a day with the chainsaw

After two weeks or so of zero activity beyond picking up a few sticks in the yard and walking the dog, Sunday dawned with a clear blue sky and temps promising to hit the mid 60s. I did my yoga routine and after our Sunday brunch put on some ragged blue jeans and headed outside with the chainsaw. Pre-deck I spent most my yard and flower bed maintenance in the little and big backyards and so the front is usually in a state of neglect and untidiness. Sunday I set out to correct some of that. There is a fairly large pittosporum next to the yew tree that had two big dead branches and the yew trees needed some low branches removed and the three red tip photinias across the front were completely out of control and neglected and full of dead and low branches and the three crepe myrtles had water sprouts all around as did the two Chinese fringe flower trees which also needed low branches removed. And so I spent 4 hours out there with the chainsaw and long handled nippers trimming and pruning out dead wood and low branches and water sprouts and then cutting up the downed branches into manageable sizes and loading the truck with all the debris. Before I loaded up the truck with Sunday's debris, I filled it with the pile of dead orange cosmos, another pile of fallen dead wood, and the pittosporum and yew branches and then emptied that onto the burn pile. The photinia debris is still in the truck though because by then I was really tired and still needed to walk the dog.

When I was loading the truck the second time my neighbor Gary came by and asked if I hired out. Yes, but I don't think you can afford me. My sister came out to observe and remark on all the fun I was having. Well, the fun part's over, the fun part was using the chainsaw. Neither offered to help.

But, you know, if it wasn't actually fun it did feel good to get out there and do some physical labor, use my body, and it looks so much better.

before (I had already worked on the one on the left before I took this picture)

after (though I saw three more branches that need to come off but I had already put everything away)

the view from the street (before this the branches on the street side were so low you couldn't walk under there, you can now but you do have to duck a little)

I still have a lot of work to do in the front, tidying up and bordering the flower beds and doing some planting around the deck, spreading mulch in the areas that only get enough sun for weeds. I was going to take advantage of these warm days today, Monday, before a cold front starts moving in to dig up a clump of dietes iris that's in an inconvenient spot and which doesn't get enough sun to bloom but it's overcast and has and is supposed to rain all day. Just as well, I guess, because by the time I quit yesterday, the body was tired. And we do need the rain.

Here's the 12.5 acre pasture behind our house, behind everyone's houses on my side of the street, with the trailer park on the other side. 

The animal path is right about at our property line.

Neighbor Gary, a retired farmer who has lived in his house all his life says that property has a kind of slough through it at the far end from me and even my end can be under water after a hard rain. I wonder if the prospective buyers realize how easily that property floods.