Dormer window woe

[Observer]

A few years ago - needed to paint the fascia boards on a small, pitched-roof, dormer window set into a steeply pitched house roof. No roof ladder to hang from the main roof but the dormer is ~1.5 metres from the side wall of the house (just a bit more than a single step across) and could just reach fascia if sitting/lying astride the dormer.

So set extension ladder up the side of the house (not fixed to the wall). Up the ladder with paint and brush. How to get across the roof to the dormer? One quick shimmy will do it, before gravity takes over - no problem. Got across with no bother and did the job. But how to get back? If shimmy back same way as I came, I'd push the ladder away from the wall and ....... perhaps not!

Sat there for an hour waiting for my wife to come home and hold ladder so I can get back.

 

[David P]

when i was a student, behind with my rent, my landlord said he would let me off the debt if i agreed to paint the outside of the house, if not I would be evicted. no brainer really.
a few days later this guy turned up with some rusty old scaffolding and put it up in the sliver of front garden (only about 2 scaff boards wide).
came the day that i was supposed to start and i realised that the bloke that had put up the scaffolding hadn't put ANY diagonals in the structure.
after a long argument the landlord agreed to get him back and he added a couple of 'braces' as he called them.

I spent the rest of the day painting the house, well actually the wind did most of it, cos the scaffold rocked in the wind. next day imagine my delight when a building inspector on his way to work condemned the structure and threatened the landlord with court action.