Life in the Swamp: Flooded Roads and Snake Bites

Over the past several weeks, a LOT of rain has fallen on southeast Georgia. This of course means that the "roads" to get in and out of my mom's property (which are not maintained by the county) are flooded.

This is the northern "road." One of the other property owners out there just paid someone $12,000 to "fix" the road. This is the after shot. Clearly they wasted their money. In addition to being flooded, much of the "fix" included dumping clay, which has the added benefit of making it easier to get stuck. Good times.
Meanwhile, the southeastern "road" is in its usual post-rain state of flowing. At least the bottom of this part of the "road" is fairly hard packed, so one is less likely to get stuck. (Note I said 'less likely' not 'unlikely'!)

Meanwhile, this is what mom's yard has looked like much of the time in recent days: This being southeast Georgia, all this high water has led the natural inhabitants of Georgia's waterways to move into areas where they don't normally hang out. And by inhabitants, I mean snakes. Water moccasins (aka cottonmouths) to be exact. While my mother hasn't seen any moccasins with her own eyes, she has seen the result of not one, but two, moccasin bites in the past two weeks.
On August 31, 2015, Pepper (the pit bull puppy who was dumped out at my mom's house at the beginning of August), was bitten in the face by a moccasin. He was rushed to the vet immediately, and $1200+ later is doing fine.
This was Pepper when he came home from the vet.
Slightly less swollen Pepper
Fully recovered Pepper
And then, last night, guess who else decided he needed to investigate a moccasin with his face? Sunny. (Sunny was a teeny-tiny little puppy someone dumped near mom's boyfriend's house in Suwannee county, FL back in December. He now weighs 65lbs.) From the pictures, the swelling doesn't look as bad as Pepper's, although this might be because Sunny is more than twice his size.
Swollen Sunny
Sunny's Saturday night emergency trip to the vet
Then, just to make matters worse, this was mom's update on Facebook this morning: "Don't know whether to put this in the category of 'Just When You Thought Things Couldn't Get Worse', or just file it away under 'Shit Happens'. Sunny, the 2nd snakebit dog (who now weighs 65 pounds) was coming back into the house when Brin (the old dog who is recovering from a broken pelvis) decided to attack him. No harm done to either dog, but Sunny, in fright, peed over about a square yard of living room rug, then backed into the front door, breaking out a glass pane. Guess from here on out my 'home improvements' will be of the 'cardboard and duct tape' type!"
I don't have pictures of the broken glass pane, and I'm not sure which one it is... but here's a shot of mom's front door, so you can get an idea of which of the glass panes might have been broken in this incident. Sigh.

Meanwhile, did you notice her comment about the dog with a broken pelvis? He's 12 years old, and insists on maintaining his Alpha Dog status, even though he's 12 and now has trouble walking. How did he break his pelvis? Some asshole hit him with a truck. On mom's "road." Granted, it was dry in early August when this happened, so the "road" was passable - but it's a private road and not exactly a place where you might accidentally hit something because you're going so fast. Grrrrr. I bought her some road signs for her birthday last month:
(That's the now snakebit Sunny on the left.)

Mantelpiece!

The house originally had a central chimney with FOUR connected fireplaces and their mantelpieces. There was also a fireplace with a mantel in the master bedroom. During the move, we lost all the brickwork for the chimneys and fireplaces. Mom tried to save the mantelpieces, but due to some incompetent handymen along the way, only two made it. Even though the fireplaces were gone, she still wanted as many mantelpieces in place as possible. One of the former fireplace locations is now the location of the door to a large closet and the ladder to the attic. That left two former fireplace locations without mantels. But thanks to the local swap and shop group on facebook, mom was able to fill one of those spaces for FREE with this lovely mantelpiece:

One of her new propane heaters will go in front of it.

Also: In case you haven't noticed, this blog is still a work in progress as far as uploading all of the background information goes. If you're viewing this site on a computer, there's a grey link bar across the top underneath the picture of the house. If you're here on a cell phone, it's a grey drop-down menu under the picture. At this point, not all of the links are active. You can either check the pages out by following the links at the top, or you can follow the links below:

Read the full story of the move

Photos of the house before the move

Photos of the moving process

Photos of the kitchen restoration

Photos of the bathroom restoration

About the Brierpatch

Back in 2011, my mom had the opportunity to move a 1905 bungalow out to her land. It wasn't in the best of shape when she started the process, and the move was rather rough on the house. (Read all about the move here!) After nearly three years of work, the house was finally livable. My mom moved into the Brierpatch in August 2014, although the house itself remains a work in progress. Please follow the links under the picture at the top of this page to read the story of the move and to see photos of the house's progress. This website, like the house, is a work in progress, so please check back. In the interim, here's a video I shot of the interior of the house back in November 2014; I need to do another because there have already been a lot of changes!