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Monday, January 31, 2011

Our Slip Is Showing

Icicles are nothing to be proud of. Yes, they look pretty; all winter meets gingerbread storybook. But they are the housing equivalent of going out in public with your slip showing. They demonstrate something is awry. They mean we don’t have enough insulation. Some of our heat is escaping from the main living areas of our home into the attic spaces. That heat is rising up and warming the roof so that the snow melts, drips, refreezes and slowly but surely forms icicles. That melted snow can also build up at the edge of the roof and form ice dams which can damage said roof.

The winter home equivalent of a gal who looks as if she just stepped out of a band box would be a house with a thick, even blanket of snow across the whole roof - no lumpy ice dams, no stalactite-like icicles, no strips or patches of melted snow revealing the slip, er, the shingles beneath.

That said, here are two photos of the icicles on our home. I shall miss them when our insulation is complete, but not their cause.



7 comments:

Ms Brown Mouse said...

they are very, very beautiful.

Unknown said...

Can you spell spelunking?

:o)

Pink Granite said...

Thanks Morgan!

Why yes, Gail, I believe we can now!
;o)

Sue said...

WOW!! That's unbelievable. Housing flaw or not - totally incredible. Jake is so fascinated by icicles; he wanted to bring some home from Lapland! They're just so pretty, thanks for sharing!!

Sue x

Wendy said...

beautiful icicles.even if they were caused by a flaw in insulation, they sure are pretty
xx

M2Oskie said...

Off topic... but thank you for your NECN comment via Twitter. I can no longer access NECN without a cable box so hardly ever watch it anymore. (Miss Matt Noyes a little bit.) This week I flipped it on for the first time in a long time and straight out of the gate heard Alison King inform me that "Scott Brown wants to create jobs but Democrats want to stop him" or words to that effect.

Prompted me to say something very rude and flip the channel.

Have a snow free day,
Jane

Irene said...

I learned something new today about icicles! Since it rarely freezes where I live, we don't experience icicles.

Beautiful photos.