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Life sucks and then you get hit by lightning 
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Felix Rex
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Post Life sucks and then you get hit by lightning
So, last Friday (6 days ago) there was a major storm in our area and our house was hit by lightning. This wasn't really clear at first... we just knew that we and much of our neighborhood lost power about 1am. I remember waking up to this. A few hours later power was restored... but only once I woke up in the morning did the real damage start to become apparent. We didn't realize our house had been hit until that evening when we started to investigate.

To cut a long story short, somehow our rear porch got hit by lighting (probably a metal overhang) and it appears to have arced into a light we have hanging outside. This because a metal hook in that area was literally blown out of the wood it was driven into and a piece of redwood exploded out and left a scorch mark halfway across the back patio. The damage that we've ascertained since....

- dishwasher dead
- television two rear HDMI ports dead (but otherwise working).. my poor poor OLED tv. :(
- VCR dead
- Playstation dead
- AV receiver partially fried (turns on and display works, but no video or audio output)
- Wii dead
- home theater pc dead (turns on, no post, mechanical hard drive revs up like it's trying to take off into space)
- xbox360 possibly dead (further testing required)
- one sub woofer probably dead (further testing required)
- Nest very dead... initially air conditioning was nonfunctional, but replacing the Nest thermostat fixed it. The one we had was dead enough that it smelled like ozone and the glass front actually cracked (no mean feat).
- Router provided by our ISP dead (would power on, but rear switch was fried to the point that devices connected to it showed no media connection)
- Rack mount switch fried.. would not power on
- Satis's UPS dead... would not start up. PC survived though, so kudos to the UPS
- Shiny's PC dead. No boot. Replacing power supply got power to the motherboard, but no display and questionable boot. Motherboard probably fried. Her UPS, on the other hand, is fine. Big negative to Mr. UPS.. avoid Belkin... go for APC.

So anyway, that's where we're at. I've replaced the AV receiver and the rack mount switch so far with new ones. Our ISP replaced their router and almost all of their own hardware, so we have internet (omg... the internet... I love you so). UPS replacements should be in tomorrow and we're looking for parts to build Shiny a new PC. But omg.. such a pain in the ass and so very expensive. I'm afraid there's more damage we haven't discovered yet.

Life lesson.... don't get hit by lightning.

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Wed Aug 15, 2018 9:15 pm
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Post Re: Life sucks and then you get hit by lightning
I heard on the internetz that buying stuff is happiness :D. Glad you guys are ok. My dad's place is in region that is a gathering place of different air masses and there's regularly lightning there. Sometimes it hits the granite rock and it literally sounds like cannon fire. All the buildings have lightning conduits and triple circuit protection but no direct hit so far.

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Thu Aug 16, 2018 12:15 am
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Post Re: Life sucks and then you get hit by lightning
Ouch, sucks big time indeed. :cry:

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Thu Aug 16, 2018 1:35 pm
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Post Re: Life sucks and then you get hit by lightning
Holy shit, that's some insane stuff! I'm really sorry to hear about all the damage to your electronics, but at least I'm happy you guys (and the house) are fine. Could always go worse with direct lightning strikes. Not that will make you feel much better, I'm sure.

Does your homeowner's insurance or fire insurance cover any of the damage? Or is this one of the act of god things? I'm guessing it must be. :-(

Any more things you noticed that went FUBAR?

I hope you gave your UPS a ritual sendoff though - that's some epic lightning surge stopping power. I'll stay clear from Belkin if I pick one up myself...regards to Shiny and her PC. Think the hard drive got fried too?

On a lighter note: YOU STILL HAD A VCR?! :D

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Fri Aug 24, 2018 4:25 pm
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Felix Rex
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Post Re: Life sucks and then you get hit by lightning
heh... yea.. still had a VCR. :roll: Pretty ancient, to be honest... and we still have another VCR that was in a different part of the house that still functions.

Something else we noticed that fried was out laser printer. :/ That sucks. The thing was a monster... we'd had it for like 10 years, printed hundreds of pages.. and it was still rocking the original starter toner.

