Cutting Down The Tree

When I first saw this one, I decided it was a job for Paul to do. He's a mean hand with a tree saw, whether the long or short handled one.  I do fine on small clippers or larger loppers, but the saws are hell on my shoulders. I told Paul when he got home from work that July day where it was, roughly, and that removing it, before it decided to warp our chain link fence as it grew right next to it, was going to be his job.

He immediately forgot about it.

I decided to do some of the last yard chores in these last days before heading back south. That tree was still there, still healthy, still growing. Still offensive. A box elder, it's one of the weediest of the maple family, though that family does have lots of varieties vying for that distinction, much as I love them. This one actually had two trunks, the original, fat one on our side of the fence, and a twiggy one coming up from the bottom knuckle on the other side. Both would have to be dealt with. It appeared I was going to have to be the one to do it, not only because it was getting so late, but because Paul's recovery from an abscess infection resulting in a fever and days of work lost was still keeping him from putting in a full day on his job. I'm still hoping to count on him to mow the back yard for our farewell-to-Minnesota bonfire. Little kids will be there. Geezers with unsteady footing on an uneven yard will be there. The lawn needs its second mowing of the year! Especially since we had about an inch of rain yesterday.

This morning I donned my outside duds, grabbed two saws, one set of loppers, and a bit of brush killer to paint the remaining stump(s) with once the job was done.

There were challenges. Once I set the equipment down I needed a chair for my base of operations. If I was going to do this thing, I was going to do it comfortably, and save all the work for my upper body. Our resin lawn chairs have skinny legs. Remember that 1" of rain yesterday? Every five minutes those legs sank into our basically still clay soil and had to be pulled up and repositioned. There are some wild divots back along that fence area.

The first saw is pretty great. It has a curved blade, curved inward on the toothed side, and a very long handle. In previous use I'd come to appreciate the teeth faced only in the "pull" direction, so I could push it back through the trees or branches easily for the next big stroke. My muscles work better in pull than push mode. I'd gotten about a third of the way through this lower trunk when it started leaning to close the cut and trap the blade. The part I was cutting through was over 2 1/2" diameter, just above the knuckle on the ground. It was low enough and close to the fence enough that my saw angle had to be chosen very carefully, not only to avoid trying to cut through the clay but to also avoid running into the chain link. It also had to be nearly parallel to the fence. Knuckle bumping time. But even as big as this trunk was in terms of how little could be cut at any time when such care had to be taken, it was flexible enough to stop all progress as it leaned away from the fence as that increasing sliver of trunk was removed.

I needed assistance. It wasn't going to be human. Steve was sleeping, and I wouldn't think of trying to get him out in the back yard for anything less than a bonfire with his favorite people in attendance. Paul had gone to work. I did try changing my position into one more facing the tree so I could cut sideways (stupid!) and lean my forehead against the trunk to push it back towards the fence. Pointless as that was, it gave me the idea I needed. 

Tie the tree to the top of the fence! Of course I had no idea where to find something to tie it with in the house or the storage shed. If I were to have the energy to take out this tree, and by this time I decided to take out its small offshoot as well, despite which side of the fence it was on, I wasn't going to spend any of it on hunting up a rope or something. But... I had shoelaces! Newish ones, nice and strong, in newish shoes. Since I wasn't going to be walking all over until the job was done, having one shoe sloppily covering my foot wasn't going to be an issue. Relacing it was going to be an issue later, but nevermind.  (Design flaws in this model shoe.)

The lace wrapped twice around the trunk and the top fence rail, and pulled tight, it had enough length to tie it off, in a shoelace bow of course. Why not? With the tree forced erect, I recommenced sawing. I had to switch saws back and forth because by then each had different strengths for the job. Intermittently I tried the loppers to see what cutting could be done that way, though most of that effort went into the frivolously fruitless task of building my arm muscles. So, back to alternating the saws. I was at a point now where the little saw tip could go inside one of the holes in the chain link, with its cut at a different angle now going through a smaller chunk of trunk, making it easier on me. Progress was again visible in accumulating sawdust.

Switch and saw, switch again and saw, try the loppers. At some point I was positive they would finally come in handy. Just because it hadn't happened yet.... Each switch meant relocating the chair again, a whole other kind of entertainment.

I finally noticed the back of the tree had a section splitting vertically up from the cut trunk. No way I could attack it with any of the tools  because it still was next to the fence, but it gave me another idea. Lose the shoestring. Not loosen it, lose it, as in put it back in my shoe, and knock the tree over to the ground along the fence. Once all of that was accomplished, the loppers did indeed come handy, first in cutting all the branches off the trunk so it would be lighter and more manageably close to the fence and ground, and then slip down between fence and trunk to cut through the splitting piece. Just a tiny bit more sawing and It! Was! Loose!

