There are many oddities in the basement. Today's installment features the oddities of the chimney. First, there is the very bottom of the chimney, where you will find this tiny door. Behind the door is a bunch of dirt & leaves & such. We cleaned all that stuff out today.
Oddity number 2 is the holes in the chimney. We know they had a wood stove down here at one point; this was clearly where it was hooked up to exhaust out. But why fill the hole with a sweatshirt? Why not something more permanent? Why not sweatpants? I suppose it is a nice touch that they used something red that matched the red chimney; perhaps they thought no one would notice. Today we pulled out the red sweatshirt, assessed the hole, and then shoved the thing right back into the hole. I think we need a more serious fix -- some insulation and a metal cover -- to take care of this. But at least we know what's in there now.
So neither of these items are exactly huge mysteries; however, I still have a serious question about the chimney, and perhaps chimneys in general. Why don't they fill up with water? Ours has nothing up on top. I even put a mirror inside the bottom hole, and you can see all the way up to the sky above. So why doesn't that little door at the bottom fill up with water (it was filled with old leaves!)? I've seen other chimneys with a thingy on top, but ours is open (we can see this because we can access it from the flat roof). Anyway, the mystery of the chimney is my big worry of the day. Are we going to have a chimney full of water or snow?
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