Anyway, I have renter's insurance, and they'll cover most of the damage I think. I'm still in the process of doing all that. For anything worth over $250 I have to get a diagnostic from a third party stating whether it can be repaired or not. Big pain in the butt, but hey, I think my estimated total damage is in excess of $4000 at this point. To me that's probably worth all that extra work. :roll: Thankfully i'm not poor any more. The important stuff I could afford to replace immediately. Shiny is still without a PC, though.

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Sun Sep 09, 2018 12:39 pm
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Post Re: Life sucks and then you get hit by lightning
I hope they pay out extra for the VCR as an antique. :lol:

Happy that most of it will be covered by your insurance, although I wonder if this falls under act of God or not? Lightning strikes are pretty much impossible to prevent or predict obviously. And poor Shiny...what does she do now instead of gaming? Watch you play? :P

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Sat Sep 15, 2018 7:48 am
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Felix Rex
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Post Re: Life sucks and then you get hit by lightning
She watches lots of Netflix. I helped her set up a Newegg wish list for parts... she's just chosen not to buy yet. I think because of the new Nvidia graphics cards. She's interested in the gtx2070 I think. But who knows. I personally would not have been able to do without for so long.

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Tue Sep 25, 2018 1:04 pm
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Post Re: Life sucks and then you get hit by lightning
hey Satsi, you got all the insurance stuff wrapped up by now? And recuperated (most) of the money? or are they being dicks.

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Fri Dec 07, 2018 3:23 pm
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Felix Rex
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Post Re: Life sucks and then you get hit by lightning
Yea, it's handled. They were pretty good about awarding money, though it's for replacements, not compensation. So they give a part of the value, then I have to provide receipts for replacement purchases and they pay the balance (up to their max for each item). It went pretty well, just a bunch of work. Built a new PC for Shiny to game on that was mostly paid for by insurance, including a gtx 2070 graphics card. All in all, I got back somewhere between $4000-$6000... can't remember exactly... I have it written down somewhere. At any rate, I'm basically done. There are still some thing I can/should replace, but I have until August 2019 to file the paperwork.

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Sat Dec 08, 2018 10:04 pm
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Post Re: Life sucks and then you get hit by lightning
Good to hear! And yeah sounds like a big hassle with all of the receipts etc, but I guess it's worth 5-6 k haha. Great that Shiny is back among the land of the living (gamers) too. :)

Currently dealing with a sort of mini tax audit myself so I find myself having to dig up all sorts of receipts and invoices too, pain in the ass. And no reward at the end of the tunnel, unfortunately. Unless you count not getting screwed by the tax services as a reward. :P

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Sat Dec 15, 2018 9:17 am
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Felix Rex
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Post Re: Life sucks and then you get hit by lightning
Hah... yea, taxes suck. I don't have to do mine until early February at the earliest (or mid April at the latest), but mine are pretty simple. I don't own a house or a business or anything else that would give me any serious write-offs, so it's pretty simple.

BTW, I recently replaced my ~2014 Razer Blade laptop with a new one. They're expensive, but oh so awesome. Shiny has inherited my old one. I'm pretty stoked, though I don't really use my laptop unless I'm travelling.

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Thu Dec 20, 2018 3:56 pm
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Post Re: Life sucks and then you get hit by lightning
I'm jealous, I don't have a laptop right now (other than my work one) and I do miss it when I'm out of the country which is fairly often. Right now I'm in Belgium for two weeks and I'm itching to play some Rimworld. :lol: I just don't feel like I can justify it just for gaming abroad (because like you that's the only time I would use it). Oh well.

Yeah my taxes aren't complicated either but since I'm self-employed it does involve a bit more with VAT returns and so on. One of the reasons I wouldn't mind being employed on a normal basis again. :P

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Sun Dec 23, 2018 3:38 pm
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Felix Rex
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Post Re: Life sucks and then you get hit by lightning
Yea, if I were working as a contractor instead of an employee, my taxes would be much more difficult. Still, you tend to be paid better, so it probably makes up for the extra hassle.

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Mon Dec 24, 2018 12:38 am
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