I finally was able to use the loppers one final time, through the fence and around the small trunk. A quick thought, however, before the final cut. I didn't want that to fall into the neighbor's yard. They might not only notice it and decide to be annoyed about not having a choice in what happened to "their" tree despite it never doing anything besides destroying the fence, but they might also simply be annoyed about having to pick it up off the ground. So before that last squeeze for the cut, I stood up, took the top of that smaller tree in my teeth to hold it, and cut. Then dropping the loppers, a free hand reached over the fence and hauled the last evidence of the tree over to our side to add to growing brush piles.

The brush killer was slathered twice over every new cut surface. With no rain expected for a couple days, it should be the last gasp for this box elder. Before putting my tools away for the season, in my elation at having completed a tricky job I went over to the dying apple trees that are supposed to be worked on this Sunday with much younger, able help with their chain saw. We promised them all the fresh apple wood they wanted to cut up and take back with them in exchange, besides our following family bonfire, of course. The trees have several large, very dead, very thoroughly angled and pokey branches around their lower end. These are the kind of branches that threaten eyes and push a sane person well away from the trunks which are a prime chain saw target. Those lower branches are very dead, several years dead in fact, and while dangerous are also fairly easy to saw through while the equipment is right there. It seemed the least I could do to open up a safe way to approach each tree, especially for somebody with a roaring chain saw in hand. They can cut the rest in a jiffy... now.

And yes, extra ibuprofin to allow sleep on a pair of misused shoulders was very appreciated tonight.

On Taking The Same Picture Again, And Again

 I do that. I mean I keep coming back to the same place, the same thing, and taking the same picture. or more likely pictures. Just look at this summer's garden shots. Daylilies, most of them, though I got here when the dutch and bearded iris were still blooming, along with columbine and a few others, and stayed through coneflowers, liatris, white Alaska daisies, brown-eyed Susans, balloon flowers, astilbe, and hostas. If we count the yard blossoms, we can add roses, honeysuckle bushes, high bush cranberries, milkweed and asclepias. I've shot most of them before, except for newly purchased varieties or newly planted ones from last fall. When I get a particular bloom, and a new one opens the next day in a slightly different spot or in different lighting or with different companions, I'm there taking more shots.

The thing is, it's never the same picture. The slightly hot pink are still  slightly hot pink ones, the small purples are same as the day before, except they aren't. Not quite. And I don't always shoot the same quality. Backgrounds vary, sun/shade varies, the direction they face varies, how open the petals are varies, and even something in the same color I shot yesterday strikes me more compellingly today. All that is just the garden flowers in just one garden.

Try the cherry trees. First there are oodles of green cherries. Then reddish. Then red, fat, and juicy. Then fewer of the red, fat and juicy, or a different hour of the day, or the magic of watching the birds go after them and teach their fledglings to do the same propels me to shoot more even without any birds. There might be blue sky or green treetops or white clouds behind the branches, and those are never the same either. I'm no longer here when they bloom, nor when their fall colors take over, nor when bare branches wear their various winter decorations, be it frost, sticky snow, or ice.

When I travel, I shoot the same mountains, or what appear to be. There are differences, as even they age, timeless though they seem. I study a stream as the water moves, and from as many angles as I safely can. I see how it changes on a return trip with light from a different angle, or how this year's water level reveals what last year's hid. Does the tree canopy enclose it more or has a storm broken openings for light to shine through? 

I love the fog. On a good morning, if I can I cancel plans, grab the camera, and roam looking for what it reveals when it hides other things. There's a favorite river close by with a park I can roam and a high bridge with a safe place to walk on each side. Are the sandbars larger and supporting greenery or have spring floods washed them away? Who's tied up a boat along the bank, or is casting from their boat downstream? Is a canoeist approaching? Two dozen? I'll keep returning here for the shot that tells my heart what it found there, or at least that's the hope since my heart has loved this spot for decades.

Occasionally I'll go through my photos and heartlessly cull former treasures. There'll be cleaner, sharper focus, a more perfect bloom, a day with more meaning, that sudden appearance of some wild creature not visible previously. I'll decide those three dozen shots are actually the same one, all mediocre, but I may keep one until the better one comes along. If a trip is not likely to be repeated, more are kept, so I don't forget a moment past the point of recovering it with another look at the photo. 

