I thought everything was fine with my dear old house. I’ve been living here for ten years, and although the house is quite old, there’s never been a single problem. But then when the first thing broke it suddenly triggered an avalanche of other things. It all started with the humble old light bulb in the hall. Just blew out one day when I came home. Next things I knew, l sudden needed window replacements, exterminators and

It was like one thing after another, and I was starting to wonder whether it was worth getting all these things repaired individually or just knocking the place down and starting over. But the costs of renovations or rebuilding would have been way too high, so I’ll just go for the slightly simpler option of repairing things as they come up.

It turns out that the roof was leaking due to rot in the rafters. When the roof services company arrived they explained that the tiles had to be de-mossed and many of them had to be replaced. Although they gave me their best price, I was looking at a pretty steep figure purely because of how bad the damage to the roof was. The problem wouldn’t have been as bad if I’d paid attention to roof maintenance. In Melbourne, you get storms, rain, wind, and all of these things contribute to the buildup of dirt and debris which damages the roof, not to mention the erosion caused by the wind. Anyway, I got the roof fixed and now it’s looking good. I’m just wondering what else I’m going to have to get repaired in the coming days. I never expected to need roof maintenance or repairs, so now I’m expecting the unexpected.