It sounds like Portulacaria afra, which doesn't tolerate wet feet well at all. Test the plant by moving it side to side to see if it's still secure in the pot. Usually roots rot off the main stem very quickly when they're over-watered and the plant often simply falls over. If you've lost most of the rootage, you'll essentially need to treat the plant as a cutting and hope you can reroot successfully after removing rotted tissues so only sound roots remain. Al

Thanks for the replies. I will try to find some of that glue. I am especially glad he or she will not eclose in the middle of winter. tdogmom - I actually thought of you and your toilet when I realized I might be missing one. (it was you with the toilet pupae, right? And the carpet?) Another one made his chrysalis today, and 3 more are almost ready. The last one to hang was a real pistol...he kept trying to get out of the hamper - he made it once but I caught him. I kept putting sticks in his path, but he didn't seem to like them. I had to go to bed, so I finally got him onto a stick and put it in a jar with saran wrap in top. He had no choice but to attach to that stick ;) More babies are on the way -- 5 or 6 hatched yesterday, and about a dozen more should by tomorrow. I finally had to stop bringing the eggs in off of my parsley - I don't know if I'll have enough to feed the upcoming herd! I plan to get some more parsley from the nursery. Of course, last time I did that I inspected them and picked the ones with eggs and baby cats. It's a sickness! Oh, and a very cute thing....the hatchlings are so tiny, and they really don't move too much. I thought one was dead so I nudged it to check. He stuck his little teeny osmeterium out at me! hehe.

The builder needs to learn how to properly deal with the structural design issues before making decisions about how to install flashing. For instance, he should have looked up the shear value of the lag screws he was using in the NDS. By taking the easy way out regarding flashing and ignoring the structural requirements he created a dangerously weak ledger design. And adding more lag screws is not the appropriate solution at this point. You should introduce him to the Maine Deck Bracket or a structural engineer before someone gets hurt. The link below might be a good place for him to start his education. Keep in mind that the snow live load in your area might be greater than the 40 psf assumed in the article. In MA the snow live load is 60 psf and we're on the ocean. I worked in Aspen in '66 &'67. It snowed so much a large old commercial building collapsed in the center of downtown. In the Rockies decks the size of yours should always be designed by an engineer, not builders or building inspectors. If an engineer is not available I recommend using posts on all sides in addition to through-bolting with spacers to the house. Here is a link that might be useful: deck ledger options

I'm glad you got out of your mess ok and saved your sink and yourself (you could have hit your head or broken an arm or something really bad). That would be scary for sure. One thing I have learned, and I will never learn it all, is that even if you don't do the work yourself, don't put blind trust in those who do, even if they are professionals. I try to inform myself as best I can about options, requirements and how the job should be done right. A small example. The plastic molding around the kitchen. It should have been shimmed out or filled in with wood pieces so it would adhere better. It wasn't, so half of that has pulled away. I could probably fix that myself. He (back to your bf) probably missed the studs. The guy who put mine up missed some, not all, and that is why the insurance company gave me a settlement. What I didn't figure out until later is that the end of the wall has the first three or more studs rotted out from water leakage over the years (don't think my ins covers that). I knew there was a small leak, but didn't know it was that expansive. Now the wall needs to be ripped out and redone which is why I've procrastinated so about putting the cupboards back up because of my nerves and the whole countertop, which includes the sink and garbage disposal, and bottom cupboards taken out, wall redone from scratch and new drywall, then put everything back in. I can't handle something major torn up any more, used to do it, no more unless there is no way around it. I've got some tub enclosure sheets cut and duct taped to the huge hole in the wall that was rotting out behind that section of cupboards. By the time I had the second new roof since I have lived here put on, I nagged the roofer about that spot and insisted that they get the valley done right. Now there is an exterior wall just under that spot I paid some workers I got through the local employment office to fix the side of the house, $300. They didn't do it right, and it needs to be redone. I was having a prob with my anxiety over the pounding and stress of it and ended up in the emergency room, so I wasn't able to pay very close attention to that. Sometimes you don't save, and you have to watch the pros, too. Water sometimes gets in there, too. So it seems I just can't win. Well, I think we both should consider ourselves fortunate that it didn't turn out worse. Maybe I'm lucky I didn't have a boyfriend do work for me. The one I did, I paid him for the work, it seemed ok, but he set a closet door crooked! It was so obvious. I unscrewed it, drilled new holes and straightened it myself. But I never could have hinged all those shutter doors together because I just don't have the skills. They didn't hold up very long either. I put a lot of effort into painting them. Get a smarter boyfriend next time :-). Some guys really do know their stuff and take great pride in doing things right. I suppose I'm the kind of person who should not try to own a house with all the maintenance, but I just love my green space and nice neighborhood, so it's kind of a tradeoff. I am not the condo type and just hated it when we lived in rentals. Getting older, eventually I'll probably be forced to make a change. Sorry I went on so long about it. It's my own doing but is a good example of why you should nip a problem in the bud or it will just get worse. I now realize that former owners going how far back I don't know had the same problem because of water stains. I thought just paint over them and everything will be ok. No.