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Picture #1
Click each picture to see an enlargement pop up in a separate window...
Note to all who navigate here from the PG site. Spurge was the father of my good friend, Dana. After Spurge was sent to a nursing home it became Dana's job to clean up and sell Spurge's house. These pictures, along with his commentary, were put here so that others can see just what it looked like (and until we did put them here, Dana would describe it to others and very few of them believed him).
The first 29 pictures were taken by Dana circa 2006. The rest (beginning with the "dog dick candle") were taken by Pat when making a trip there with Dana in December, 2009. Spurge passed away in October, 2009. The house was eventually cleaned and sold. The location of the house will never be revealed so that the new owners won't ever accidentally stumble upon this web page, see the photos, and go syncope.
This was my mother's car. I gave it to Spurge after her death because he had bought it for her. He backed into something and cobbed the left rear bumper, busting the taillight lens. The seats have some rank shit creases on 'em.
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Spurge: "I went up 'ere ta th' Shiv-ur-ley place taday ta git 'at back winder fixed in th' ol' blue car. 'hits stuck haifway down 'n won' go up. I tol' 'em just to close it 'n discannec' th' switch so it cain' be opened no more. I don' hardly use it no way. I don' go down th' road wid only mah back winder down lak a carload ah n_____s. Yeah. I seen a carload ah dam n_____s lais' week. They'uz goin' down th' dam road in th' cold with th' back winders down ayah'ing it out. I said God-ah-m-eye-dee-dam, they gon' ketch their death ah col'."
Apparently, Spurge didn't go to the "Shiv-ur-ley" place that day. He just thought he'd been or was going to go or something or another.
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Here's a view of Spurge's kitchen floor. Believe it or not, 2 large trashbags of garbage were removed from the floor PRIOR to this picture.
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Spurge don't do much cooking on his stove as you can see from the encroachment of cans and stuff onto the cooking surface of his stove. In the foreground is one of Spurge's chief dietary items, V-eye-EE-na sauce-si-jiz. On the floor you can see an overwhelmed garbage bag lying on the floor. Once they fill up, he just keeps tossing garbage at them until a mound forms which eventually buries them. What an aroma.
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Spurge's dining area has looked like this for a long time. His table has long been buried under papers and stacks of envelopes with the corner cut out, held together with dry rotted rubber bands. In the foreground is a motorized chair he bought at my mother's estate auction and wheelchair parts. Of particular note are 2 boxes containing 6 1 gallon bottles of some fruit drink. They've been sitting there nearly a decade and some have turned deep, dark red. If you drank these, it would come out looking like it went in, only alot faster.
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Here's where Spurge sits most of the time. In the foreground is his shit creased Invacare wheelchair. In the top right is an old RCA XL-100 TV from the early 70s. The filter capacitors dried out long ago so the audio has a loud "Buuuuuh", 120Hz "motorboat" signal superimposed on it.
Spurge: "Ah had ol' man Beeker ta change th' pire switch on 'at ol' TV an' hit still plays good."
Note the Time Warner cable box on top. Spurge keeps cussing about it and saying he's "gon git t'at 'eral put up". The antenna he's referring to is in picture 21.
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This is a big picture view of Spurge's urine lacquered hallway, clearly showing the trail from the back bedroom to the hall restroom. In the foreground, you can see that clean up efforts are underway. That's toilet tissue, kleenex and paper towels you see matted to the floor. Parts of it are hard. Other parts have a spongy texture.
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This is a close-up shot of his urine lacquered hallway. Yessir. It smells worser than it looks. My theory is that he pees as he's trying to reach the toilet. Then, he tosses paper towels down to soak it up but never gets them up, creating a sort of paper machee decopage on his floor. I wiped my shoes with Clorox wipes.
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The urine lacquered trail continues into the back bedroom, as he calls it. A piece of newspaper is matted to the floor. There alot of trash compacted behind the door, consisting of paper, empty and nearly empty cans of Ensure and soiled underpants. I filled the trashbag in the foreground so I could get in the door. One corner of the room is piled high with stuff, some of which is trash. The window is inaccessible as are the closet doors. The stench is overwhelming.
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This is the filthy mattress Spurge sleeps on. A night on this and you'll have sores a plenty. Where the sheet was pulled back, you can see an area covered in duct tape. There's basically a big hole here. Yeah. I don't know what dripped down the headboard. I ain't touching it. There's piles of papers, trash, boxes, medicine bottles, clothes and more stuff extending out from the wall by about 2 feet. It's approxinmately 12" - 18" deep. This is one end of the urine lacquered trail. It looks like he ran out of space to manuever due to the trash. So he shoved the mattress and springs against the dresser.
Note the urine lacquering along the bottom of Spurge's nightstand. It looks like a thick layer of the glazing you see on Krispy Kreme doughnuts only it is tinted yellow. The middle drawer is where Spurge kept his "smut collection".
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This is the large corner pile of junk, boxes, clothes, trash and debris blocking access to the bedroom window. That window hasn't been opened since the early 60s. Yes, that's the top rung of a ladderback chair protruding from the top in from of the window. There's a broken walker in the pile, Van Halenized with electrical tape. I don't know what all the tubing is for and don't care to find out.
