"Personally, I'm always ready to learn. Though I don't always like to be taught." - Winston Churchill

On the way home from work yesterday I stopped at The Truss Company. Our roof is a disaster waiting to happen and I patch bad spots every fall. This cheap MoHo was never meant to last 45+ years and the roof probably takes the brunt of the aging process.
I'd like to put on a metal roof for durability and have eaves for both appearance and function. So my idea has been to put trusses over the existing roof and attach the metal panels to the trusses (purlins across the trusses, but neither of us wants to get into the technical details).

I spent over an hour with Stephen, a super nice guy who gave my plan the thumbs up and then used a computer to create plans for the trusses per my specifications. And a cost estimate. If I pick them up (instead of delivery) I can save about $200 off of what I expected to be a much higher price. Each truss will only weigh 43 pounds (his computer told him that) so getting them up on the roof shouldn't be difficult.
Hey, I go to the gym every day!
Next stop: the place in Eugene Stephen recommended for the metal panels. But I'm thinking I may hire that part out. Getting the trusses in place isn't tricky, just a day's work. Installing the panels is easy enough, but cutting and flashing the holes for the stove pipe and plumbing vent pipes may be a job best done by professionals. We'll see what they say at the metal roofing place.

MoHo will look a lot better with a regular roof. The new windows and trim were a good start (and much better at keeping the weather outside). But one of the most obvious visual clues of a cheap trailer home is the lack of a regular pitched roof with eaves. Having eaves will be nice in a place with as much rain as we get. Yesterday's cost estimate has me optimistic we *may* have a new roof by next winter.

This is now the norm. October means cool, and sometimes cold mornings. As long as I'm up early I can start the fire so MoHo is warm when Pam gets out of bed. Then she can keep it going as necessary though the day. Some days it warms up enough that getting the initial chill off is sufficient. We were in the high 30's overnight and it was 59 inside when I got up at 3:00.

Roger Fosse was my best friend growing. Our families were very close in every way. The Fosses lived a mile or so away so Roger (my age) and his younger brother Jim (my younger brother's age) attended the same schools through H.S. We all went to the same church where both dads were elders, and mom and Wilson played for many of the services (mom on organ, Wilson on piano). Wilson and Evelyn were my second set of parents.
I was a misfit kid, socially awkward (to put it generously) at both school and church. Except with Roger. He was super bright, athletic, had all the social skills including with the girls. My polar opposite. But I NEVER felt anything but ease and acceptance when I was with him. I felt his equal. We walked to school together every day until we were old enough to drive. I had access to our family's 1950 DeSoto, so days when he didn't have football practice or some other cool thing before school I'd drive over to his house and then to Ballard H.S.
Roger was best man in our wedding. That added a touch of class to an otherwise plain event because at the time Roger was between his junior and senior year at the Naval Academy and wore his dress whites for the ceremony. Yeah, he really was smart and totally classy.
Right after graduating from Annapolis Rog married Karen, who also grew up in our church. He did his req'd 5 years in the Navy (submarines) and then went to work for Bechtel in their nuclear energy department. They quickly had a "quiver full" - five kids. Four boys and a girl.
In 1980 a flight home from a business trip from Atlanta to their home in Pennsylvania involved a final leg on a commuter jet that crashed into a hillside and killed all aboard.

His parents, his wife now with five young children, his brother....
What pain.
Pain undergird by the assurance that Roger was with his Savior and his Savior was giving grace to help in time of need to his family.

I'm friends on Facebook with Karen who. after raising those five kids, remarried a few years ago. The oldest of the boys, Pete, just got promoted to the rank of Major (Army?) and Karen posted some pics of the promotion ceremony. I commented on one of the pics how very much Pete looks like his dad. That led to an exchange between us that culminated in Karen sending me a promotional video that was shot while Roger was at the Naval Academy.
Here.
It's a fascinating period piece, but at about the 6:32 mark...Roger.
My best friend, Roger.
Oh my.

T'ank you, Fadder.