It doesn't look like too much work, does it?

Here are some shots of all the damage caused by water and a few termites (that I hope are all dead). Of course, what you're seeing is the damaged wood removed. There should be pieces of wood running along the house, connecting the floor beams you see that are perpendicular to the wall. The wood I removed had water damage on the top and termite damage on the bottom.

I don't know why, but termites with their puffy white squirming bodies *really* give me the willies. But other things, like maggots, worms, and most bugs don't bother me at all, and I have no idea why!

The good news is that after a marathon repair day, this damage was repaired ('after' photos coming soon!). It was 8 hours of using scary power tools and crawling around under the house. I really can't decide which is worse.

The power tools are cool and all, but they really freak me out. When I'm using them, I'm all business and I try to be as careful as possible. I always have in the back of my mind that I'm a blink of an eye from a gruesome fate of some sort. I guess you get used to what they can do like any other tool, and I think have both a healthy respect and healthy fear of my table saw, circular saw, and reciprocating saw. After each use, I always feel grateful that I'm still in one piece.

Crawling around under the house I think could qualify as torture. It's dark and cramped, has areas filled with creepy spider egg sacks slung upon equally creepy dusty, thick spider webs, lifting yourself up higher than a crawling stance results in bumping painfully into beams or nails protruding from the floor boards above, and the dirt you're crawling upon consists of fine, powdery dirt for penetrating clothing and breathing protection, mixed with medium to large hunks of concrete or hardened dirt for you to lay on. There's also the fact that the 6 inches from every wall and pillar has been treated with chemicals to kill termites.

Have I painted a sucky enough picture? Read on!

Of course, you just know that at one point I had to do both at the same time, right? I had to drag the reciprocating saw with me under the house to cut off some rusty nails so I would have a clean space to put in new pieces of wood. The saw weighs about 10 pounds and when it fires up in that small space, let me tell you, it's LOUD and kicks up a huge cloud of dust that doesn't have anywhere to dissipate. You know what's even better? I had to do it twice :)