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This is the beat up chest of drawers in his bedroom. It's adorned by a pile of the same junk, boxes, clothes, trash and debris found elsewhere in the house. The compacted trash behind the door with partially emptied Ensure cans is in the background. Just behind the door is one of those oil filled radiator type electric heaters AND IT'S PLUGGED IN! (not on, just plugged in)
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This is the unused master bedroom. It is filled with junk, boxes, clothes, trash and debris, piled chest high. You can walk about 4 feet into the room but no further unless you climb over this stuff. The unused master bath is full of junk. The shower stall is full to chest high with junk.
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In yet another shot of the unrine lacquered hallway, I see that Spurge has used newspaper to soak up the pee. Notice how some of the tissues turn the corner into the hall restroom. My nephew and I cleaned the hall restroom last summer and a woman working for Spurge cleaned it a few days before I took these photos. So there was little shock value to be had by photographing it. Click here for a description of the summer bathroom cleanup.
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Here's another bedroom piled high with junk, boxes, clothes, trash and debris. I slept in that baby crib 48 years ago. It was never moved. That's a nice pie safe in the corner, one of the few valuable pieces of furniture in the house and in front of it, mother's old Dirt devil vacuum. See, Spurge does have a vacuum cleaner.
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Spurge's den fireplace has a large piece of cardboard covering it. It too is inaccessible due to junk, boxes, clothes, trash and debris. Under this debris is a coffee table. His shit creased wheelchair, roller walkers with hand brakes and his fairly new Invacare motorized chair are visible. The controls on the Invacare chair are so sensitive, he doesn't use it. He has broken electrical outlet covers off the walls and gouged holes into the sheet rock from these collisions. There's another, even larger motorized chair in the den which hasn't been used in some time. Both came from the VA. The white lounge chair in the foreground is one he got cheap for helping a broke down truck driver out on his mail route. Notice the sawed off 2x4 under the back legs. Yeah. This chair's springs were busted by a 350 pound woman who was working for him. He says she got fat from "eatin' peanut butter 'n jelly smmiches an' layin' in th' dam' bed all day. ... 'an when 'at 3 hunnert 'n fity poun' aise plopped down in mah cheer, I node it'uz rurnt. Th' sprangs is busted." So it's piled high with junk, boxes, clothes, trash and debris.
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Spurge's ancient RCA XL100 19" TV with the dried out filter capacitors is the center of this shot. I worked at RCA with the man who designed the SCR defection circuitry used in this set. It earned him the coveted Sarnoff award. In the background is a old Philco (help me out here Chip) radio, topped by Papa Bud's old Zenith tabletop radio with the space age tuning dial. There's really nice paneling in here. On the floor in front of the TV is where Spurge's catheter bag leaked urine on the floor with it's open stopcock valve.
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More junk, boxes, clothes, trash and debris are piled on top of a large motorized chair, walkers, chairs, cases of motor oil and Ensure, snow tires and more old bottles of deep, dark red fruit drink. Most of the square footage in this house is inaccessible.
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The dishes in Spurge's sink haven't been disturbed in several years. Occasionally, someone washes the dishes and empties out the sink. Then Spurge uses it again until it fills. On the counter is a plastic GE clock radio with a shredded speaker. When not at home, Spurge turns this on with the volume dimed full out. You can't really discern the signal from the noise. Spurge has scratched hell out of the once beautiful paneling. There's a cheap, crappy, broken floor standing clock. Spurge claimed this prize for going to one of those time share scam weekends.
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Two car doors to a 1983 Chevrolet Malibu sit on top of a log pile out int Spurge's backyard. I don't know what all that crap is back beyond the fence. Blue tarps are visible. Remember, this is sort of an upscale neighborhood with $200k houses. My childhood doctor lived around the corner. I can't fathom why this mess is tolerated, not to mention the 3 cars, two of which are clunkers.
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This is the TV antenna Spurge paid dearly to have removed from my mother's house after her death a few years back. I don't know whether he got the Alliance brand "Tenna Rotor" which controls the stepper motor. At one time, you could pick up WFMY 2 Greensboro, WXII(WSJS) 12 Winston Salem, WGHP 8 High Point, WBT 3 Charlotte, WSOC 9 Charlotte and public TV. But now it's a rusty relic that he'll never use and I will have to dispose of. I'll probably have to hacksaw the mast to get it into the dumpster bin I'll be renting.
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On Spurge's screened back porch is a dishwasher. I don't know whether it works but I bet it doesn't. He got a german sheperd dog back in the 70s. He quickly got rid of the dog but kept the doghouse. When I told my mother about the dog, her response was, "I hope it shits and he steps in it." I suspect that was indeed the outcome. Behind the doghouse is a trap Spurge used to catch neighborhood cats because "they git up on mah got dam car 'n scratch hell out of it." The big wood pile in the carport has been there since the late 80s. I don't know where the orange cone came from.
Spurge's car fleet includes:
1. modified 1992 Chevrolet Caprice - dubbed the "Shamoo" by Highway Patrol officers who drove them in the early 90s. Spurge tends to buy whatever car is currently being used as a police cruiser.
