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first thing i did when i woke up this morning was to call my homeowner insurance. this is my 2nd year with travelers insurance (actually through geico), and my first time attempting to file a claim. the feeling i got from their website is, "are you sure you want to file a claim?" which made me unsure if i was even able to do so. so i called them and spoke with a consultant, we heard my case and pulled up my policy to see what's covered. they won't pay for the plumbing repair - which they deem as "wear and tear" damage. however, they will pay for everything that was damaged due to the leak. the catch is i have a $1000 deductible. given what i've seen so far of the damage, if i fixed it myself it'd probably cost less than $200 in materials, if even that. just some drywall, some primer, some paint. i could watch a few youtube videos and figure out how to remove the old walls and replace them with the new. i told my agent i would think about it, inspect the situation some more to see how much it might cost.

after i finished the call, i went into the bathroom to start working on the next stage. since yesterday, the bathroom has a drywall dust smell to it, reminds me of home renovation. i started peeling away the rest of the "box" wall to see what's inside. that's when my repair estimate went up. for one thing, most of the box was filled with wet insulation pulp. i removed them in clumps, filling up 4 trash bags. they had to be removed in order for the inside of the wall to properly dry. i also made the rookie mistake of accidentally ripping paint off a section of the wall that wasn't water damaged. not just a tiny amount, but a big sheet, and ripped off some of the drywall paper as well. maybe that was a blessing in disguise, but i also saw some water damage on that wall as well, though it might disappear once the drywall has a change to properly dry out. however, it was the condition of the pipes inside the wall that got my troubled. the bottom of the 2 copper hot water pipes were heavily corroded. not sure how long the pipe's been leaking, but they were entirely covered in a blue patina. the main cast-iron outflow pipe also seemed heavily corroded. this may all change once everything's had a chance to dry, but from what i was looking at, it seemed serious.

i didn't want to seal everything back up like a tomb and then have the pipes burst again. while the pipes are exposed, my upstairs neighbor should decide if they want to fix them first before i proceded with repairs.

in the afternoon i went to market basket to get some groceries. this week is going to be ham sandwiches again as i still have plenty of bread left. for the first time since they lifted mask restrictions back in late mary, i wore a mask to the supermarket. my mother's been on my case for weeks, and now with the delta variant picking up the infection rate, i decided in the interest of safety i'd wear a mask. can't hurt, and i still have boxes of unused ones.

back at home, i continued pulling out wet insulation. i also didn't see this when i cleaned it out this morning, but on the wooden slated against the inside wall of the house i can see some white mold. they could very well go away once everything is dried up, or they could be a problem. what i really need is a dehumidifier. when i went out on errands earlier i had the oscillating fan blowing in the bathroom, but a dehumidifier would speed up the drying process.

when sunset arrived, i could see through the cracks of my venetian blind that it was something spectacular. i felt compelled to go outside with my phone to take some snapshots. i was going to call my mother to tell her to go outside and look but i figured by the time she went out the sun will have already set. unbeknownst to me, my parents by coincidence were out walking and saw the sunset.

for dinner i had a ham sandwich and a bottle of health-ade kombucha, cayenne cleanse flavor. it had some spiciness, and one of the ingredients is ginger, so it sort of tasted like spicy goya ginger beer, except instead of sweet it was sour.