But I never have to do more than step outside for one of my perennial favorites, the driveway here in MN. There are shots looking both out and in. The ones looking in capture the history of the house, from a skeleton being built into a home, to the baby trees which grow and stretch from 3 feet to 60, even the different cars in the driveway. 

The cars fascinate me for what their windows catch. It might be a reflected sunrise, patterns of winter frost, something in the dirt or the leaves caught under the wiper blades. I've tried to catch doggie noses pushing out but they never misbehave just the right way at the right moment.

The best driveway shots are taken when the cars aren't there. Or at least aren't in the shot. One sunrise caught a long, heavy icicle standing in a snowbank which happened to be in the right spot when it dropped off the roof, and large enough to support it vertically for days after. The sun was rising red and snow shadows from the icicle were dark blue while the sun gleamed through the ice.

We have two birch clumps along the driveway, uprooting meandering trails in the asphalt. Halfway to the street are the white paper birches, their trunks with lichens a favorite backdrop for the flowers which happen to be growing near them. Out at the property line are the massively overgrown river birch, leaf laden branches pulled down low enough to brush the cars as they go through. Pruning off branches ever higher on their trunks each year never does more than mitigate the issue for the end of the season while the trees ready the next level of branches to make their attacks next midsummer. Looking out through them hides much of the neighborhood from view. Looking in from them, angled perfectly, frames the outlines of the house or more narrowly, isolates pieces of the garden. Looking outward in a good fog turns those branches into the end of your world. Morning sun turns those branches into silhouettes. Autumn flecks the sky with gold. Moonlight after an ice storm is unearthly.

Same shot? Always. Never.

My Weeping Willow Trees

When the house was built back in '91, the far back corner of the yard was a low spot that filled with water after heavy rains and held a small pond after the snow melted.  The land was 6' tall grass - my youngest calls it buffalo grass - on a tan clay surface. The whole field had to be cleared, dirt from the basement excavation spread out over it, and then seed scattered to give us an actual lawn. 

Or so they thought. It never has conformed to suburban standards. We like it that way.

We had the back fenced because our two keeshonds, Sam and Bridget, or "Sambridgee" as they were jointly called, needed a place to run and we couldn't keep up. Each weighed enough to make divots in the muck with every step. It never got rolled to smooth it out, because it would have been wasted effort, even as grass, clover, and miscellaneous weeds filled it in. We learned to live with it, and be glad that enough plants grew to keep the house from turning into a frame around clay carpets. 

But the sometimes corner pond remained. Conversation with a neighbor informed us that they'd dealt with the same issue, but solved it by planting several weeping willows along their back property line. They grew fast and the deep roots broke through the clay so it could drain. I loved the idea of weeping willows, long a favorite tree. A house we lived in when the kids were very little got a weeping willow planted in the front yard and within a couple years was climbable, due to judicious pruning to space the strongest limbs, and its perfect location for nutrients and moisture. My daughter nicknamed the tree "Alice". My daughter had since grown and left, but I welcomed the idea of a second "Alice" for the new yard. There was a grandchild on the way.

I wound up with two willows. They bore the "Alice" names for a bit but the names got forgotten. Two were all we had room for in the corner, with all the other things we'd already planted or were planning to plant all around the yard. I'd started hunting for some but it turned out they were not popular trees at the local nurseries. They have their special needs and those are either on your land or not. They are perfect for the right situation, otherwise something of a weed. Or else they simply die.

After a few weeks of hunting I located a place which happened to be something I passed regularly without noticing it, just a few miles along the highway from the house. I popped in and decided, small though it was, I'd ask about willows anyway. He'd just had a shipment that morning but hadn't potted them yet so they weren't ready. Couldn't he sell them bare root? We'd plant them right away and he'd be saved the time and expense of potting them. He hemmed and hawed, went in his office and ran some figures, and came back with a price of $10 each for two. (Potted I think they would have run around $25. each.) I was delighted, got them loaded in the car, about 5 feet of slender branches sticking out a back window with the roots partly up on the dashboard, and drove straight home to plant them with Paul, my youngest.

That isn't all the story of that sale, however. I never went back to that place to buy anything else from him. I avoided it ever since, and most of his trees didn't sell but got planted on the premises, sign long gone, business closed. It may be he managed to turn off his customers the way he turned me off to the point where I could barely stand to remain long enough to complete the sale. Why? Because for no particular reason, completely irrelevant to our business, and having no reason to be inserted into the conversation, nearly every sentence he uttered was full of the "N-word". There were no black families in the area to have ticked him off at that point, though several have moved in since. None of his complaints were anything but pure venom, bile just to be ornery, ugliness for the sake of being ugly.

