My Calls?

Two weeks ago we had some pretty heavy rainstorms here in St. Louis. Normally, this isn't a huge deal - we get big thunderstorms once every month or so here, and it's never really been a problem (except for fans at Busch Stadium). But, lo and behold, our house had a bit of a leak during these most recent storms.

A little background may be in order. When we bought the house, we had it inspected, like all good home buyers should. The inspector pointed out two problems with the house - the first was that the otherwise flat roof had a bit of a dip in it. This was a problem, he said, because it indicated that something structural had gone wrong. He also pointed out that the flashing - the tar around the joints between the chimneys and the roof - looked like it had been done by a retarded monkey with a hatred of all things purple.

Just run with me, people - you're on the shapu train now, and there aren't any stops.

So, knowing these two things, Kirsten and I still bought the house. We knew there could be problems, but we figured we'd have time to work around them.

Until two weeks ago, that is.

I'm coming to bed on like a Tuesday night, and I hear Kirsten say, "What's that?"

I looked up, and there's a bubble on the ceiling. Bubbles mean one thing - water. And water inside your house means you have a problem with your roof. So I quick like a bunny got a bucket to put under the bubble and I punctured it, to allow the water to drip out from there and not get any farther in the roofing and cause problems.

It took a couple of tries, but we finally got a roofer to come by and repair the flashing around the bedroom chimney, as well as the chimney in the dining room, the chimney in the kitchen, and the sewer gas stack that runs past the library - four chimneys in all, plus a roofing tile that had been installed by that same hateful and impaired monkey.

As soon as the roofers were done, I breathed a sigh of relief, and said, "There's no more drizzle in the hizzle for shizzle."