Update! The gaping hole gapes no more!!

Just moments ago, I noticed a large pickup truck circling the house. Strapped to the top of the vehicle was a little red extension ladder -- so I guessed immediately that this was the truck of some sort of contractor. Upon closer inspection and on about their third trip around the corner of our house -- I could make out the faces of two men staring mournfully up (way, way up) at the roof and sides of our house where the siding and fascia are still missing.

I could tell by the pained expression that these folks had been sent to work on our house.

They stopped momentarily and removed the little red ladder from the top of the truck. I watched from my bedroom window as one of the men maneuvered the thing through the shrubbery and up to the point closest to the gaping hole.

Before I knew it they had taken their ladder and gone... Perhaps to find a man-lift or a crane or maybe a helicopter with a hanging scaffold.

More to come.... Keep your fingers crossed.

New Update March 13, 2006 - 1:45pm:
The truck and the guys returned not long after my initial post and by the time I got shoes on Yvonne and found my way into the front yard with a camera - the foam board had already been replaced.

It's shocking how very not blue our blue board had become over the last few months...

One of the two guys informed me that they didn't have the metal for the fascia yet.. but that they had returned to at least finish the siding. (The other guy didn't talk much...) I'm more inclined to believe they just couldn't find that helicopter with the scaffolding... or maybe they - like so many others we have spoken to (and even hired) over the last few months - simply don't relish the idea of hanging off the peak of our really tall house.

Note the little red ladder.

It took a little tapping and banging and sawing... And after all of these months it is almost comical just how quickly the job was completed -- but I am happy to say we have siding again.

The hole gapeth not.