I never held their start against the enjoyment of those trees. As predicted, they grew fast, tall, sturdy, and got pruned several times a year with an eye to becoming climbing trees. I told the kids, for my granddaughter brought along her little half brother (another story), that they could climb in the trees all they wanted to, on one strictly enforced condition. The first branches were about three feet off the ground. The kids, in order to be safe in the trees, had to be able to manage getting up in them by themselves. They managed that as soon as possible and spent long hours up in them, climbing around, viewing the neighborhood from various perches. I cooperated by pruning to keep them safe for use, and the trailing branches short enough to sway just off the ground, filling in as yellow curtains around the trees at spring catkin time. 

Eventually there was a problem. I think they were growing too fast. We noticed a hollow in one trunk after a particularly hard winter. It was rotting from the inside out. Water got in, froze, expanded, thawed, left with a larger space for the next freeze-thaw and the next. I no longer believed them safe. That fall, before more winter damage could ensue, I had a party for cutting them down with chain saws and axes. My daughter and her husband brought a chain saw and started cutting low through the trunk of the first before we suddenly saw a problem and insisted they stop. The trunk luckily was still safe for an adult to climb up a ways and secure a rope to pull it as it fell in the direction we needed it to fall! Just in time too. Saved the fence and the neighbor's ire.

The second tree was safely roped ahead of time for its go round. Once down, branches got removed, cut up, trunk pieces cut into huge chair-sized chunks and vertically stacked for later splitting, and over the next few weeks the debris was organized for next summer's bonfires. Over ensuing years, the pillars of trunk pieces were pretty much left alone since nobody really wanted to bother splitting them. Woodpeckers made a nest in one chunk for a couple years. Eventually the ignored sections started rotting to the point where they were punky enough to break up by hand and made great kindling. Before their final removal, a dogwood bush was planted in the now reasonably dry corner. Later paper birches were placed in an "L" back in the corner, springing up enormously straight and tall, and edible elderberries filled in, another fruit to harvest for jelly. That whole corner has gone wild, lucky if a mower forces a way through every couple-three years so people can get through. Or perhaps it's the people who have to go through every couple-three years so a mower can get back there. This summer yellow iris have clumped around the remains of the old dogwood, waiting for it to decide it it still has a few years left in that spot or will just join the woodpile.

No trace of my willows remains. All the Alices have gone. Their job of breaking up the ground was performed beautifully. All the yard's clay has a good layer of black dirt covering it now, no matter where you dig. My weeping willows are just pleasant memories now, wistfulness waving through those memories like the branches waved over the ground, dusting the earth with yellow pollen and the laughter of children now long grown.

Where Has The Summer Gone?

And why wasn't I there for it? Oh wait, I was. Looking back, I've been busy doing everything and not so much for my own fun.

Swimming? Once. With my friend. We'd made plans, but the local options wound up costing $10 a time or $75 a month. Neither of us chose to afford more than one hour in a pool.

Crex? Once, again, with my friend and her son who complained most of the time because he didn't have his new glasses yet so couldn't appreciate anything beyond his cell phone. He didn't see the doe crossing the road, the trumpeter swans in the dozens on the lake, the osprey nest, the sandhill cranes being dive bombed by blackbirds. I didn't enter the photo contest, back this year after several when it was not held, as I don't have new pictures worth entering and can't remember now which ones got entered in previous years.

Photos? Well, I did get out for a bit one foggy morning, but much of what I wanted to shoot was under construction. Crex wasn't that photogenic the day we went, and the rest of what I shot was mostly what was blooming in the garden. There was lots of work still to do there, despite last year's slaving, though this older body took a few extra mornings off from the job.

See family? With Steve's back in the condition it's in, despite everything, they pretty much have to come to us or make plans to meet with just me. Everybody's been seen once now, except one visit planned for today but postponed for - hopefully - tomorrow. But once just isn't enough, especially when it's in the middle of a crowd, with all kinds of other things and people grabbing your attention away from each other.

Teaching jewelry making? Once, with my friend, but limited time, so things remain unfinished.

The bead store where I've passed on some things learned in AZ by teaching classes to their staff hasn't panned out yet because the woman who OK's and participates in that has had her own "stuff" for much of the summer. I still shop there for stuff I don't get in AZ, but I'm waiting for a go/no go on the class.

Shopping? Not enough, and too much spent. Gas prices dropped as summer passed, especially in this immediate area, so my reluctance to go places eased somewhat.  I did manage to keep fed because of course. I got a haircut and necessary oil change, but as long as I was going to be driving around there are places I'd rather have gone.

