Welcome back for another episode of my "bad luck" series, my 3rd such post based upon the premise of bad luck coming in 3's. I initially posted about Boys will be Boys, outlining our trip to A&E and more recently about my broken boiler, under the guise of Bricklaying for Beginners.

As I seem to do a lot recently, I'll ramble on a bit before getting to the leaking roof part of my post and found this interesting when I did a quick search to see whether the "bad luck coming in 3's" is a British thing or more global... I stumbled across this which feels rather topical at the moment:

The origins of the belief in bad luck coming in threes are difficult to trace definitively. One theory suggests that the superstition emerged during the Crimean War, where soldiers were warned against lighting three cigarettes from the same match to avoid being spotted by the enemy. Another theory connects the belief to Russian funeral rituals, where three altar candles were lit by the same taper. However, these explanations are speculative and lack concrete evidence. Source

Interesting.

So, has my bad luck come in 3 since this is my 3rd post? Certainly not. But the 3 broken sinks, plumber drilling through our underfloor heating and this week's leaking radiator probably don't warrant posts in their own right. So let's include those 5 with the original busted boiler and hospital visit to take us up to 7 so the leaking roof can take us to 8 - I'm hoping the luck stops at 3x3 rather than 3³. Maybe this one can count as 2 seeing as the first (and most expensive attempt) at fixing it didn't work. Or maybe the leaking shower counts 🤷‍♂️

I can't believe that it's been a month since the leak started. It coincided with the storms that came our way and the strong winds and heavy rain... despite the storms though, I didn't expect to wake up to find water stains in the-5yo-gorilla's bedroom. I think we'd reached bad luck item 6 or 7 by this point and I couldn't help but cry a little 😢

I don't mind things going wrong when there's the slightest chance of me fixing it... a tripped fuse, slight leak or broken toy doesn't scare me... but water coming in from an unknown location worries me. I say unknown... it was obviously the roof but was it the ridge tiles (I thought it was) or the flat part of the roof failing or something else?

So I went up to have a look... remember this?

Gulp!

I put my brave face on though and the mortar in the ridge tiles was completely screwed. I could pick them up without any trouble which I shouldn't be able to do.

Although... the felt underneath should be doing its job and stopping the water from coming into the house so there was probably another problem too. But I'm no roofer so I needed a pro.

Before getting the pro though, I secured the roof with tarpaulin... like a pro.

I then admired the wonderful view and the beauty of my solar panels...

Time for the pros... I called the roofer who did a new flat roof at the back of the house... he also suspected the ridge tiles but was fully booked until his knee operation would take him our of action for 6 months. Not ideal. But he recommended the firm that he used to work for so I gave them a call.

A 2 week wait for them to come and look at it, and even after that, a wait until next year to come and fix it. With strong winds, heavy rain and multiple incoming storms, this wasn't going to work but I accepted the appointment.

So, not ideal. The strong winds blew my professionally installed tarpaulin around and the leak continued - the-5yo-gorilla room condemned until a fix could be implemented.

And then a spot of luck... the-5yo-gorilla's parent/teacher thing and a dad sits in front of me wearing a hoodie advertising "*** Roofing". A tap on the shoulder "Hi, how busy are you?" and the reply "Yeah, fairly. What d'you need?"

A week later, he's got 4 guys on my roof, replacing the felt and installing a dry ridge 🥳

The rain came and I smiled as it battered the house... we were safe again. I love the rain... apart from the bastard water getting in again. The slimy little shit.

So the next morning, I went up to have a look. Fuck you storm, I'm going up anyway... and whilst up there, I saw a potential entry point and took a few photos. A couple of days and bit of lead flashing later, we were finally water tight and whilst I'd like to enjoy the rain again... I don't quite trust it just yet.

All images are my own

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