2. 1983 Chevrolet Malibu - he's poured 1000s of dollars into keeping this abortion running. Spare doors for it sit atop a pile of wood in the middle of his yard. The best use of this car would be as a movie prop. Film it being pushed off a cliff and blowing up when it hits the bottom. On the other hand, imagine the fun you could have with this old clunker on a snow day. Most of the drunks I played in bands with drove cars like this.
3. 1998 Chevrolet Lumina - Spurge calls it, "'at lil' ol' Loo-min-ee" My mother drove this car until she died 3 years ago. He has bumped into yellow steel pipes filled with concrete and skint up the exterior. The seats have rank shit creases.
All 3 cars feature dusty boxes of junk in the back seat and trunk.
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I think when the time comes, I'll just get one of those appliance handtrucks and pick up Spurge's fridge, roll it out to the dumpster and heave it in, full. I mean, it's beyond redemption. Check out that discolored hot dog. mmmmmmmm There's some kind of meat in the lower right drawer. I ain't gonna open the drawer for a better view. Notice the rubber band around the aged egg carton.
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Another close up of the kitchen floor garbage pile. Oh my god. He HAS been drinking the deep, dark red fruit drink. Oh, I understand. That's what the black stuff is on the hall floor. And there's some kind of liquid stuff in the bag that looks like corn. I can't tell whether there was any attempt made to eat it before it wound up there.
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Here's another view of his den sitting area. I see a Duracell D battery on the floor near some syrofoam packing material. There are red and green checkered bags with handles containing the christmas gifts we gave him in 2004.
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There's a couch under the papers and boxes. The waist high debris field in the background was shown from another angle in 18.jpg.
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It's another shot of Spurge's motor fleet, the carport and the lovely screened in porch. The 1983 Malibu doesn't quite fit in the carport due to the woodpile.
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Except for a lone walnut tree in Spurge's backyard about 20 yards for the woodpile with the 1983 Chevy Malibu car doors, there are no trees near the house. There's thick woods on the back edge of the property. It's a fairly steep hill.
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Spurge has never used the front entrance. There's no side walk going to it. The front door opens into the living room or parlor. It's the only room in the house not filled with junk, boxes, clothes, trash and debris. There's usable furniture in the there. But Spurge seldom goes in there.
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The Dog Dick Candle. It got so hot in the master bedroom that Spurge's candle softened and wilted over toward the wall mounted holder.
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The master bath shower wasn't being used. So Spurge repurposed it as a dump for used commode seat extensions, stools and other unwanted medical products. The tiles were once pink but are now sorta beige.
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A better view of the master bath shower. There's 2 commode seat extensions and a commode chair ditched in there. Since those peg the disgust-o-meter, nevermind what's under them.
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Nobody has used the master bath commode. But it's teeming with life.
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Spurge's Mystery Preserves. To the left was the last bicycle I rode in Lexington, a 3 speed Huffy english style bike.
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Another shot of the shelves of Spurge's preserves. Spurge saved some car springs on the floor under the shelves.
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Some of the lids have corroded and the contents are a deep, dark color. The more corrosion, the less content in the jar. Hmmm, a pattern emerges. Perhaps this is a science experiment Spurge was conducting.
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There ain't no tellin' how long these canned goods have been in Spurges basement or what their contents were.
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More bicycle parts and a Christmas tree stand. In the foreground is the remnants of a bike my mother got me for my 7th birthday. I think she won it from Lanier Hardware. It was way too big for me to ride then.
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What basement is complete without the gas tank off a 1970 Impala? That's the fusebox on the wall. To reach it, you'd have to step in an inch or so of sanding water. Spurge stores gasoline down here. Yeah, with a gas furnace.
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Numerous basement flooding episodes have been ignored over the years. Spurge nailed a board across the door to enhance his security.
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This was Ma Mame's Maytag washing machine. I don't know how long it's been in Spurge's basement or whether it works. Any belts or hoses are likely dry-rotted by now. When I was 7 or 8, I got my thumbs caught in the wringers. Luckily Ma Mame was nearby and disengaged the rollers. My guess is that's her old stove sitting in the waist high junk pile in Spurge's basement.
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Spurge's basement junk pile contains a spare bumper for a 1981 Chevrolet C10 truck. I used to have such a truck but can't imagine why Spurge has a bumper for it. There's more than a half dozen boxes of adult diapers stacked up on the edge of the junk pile. I think he got these from the VA.
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Let's see. There's tires, chains, soggy old flattened boxes and plastic buckets containing lord knows what in this corner. Water is leaking into the basement somehow and there's some standing in this corner. That'll complicate sales logistics.
Spurge used to keep some tires with chains on them for when it snowed. He said when he was on his mail route, it was far easier to put on the tires that had chains on them than it was to put on the chains.
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For whatever reason, Spurge had the washer and dryer hook ups put down in the basement. There was a laundry chute in the hall bathroom. This proved to be very inconvenient and Spurge didn't use these much. He relied on family members, girlfriends, laundromats and later my mother for laundry. This area also flooded. It's unlikely these appliances work.