If I've lost the summer, Steve has even more so. He'd planned on walleye fishing on Lake Mille Lacs, but they cancelled walleye season for a bit, and now his back won't let him. He hasn't even gone fishing along his favorite riverbank from his folding chair since the first brief time. Most of his time is spent in his lift chair, waking or sleeping, reading, eating, watching TV. These days he uses a cane inside the house and is getting discouraged about growing old. Not just older. Old. Walking in the yard requires another person's steadying hand in addition to his cane.

Bonfires? There's been little rain, but it keeps falling often enough to keep the firewood pretty wet. Weekends have had regular rain, or at least threats of it, so we can't make good plans to have people up here for a bonfire. It finally stayed dry for a couple days, so we had two in a row. The first night, with a surprise visit from an old friend of Steve's, it was cold and most of the wood was still damp, but  they had a great time, even roasted a few brats. Last night we had other friends up for the first time this summer and Paul had lots of dry wood for a good fire with a great bed of coals. Since we'd shopped for food for several people who had a rainy Saturday cancel, we cooked all the brats so they wouldn't go to waste, and we'll work our way through what's left in the next several days. S'mores were managed, along with plain marshmallows for Steve, his favorite version. Two nights of great conversations, but not what his back appreciated, especially his walks across the uneven ground in the back yard. A trip for today had to be postponed.

I spent my morning instead out cutting down trees. These are not the ones which can be cut back with loppers. I dragged out the saw. New muscles are busy reminding me that they found that a very bad idea. Not doubt the trees would agree, but they're mostly scattered across the yard where tomorrow's job will be hauling them over to a major pile where they can sit for further attention from Paul, sorting, cutting, relocating into the various sizes of firewood and twigs for further bonfires, probably next year once they've aged. Right now they are no longer growing up through the honeysuckle hedge, nor are a bunch of tiny trees and some massive vines, enough to make me feel I accomplished something. The stumps got treated, so gone = gone as far as they are concerned. There were box elders, even a sizeable maple weed tree. In the process lots of thick old dead branches of honeysuckle were removed, along with some live branches that were way out of place due to lack of regular pruning. Now another garden area is getting some sunshine again, badly needed.

I can see what's been accomplished in the yard. But in those needed rest breaks, I sit in a chair, looking around and spying things remaining to be done that likely won't. The paper birch trees along the driveway are dying back, dropping dead twigs all over the place, messing up the flowers and littering the driveway. If large enough, the undercarriages of the cars catch them and drag them out into the street, if we're lucky. If not, they travel further. There are places where small trees unnoticed last year have gained more hold and are emerging from the middles of sections of flowers. The river birch on the other side of the driveway have branches which are drooping so low the cars push them aside as they pass. So do we. Plants that need moving aren't yet. Grass that needs removing hasn't been yet. But some flowers that have spread way out in the lawn but needing about 18" of height to bloom have been dug up with enough roots and bulb to be replanted in the flower bed, while others have been left in the lawn for Paul to mow around in hopes they'll produce seeds before winter and he'll actually remember to harvest those and spread those in the flower beds.

I've found the wheelbarrow handy for moving cuttings and clippings to the mulch pile or brush piles in the back yard, but it had to sit in front for over a week. It got heavy. I'd worked to the point of exhaustion, a regular failing of mine. A couple mornings later, the pile inside had compacted and I added more. Then there were the lily of the valley with seed stems I cleared from a large area where they'd invaded, something that we really don't need spread through any more of the yard. It doesn't listen to us. So the full barrow sat a few more days while we tried to figure out where all those seeds could be dumped without finding a home. The local critters won't even eat them. They're very hard so stepping on them does no damage either. They sat  in the barrow a few more days, compacting a bit more. It rained. Compacted more. Rained again. Other stuff got added. (Sensing a pattern here?) 

I started moving it and found it too heavy for my level of ambition, so it sat some more. When my need to relocate it matched my energy level to do so, I managed  about 20 feet before deciding I needed a better idea. It was time to unload the wheelbarrow and haul it's load away in sections. We have a very large plastic pail with rope handles, so it got filled, dragged about 50 feet before the rope handle pulled out. So, time to bend over and drag it by curling my fingers under the lip. Whew! But done. Back to the wheelbarrow. I hauled it another 20 feet before deciding it needed another sectioning off, same method. By the time the last third needed to be moved, I finally decided to tilt it so the water ran out of the bottom. I could do it  now without dumping everything out, just the water. The yard needed that rich deep brown "tea" more than the mulch pile, or my muscles moving it, did. That eliminated about 3 gallons! And the rest was easy peasy. All is in the big mulch pile out back including the wheelbarrow, and at this point I don't care any more if lily of the valley grows in it. I already found two back by one of the brush piles last night when I was tending the bonfire after Paul had finished cooking duties, so it's too late to prevent them. We'll see how they survive regular (aka monthly) mowing beck there.

