Chrissy I drove over to the restaurant during a lull in last nights storm to see if there were any leaks in the ceiling. We were concerned because it was the first real storm since we took possession and Tempe was getting hammered with huge amounts of rain and high winds. We could see a half dozen trees ripped out of the ground in our shopping center alone. The electricity had gone out at the house for almost two hours.
As we unlocked the front door and shut off the alarm I realized immediately that I should have brought some buckets. There were three steady leaks in the dining room, one in the men’s bathroom, and a couple outright waterfalls in the kitchen. The roof over the kitchen is flat and it serves as a platform for all of the mechanical equipment like air conditioners and exhausters. I had already inspected the roof and I knew that all of the equipment was ancient. The exhaust fans are rusted, the condensers for the walk-in coolers are filthy and useless looking and the AC units are huge 20 year old dinosaurs. The roof looked like a junkyard and the surface itself is cracked and blistered and needs to be completely redone, so its no surprise that streams of water are working their way down into the building with relative ease. As I wandered around in that dark steamy building, peering into shadowy corners with a flashlight I could hear dripping sounds all around, and I felt a gorge of panic welling up inside me. A little voice in my head called out “What have you gotten yourself into!”