What’s that on the horizon?

The (f)ugly metal building that can be seen over the fence in the back reaches of my garden has been slowly but steadily disintegrating over the 25 years I have been observing it from my back window. It is a back add-on to the buildings of a plumbing supply outfit that operates on the commercial thoroughfare that runs perpendicular to my street (obviously just a half a block away).

It has become increasingly noisy over the last couple of years as more parts of the rusting metal roof started to pull away; the particularly stormy stretches we’ve been through in the last 12 months have taken their toll at an accelerating pace. I’ve been cleaning up pieces that have blown loose lately and stowing them behind a shed for possible use on future shed projects (you might recall the “surplus” roofing material used in the bathouse project 😉 )

This weekend I noticed something looked different on the horizon and discovered that a large section of the building had collapsed:

It is actually much worse than this angle suggests; most of the section on the far side of the ridge line is at least partially down. Nothing was being warehoused in the building as far as I can tell and now the building inspector will undoubtedly force the owner to do what should have been done several years ago and remove the structure’s remains.

An odd coincidence:

The main structure we can now see on the hill visible through the new gap is a home that mrs cohutt and I considered purchasing 26+ years ago when we moved back to town:

This grainy zoom makes it a little more visible, the taller roof in the trees just over and to the right of the chimney:

It also happens to be 3 or 4 doors up from the home may father grew up in; it is very close yet a river and a shopping center are in between (not to mention the heap of rotten wood and rusted metal closest to me).
(For locals: the house in the trees is on River Avenue in the small Oakdene historic district)

That’s all for this post- I promise to get back to gardening subjects again shortly.