Just out of curiousity, as I'm tearing off my roof, the old tar paper was laid going up and down instead of side to side... (Nevermind that there are large areas where it wasn't laid at all)

Isn't that an example of what not to do?

 

Yes, tar paper goes across the roof.

 

Actually, that sounds like 2 examples of what not to do.

 

Actually its 3, hiring those guys in the first place counts.

 

I wound up hiring someone to finish the last half of my roof... I was pretty well past the parts where I was going to have any leaks, that and I'd learned some lessons about where and how to leave the roof when I stopped work.. But since I had some water damage from 3 or 4 days of rain and snow (which followed some very nice sunny 80 degree weather) I decided I'd rather use the insurance money to pay for labor to finish the roof, and fix the drywall myself instead...

Anyway, I somewhat suspect it's possible the previous owner of the house could have done the roof himself... Most other stuff seems do-it-yourself quality (in many cases, do-it-wrong-yourself quality) But certainly I have an advantage these days with the internet to research how to do things right