Damned Flat Roof

Ye damned roof,
as viewed from the bathroom window.
Or is it a dammed roof?

I hate flat roofs.  I like to work in concert with gravity, rather than against it.  A flat roof, or nearly flat roof, is a crime against physics.  The downhill flow of fluids is inevitable, so why tempt fate?  Yes, I know, if properly engineered and installed, a flat roof is just fine.  For a while...until it leaks...and they always do.

Perhaps my distaste for horizontal roofing is as much experiential as logical.  In my late teens, I was hired for a job where I was to perform surveys on flat roofs for a company that promised to provide a cost saving to the poor business owner who happened to have dripping ceilings.  Just as I was hired, a major contract was inked with a large plant in Tonawanda, NY, an hour away from where I lived.  But that would not be factor, since the job foreman would be driving, and I could snooze as necessary on the way.

Not so.  Ted, the foreman and only other crew member, took it upon himself to save my wretched soul from all the mistakes he had made, and from all those I would obviously make unless I followed his advice.  So we travelled back and forth with a constant drone of morality lessons.  And because he was averse to driving on the Thomas E. Dewey Thruway, we had the pleasure of 90 minutes or more of companionship on Routes 33 or 31 instead of the normal hour.  Both ways.

I never asked the question.  I was too kind, I suppose.  But I had to wonder...If you know everything that I will need to live a successful life, why is it that you're messing around in the summer sun on nearly melting industrial roofs with a kid who is obviously destined for no good?

The company provided these little capacitance measuring machines that we secured to wheeled carts. The needle would swing along the scaled arc, detecting the moisture content within the tar and felt below.  Then we'd jot the result onto the clipboard and move a few feet to the next site for another reading.  But before we took any readings, Ted insisted that we measure and paint a spot at 3 foot intervals to make sure we provided an accurate grid for our measurements.  

The roofs we measured would easily hold a regulation football field.  And the Tonawanda job also provided close proximity to a metal foundry (and a sentence with plural redundancies in the same sentence!).  So we got to enjoy soot falling upon us as we moved across the roof not once, but twice.  Ted preferred this over my suggestion that we get a long rope, paint it once at the correct intervals, and then move the rope to give us our reference points.    And because of the extra marking time, we needed to make additional journeys to Tonawanda to complete the job.  I suspect Ted was also paid on an hourly basis.

The pay was slightly more than minimum wage, which was good for me at the time, so I might have toughed it out for the summer, even with the cruel and unusual punishment.  But after a number of jobs, all on roofs within spitting distance of Lake Erie, I realized that the meters really did not do a good job of determining the water in the roof.  "You need to have the computer analyze the data," said the boss, but I could not see how any computer application of logic could make real sense out of the mostly random measurements I was taking.  Particularly after I noted that the crushed stone usually found on these roofs was not always distributed evenly, and distance from the tarred surface made the readings vary significantly.

So I quit.  This action required a long discussion with my father regarding the value of work and persistence, but after hearing all the whining, he finally acquiesced when I told him that it was extremely questionable that the service we provided had any value.  And, of course, I added quickly that I did not want to be involved with an organization that was fleecing its customers.  I noted for later consideration that moral and ethical grounds had carried much more weight with my father than any degree of personal discomfort.

The experience instilled a deep and reasonable loathing of flat roofs.  So when I heard that a section of roof in Indiana was suspected of leaking, I snarled knowingly, "Damned flat roof."

Really?
You can't be serious.

Thankfully, Scott was on the scene.  He assessed the situation, sent pictures, and plotted strategy.  And he found a big hole.  Unfortunately, what first appeared to be the culprit turned out to be a very unconventional drain design.  

Who drains a roof with a hole in the middle when it would have been just as easy to build the roof with an outside drain?  The guy must have been a desert dweller.

The one true path.

Scott also determined that the bulk of the water ending up on the flat roof actually came from the normally pitched roof on the story above.  The downspout from that level dumped all the water from a large rain collection area onto the flat roof where it could really make a difference should anything be the least bit leaky.

So he configured a new path for the major flow that took the bulk of the water to the ground without the scenic and circuitous path across the flat roof and into the mysterious hole-drain.

Then the educational future of America called, and Scott was not able to do anything more.  Lucky me!  I would be able to contribute to the project.  

The bundle.

Unwilling (Oh, all right. "Unable.") to access the roof via the tiny bathroom window as Scott had done, a ladder was procured to provide an elevating experience.  I took my little bundle of tools up with me, and was nearly overwhelmed by a dose of flat roof revulsion.  But I fought down the panic and began to go about my business.  At least I didn't have to paint a grid.

Scott's new ladder.

The bottom line?  I replaced a vent cover that shouldn't need to be there at all, and went with a nautical theme by turning the vents 180 so no water could possibly enter that way.  Did I mention that the ceiling light in the bathroom below is not used because the globe fills up with water?  My first inclination was goldfish, but that solution was not met with the proper enthusiasm.  So I sought additional solutions.

Which meant applying Oobleck.  You know, that wonderful stuff manufactured by Magicians of Didd that sticks to everything and seems to multiply itself as it does so.  It has been rebranded as Leak Stopper, and the color has been changed, but it is clearly Oobleck.

I gooped up a seam and a small slice in the roof and anything anywhere that looked suspiciously like a possible water entry point.  You are always guessing when trying to stop leaks.  So I applied the Oobleck to anything that looked remotely like a gap.  Gaps between my fingers, gaps in my clothing, and a few gaps on the roof.  I'm glad that I found some paint thinner in the basement. 

Declaring victory, I returned to the roof one more time to capture this image of my fine workmanship.

My eye beholds beauty.
Oobleckian beauty.
But the truth is that Scott's downspout diversion
probably makes more difference than anything I accomplished.

But that's not what I wanted to tell you about.

As I was stepping down the ladder for the final time and dreaming of well deserved beverages, something flashed across my view.  A bird?  A plane?  No...it was Superfrog!  And there I was, camera in hand.  Though he had not made an appointment, this guy had come for a portrait setting.

Faster than a speeding bullet.
Earlier...not at this moment.

The nearest tree was more than 10 feet away.  Although I'm sure he didn't fly, the leap he made was nearly as impressive as his sudden stop and adherence to the metal of the ladder.

Why, Hello!

I rarely go outdoors to see animals of any kind, so this was my first encounter with a tree frog.  What a cute little guy.

I know hunters who would kill to have camo this good.

I was thoroughly impressed by his staying power.  Unbelievable how well he could hang onto the brushed metal surface.  Clearly a miracle performed by this tiny Ladder Day Saint.

Humans?  Opposable thumbs?
Maybe so, but you gotta hand it to this little guy...
He's got gripping nailed.

He stayed long enough for our session, and then we both went off in search of rewards for our performances.