There's all the indoor chores as well. I'm now handwashing the small dishes for the three of us, taking out trash and recyclables, and running the cans curbside per their schedules. There's floor sweeping, laundry in the basement which is my one "opportunity" to exercise those stair climbing muscles long dormant. I somehow seem to be the only person in the house who can actually see the dirt in the bathroom and who'll do something about it. I think I almost (!) have Steve trained not to leave piles of clothing next to the bed on his side and partially blocking my entry into the closet we share, but of course when I think it's ingrained, I trip on the next pile. At least I haven't stubbed my toe on the corner of the bed or dresser like Steve has. 

Right now I'm finally getting  some energy back. It's bedtime. My back has found that one spot that complains, attributable to all that lifting, pushing, pulling of the trees and branches I had to relocate this morning. Much of that was sheer laziness, testing to see if I'd sawed through enough that the rest could be snapped off so I could quit sawing. The rest of their relocation into a single huge pile for Paul to ignore or not will happen in the morning. But when I was rummaging in the box of food for whatever I'd wind up having for supper, I lifted one small box off what turned out to be a package of Hershey's kisses. I knew I'd bought that a few weeks ago! But where....? So after the Mac & cheese and a couple dried apricots, there was a handful of kisses. 

Chocolate can go a long way towards curing what ails you! That's a very good thing, since packing to head south starts again all too soon. I'll need more chocolate, I'm sure!

Product Review: Second Attempt

Amazon emailed me that my first attempt at a review of their product was unacceptable. Those of you who read my emails will find this familiar from the long version, but I'll keep it simple here. I ordered a daylily, something I've done several times over the years, always with success, even though there have been variations in size and price. The variation this time was extreme, as in a totally crushed box with a deceased plant inside. Had it died in transit some part of it would have still been green, but it was grey, shriveled, and crumbly. So I had something to say.

First, one star, since you can't submit a review with zero, much as some of us would like to. Then:

Do not buy from these people!           I have ordered daylilies from other shippers with excellent results but this flimsy box was completely scrunched when I opened the mailbox. No packing material inside or moisture-holding material around the plants, just a thin strip of kitchen plastic wrap holding it..."

I apologize that I didn't independently copy what I wrote before shooting it off. I would have liked the full copy since they rejected it. But I detailed why it was dead before shipping, and suggested they delist this product/company. Amazon wasn't happy, but the refund was instantaneous, suggesting that they'd had this complaint with this company before. (I did an online search - after my purchase of course - and found they had no reviews from a quick Google company check worldwide, but lots of complaints. One even came with a warning bar over the product.) I didn't even have to return the dead plant in the crumpled box, nor go out and buy another box, etc. 

Amazon had suggestions on how to write a review. Things like obscene language didn't apply in my case, but I took one to heart.

"Your review should focus on specific features of the product and your experience with it."

OK, I can do that.

Summary/title:  Useful.

Stars: 2. (After all I claimed it was useful, right?)

Description: "This product was shipped promptly, and will make a great addition to my mulch pile, as the dead and crumbly part of it has already been accomplished. I'm sure many of my other plants will benefit from it for weeks to come." 

I'd love to see THAT get past their censors.

 

 

The Two Day Great Recliner Hunt Marathon

Thirteen years ago the garage in this house was converted to a bedroom. The plan had been to install my father there after Mom's death, but it turned out he couldn't handle the two shallow steps down to the garage level. Daddy got my bedroom instead, and I got the new one. Once Daddy had died, I went back to my old one and shortly afterwards Steve moved what would fit from his previous apartment into the former garage. We have been slowly adapting it to use by the two of us to share on our summers up here, now that my son Paul has bought the house. Early this summer Steve donated a large share of his books here to the local library for their sales to raise funds, and two large book cases became one small one. Other things relocated.

