Oh dear.

Two things of note happened yesterday.

I had to stay at home waiting for the loss adjuster - wasn't looking forward to it - he was due between 8am and 1pm.  Could really have done with being at work. As I was at home on the 'wrong' day - both dogs guessed something was up and my heightened tension gave me away - so they were behaving really badly. At 12.15, there was a bang on the door - and both dogs became hysterical, I managed to shove Alfie greyhound into the front room - open the door and found a perfectly nice bloke wearing high visibility gear with a clipboard - as I was saying hello, the whippet ran out into the road and started doing cartwheels - so I shoved the loss adjuster into the house - grabbed the dog and pulled her back in, this really stressed me out and I was a bit embarrassed, so I just launched into a tirade about the storms, the ceilings, the insurance company and all the damage - the bloke listened politely and as I was just drawing breath said "I'm probably not who you think I am" - he was actually a volunteer collecting for the local hospice. I was very, very embarrassed. He was nice enough about it, being manhandled and kidnapped by a ranting man with two hysterical barking dogs.

The 'real' loss adjuster arrived at 12.55. He was at the house for about an hour and you could tell he had probably already done about 100 of these since xmas. He was nice enough - took pictures and measurements etc - is sending a report over in  a day or so. It didn't really go the way I hoped - as I understand it - they are going to pay for the kitchen roof - parts of which clearly blew away and I had to knock parts down because it was dangerous - in fact he said that the main reason my neighbours roof is still there is because my roof protected it and took the full force. They are going to take care of all the internal damage - which I wasn't fussed about - and any damage caused by water coming into the house - but not going to resolve the cause of water coming in - that's 'maintenance' - despite chunks of masonry and render coming off - he said 'the chimney's shot' - well - yes, we had 6 weeks of gales and driving rain.

I'm still waiting for the report - he was keen to say 'we can take care of everything and supply contractor - a bit too keen, I'll try and get some advice.

I could have done without all that, I had to go into work straight afterwards and have a meeting - and then come home to a depressing, cold, dark house (kitchen lights blew) and wonder how I'm going to pay to get the roof fixed - I'm pretty broke at the moment, still have no washing machine, have a big invoice to write this weekend but a bigger tax bill to pay.

Trying to decide on something practical to do today to cheer myself up. Failing. Any ideas? Handwashing socks isn't on my list