July 2019   

07/21/19: Well I finally got the main station computer running again and put it back online last night. It is still light by about 1000 tracks and I will start looking for and ripping those as soon as I can. At least it has a lot more on it than the backup system we have been using since 2017. Now that the main system is back online I also have a bunch of submitted music I have to get ripped and uploaded. Come Friday night you will start hearing Radio Jack shows that you haven’t heard before. To say that it was a painstaking task is a monumental understatement. Now that the backup is running again, another cause of the catastrophic failure, this should not be such a huge recovery mission if we lose a system again. As you can see I also spent some time updating the website. Sorry about that.

07/15/19: Ok sorry in advance but this has got me so angry that I just can’t stand it! Warning, this is going to be a long post.

I am a retired firefighter and have been suffering for 20 years now from a nonspecific autoimmune disease that causes multiple mononeuropathy in the peripheral nervous system, sometimes called polyneuropathy. It is very painful and debilitating at times as it destroys the insulation covering on your nerves (Myelin), and it is getting worse. Random shooting pains as though someone has a “voodoo doll” and is stabbing it in random places, random zaps of lightning like jolts when I move around, searing/burning “Indian rope burn” like pain at the slightest touch on my arms and legs. Random insane inching that scratching does not do anything for, and places that have been left with no feeling at all. It has progressed from just sensory nerves to affecting my autonomic nervous system as well causing excessive sweating, heat intolerance, gastric problems and problems controlling blood pressure.

All I ever wanted was to have a place to tinker away my retirement years. So many years ago I started putting money aside for my dream shop. Four years ago I retired from the fire department after a 35 year career and started researching metal buildings. Three years ago I settled on a building from a company called Heritage Building Systems. After a few months of asking what I thought were all the right questions, do you have Dade County Approval for all your building systems? Have you built here before? What wind load are your buildings rated for, Etc. Etc. And being assured that all was good to go, I ordered my building. First snag was the building does not come with foundation drawings. So there was a delay while I got an engineer to draw them up. The foundation was way over the market research I had done so there went the contingency I had in my budget. The building was delivered on an open flatbed truck with no trapping and everything was wet from weather the truck had gone through. All the building plans and instructions were destroyed by water getting into the box they were shipped in. All the pieces were unloaded onto wood slats on the ground next to where the foundation was being dug. There were more delays with permitting, materials, and contractors. Then when the foundation was done and the building was scheduled to be erected I contacted a rollup door company and found out the build had not been engineered properly for hurricane rated doors. That is when the nightmare of dealing with Heritage Building started.

They said that my building department was crazy and our building code is insane and that they would not be selling another building in Dade County as a result. It took 4 months and a BBB complaint to get them to agree to fix the problem. Another 2 months for them to get me the replacement pieces and then another 5 months to have the pieces they sent fabricated into usable door jambs at a local shop. Then there were a succession of problems that were discovered and repaired one at a time over a period of many months that required a portable welder ranging from multiple columns missing Purlin/Girt clips, to missing pieces and parts that just didn’t fit and had to be modified by a fabrication company. To other parts that didn’t fit and had to be replaced by Heritage.

At one point it was discovered, when some pieces would not fit in the building, that the end wall rafters were manufactured incorrectly. The building had to be partially disassembled, repaired and reassembled. All told there were 11 such incidents that added up to another 8 months of delays. Then it came to light that just like the rollup doors the walkthrough door jambs were not engineered properly for the hurricane doors that Heritage had supplied with the building and that there were no headers supplied. After 6 months of arguing in email and over the phone Heritage finally agreed to get me the right ones. When they were delivered it was found that they were manufactured incorrectly and they did not send any headers. I had to call the welder again and have all the girt clips moved to the correct locations and have them fabricate door frame headers. By then 26 months had passed and several thousands of unreimbursed dollars spent since I was initially ready to erect the building. And then the final straw, while sorting through the siding and roofing panels I found that they were all rusting from sitting through the 26 month Heritage Building Systems debacle.

So I contact Heritage and ask them to replace them. The answer was no, you didn’t store them properly and you didn’t erect the building in a timely manner. I replied that I did store them properly and the delay was their fault. No answer. So again I went to the BBB and complained because they stopped communicating. The answer there was the same. The customer didn’t store the panels correctly and the damage was caused by that. They have refused to even offer me a discount on the replacement panels even though I proved that the panels were delivered to me wet and I then covered them as instructed so they stayed wet. In south Florida with humidity levels in the 70% to 100% range virtually year round even stacks of metal that are covered will get wet from moisture condensing between them. They finally acknowledged that even If I did cover them as I said it was my responsibility to monitor the metal, un-stack dry and re-stack if they were ever to be found wet. I'm not sure were that fine print was, like I said all the paperwork that came with the building was destroyed by water in transit. It sounds like a get out of jail free card to me because in south Florida I would have been un-stacking, drying and re-stacking every day for the entire three years and then the panels would have been damaged from scratching them up. I know for a fact that the metal was not rusted two years ago when the building would have been finished if not for the multitude of problems and their extremely slow response times. So I am stuck with not enough money to finish my building, a fear that I will become totally disabled before I can get it finished and never get to enjoy it. They have quoted me $12,000 for replacement panels and I just don’t have it.

If you can, please do me a favor and email Heritage and tell them what you think about this whole thing!

Stepping off my soapbox.

DJR

07/04/19: Americana music for the 4^th all day today. Happy Independence Day!

   June 2019   

06/26/19: Well its been a year since the passing of DJ Rambler’s oldest Brother. Have had a few trips up to his place in central Florida to help his widow with things around the house. Always nice to see family but it does get emotional.

   May 2019   

05/23/19: Not much to put here. I’m sure ya’ll get tired of reading the same old crap. Trust me living it is a bit worse!

   April 2019   

04/30/19: The bedroom where DJ Ladyhawk’s mom stayed in has now been redone with new carpet and converted into DJ Ladyhawk’s home office with a full size desk with return and credenza.  

   March 2019   

03/27/19: Well not much to report. Still dealing with storm recovery and metal building company from hell.

   February 2019   

02/28/19: It’s slowly getting better. All of the trees have been stood up and braced. All our fruit trees that survived are in bloom for the first time since the storm, we’ll see how much fruit actually sets.

   January 2019   

01/25/19: Not much to say really, too depressing.

01/01/19: Another year has started and we hope everyone has a wonderful time throughout 2019!