It has long needed a chair, something more than a folding one which usually becomes a clothing holder when things are between being clean on a hanger and tossed into a laundry hamper. The bed is high and not that comfortable for sitting, but floor space remained cluttered. When the room was designed, I had a hanging lamp installed in one corner, perfect for reading under while sitting in a comfy chair. Alas. The corner had become the default location for a display cabinet, empty and unused, a sentimental family heirloom Steve brought with him. Tall, shallow, nearly all glass, doors opening on the sides, it was previously owned by Steve's sister. Once she died, nobody in the family had a place for it. Had the timing been different, we might have moved it down to AZ to stand next to its twin which I'd happened to pick up at an auction, not realizing the two were identical. So there it stayed in the corner, empty, unappreciated.

He actually sold it once, but the person who bought it never came to pick it up for reasons not relevant to the story. Last week I was talking with a friend who happened to need one. I offered, and she arranged to have it taken away Sunday. It survived its ride to its new home, got cleaned, and is ready to be filled with a new supply of collectibles. 

We had room for a chair!

What we didn't have were 1: a chair, and 2: a large budget for one. Solution? Thrift stores. So Monday I decided to head over to Forest Lake, 17 miles away, and an area with three thrift stores if the next town counts, as well as my favorite hair cutting place and my old oil change spot, both needed extra stops. I left early, considering that the stores didn't open till 10. No problem, as I could get my oil change right away.

That was the theory, anyway. The sign advertised no waiting, so I drove to the open space behind the first used bay. I was informed that I'd be gotten inside in just 5 minutes. Meanwhile the car next row over went in, and the one which pulled in behind me decided that line was to his best advantage and switched. When the same employee who greeted me greeted him, he was just there for a fluid top up, and got waved right into the third, heretofore empty bay, where they started to work on his car right away. Another car came and filled his spot. I wouldn't have noticed except the guy ahead of me, who was supposed to be done 10 minutes earlier, still sat over the pit, waiting for who knows what. Nobody was working in his car. Instead his guy was over in bay 3, chatting up the "top me up" guy. I could hear their conversation, vacations plans, some performance both liked, along with a third person, the greeter, who also had left his post and joined in. Nobody actually worked on his car after two minutes as by then his fluids were full.

Eventually, the car ahead of me left, I was guided to my spot over the pit, and... well, after another promise of being on the road in just 5 minutes, both guys who were to work on accomplishing that were back with Mr. Top Up. The greeter finally came over and checked my oil dip stick before my old oil  got drained out.  About 3 minutes later the second guy, the upper level one for my lane, came over and repeated the dip stick check since the greeter was back chatting and hadn't bother to inform him it had been done or what it said. It wound up taking an hour to get my oil changed. The fellows didn't even bother with trying to upsell me more services or products, because Mr. Top Up was still in the 3rd bay enjoying the company even as I finally drove out.

OK, enough nonsense. On to thrift store #1, one recliner. The color matched the bedroom decor, it was a wall hugger, and it was so huge that it must have belonged to somebody 6 1/2 feet tall and 400 pounds. The seat springs were sprung, and my own behind was less than a foot off the floor. Steve could never get out of this chair! I had enough trouble and my knees and back are all in much better shape. I was so low that I had to raise my arm up and over the chair arm, try to bend it where it didn't bend without serious trauma imposed on it first, in order to reach the lever raising the foot rest. This was a definite no sale.

Next two stores had none to try at all. I was starting to think I'd be better served by heading down to the metro to Slumberland, a favorite shopping spot for mattresses and recliners over previous decades. It was a lovely day for a drive, but when I got there, "there" was no longer home to a Slumberland. So back up to Forest lake for my haircut, last on my list because I didn't want itchy hairs all over me while I was trying to make sensible shopping decisions. Under those circumstances my choices tend to be based on getting home as quickly as possible so I could shower all those prickly hairs down the drain. I hadn't made a reservation online the way this chain likes, since I had no clue what time I might arrive. I didn't mind this wait as it was only about half an hour and the staff was being pretty efficient in getting through the customers ahead of me, notably unlike an earlier experience that day.

Once in the chair, I gave explicit directions on how I wanted my hair cut. Has that ever worked? Not this time either. Funny thing is, I actually like the cut this time. It's so short that I have no curl showing and won't need another cut for about three months. I can wake up, look at it in the mirror half a minute after leaving the pillow, and not see any need to brush a hair. That's my version of a summer haircut! By the time I got home it was well past time to give up for the day though. I could research other thrift stores further away, make a route of it, and start again in the morning. It was supposed to be too hot for yard work anyway.

My first thrift store next morning had no recliners in it. That was out east in Wisconsin. The next meant passing home heading west, then head north for the start of a huge loop covering three more counties. It was time for gas, since the second next town to the west from home has been having the lowest prices. Yesterday, not needing gas yet, it was down to $3.83.  Forest Lake the day before was 4.39 on one side of a freeway exit and $.20 cheaper in the same chain on the other side of the same bridge. Today the gas near home was down to $3.80. Good thing to wait, eh? (Today it was down to $3.74 locally, and since we had an errand in Forest Lake got to compare those prices with $4.24!) 

I went to the next town on my list to where the thrift store was supposed to be according to Google. The company had some kind of office building there, no store. 

Before I left the area, I decided to check out an old outlet center. They'd failed years ago but I just heard it was bought out and new stores were going in. Maybe a furniture outlet store? But once I got there the filling-in part was still somebody's fantasy. As I did a turn in the parking lot I found my thrift store across the parking lot and decidedly doing a good bit of business. In I went.

They had few chairs in the furniture area. It was becoming a familiar story. Lots of dressers, tables, book stands, magazine racks, etc. As I turned towards the door to leave, there on the other side of it was a seating group: sofas, loveseats, upholstered chairs. One was definitely a recliner, the tan twin to the blue monster from yesterday. Including the low seat.  I sat in the chair next to it, thinking it might be suitable if I didn't absolutely have to have a recliner. As I sat, however, I happened to push against the arms and lo! a footrest popped up and the back went down slightly. Comfy! Light weight. Dark orange paisley but who'd notice or care in the corner of the room. All we needed was a comfy place to read in a quiet corner under a lamp where we didn't have to fight to concentrate while somebody else's most annoying choice of TV played because this was in a different room, two closed doors away. Decision made!

Almost. Where was the price tag? I circled that chair, didn't fine one. Was it actually still for sale? I walked up to the checkout gal, and when she finished her current customer, asked what she knew about the chair. After a little consultation with another employee, they both decided some customer in the store still shopping must have pulled the price tag off so they could buy it. After some thought, I asked if they had a P.A. system and could inquire if anybody was carrying the tag so I'd know for sure. Regretfully, no. But I could wait in a row of wooden chairs near the counter and see if anybody came up to purchase it. So I did. Wait. And wait some more. After most everybody who'd been in the store ahead of me had made their purchases and left, a third employee came out from the back room and started training somebody new. Deciding she was somebody who knew stuff, I asked if I could interrupt her for a second. Apparently customers rank higher than employees, lucky me. I showed her the chair, she looked through her book of items sold and to be picked up, and finding nothing, walked with me over to the chair. After poking around a bit, she produced the price tag. It wasn't sold! 

Two minutes later it was. I even got a senior discount. There was no offer of helping me get it into the hatchback, however, so I made arrangements to have it held for a few hours. I'd return with Paul after work, along with some kind of a tie down. I was sure some of that chair would be hanging out the back for its trip home. On my way back home for lunch I hit the local hardware store for a tie-down. One of the things I love about these small towns is when you walk into the hardware store, somebody - well everybody - knows exactly what you need and where to find it, and can answer any other questions you have. I left with a ratchet strap 15 feet long and with two hooks rather than just tying one of the ends, the way a slightly cheaper one came.

Soon as Paul came in the door I pounced. He was willing, but we spent about 10 minutes first making sure we had the tools we needed to unpack the strap (yes, tools were needed) and fit it together, and that he knew how to ratchet it tight. We arrived well before the place closed, got the chair loaded in a way that the hatch door only hung open about 4 inches, secured everything, and headed home. With a little help he got it out of the car and into the bedroom.

Turns out Steve loves paisley! And dark orange! And the chair. It's comfortable for him, and supportive enough that he can easily exit it. The two days were worth while.

Late last night there were severe weather and tornado warnings on TV for two counties to the north of us as a storm passed through both on its way southeast. Just before bedtime I took the dog out for her final duty call. As I neared the end of the driveway I noticed an astounding light show to the northeast from the storm. I asked Steve if he wanted to see it, and helped give him a steadying hand added to his support from his cane to the end of the driveway. It's needed because tree roots have left a pattern of ridges under the pavement and more than his cane is needed to navigate it, especially at night. The first step outside was a slap of hot and very muggy air compared to the house. While we watched we discussed the lack of a suitable camera to take some timed open shutter shots of the display so we could get several strikes in a single photo. 

Then I asked Paul if he had about three minutes to see something spectacular, so he came out as well. The lightning in that distant cloud system never did stop, anything from a glow dancing through near and farther clouds,  to jagged streaks from closer strikes. Paul commented it reminded him of some place in Africa he'd heard about that had the most lightning of any place on the planet, where this kind of storm was almost constant. As we returned to the house, I informed him this show was his reward for helping with the chair. He chuckled on his way inside, back into the AC.