Friday, June 18, 2010

Wherein I Reveal Myself to Be the World's Geekiest Blogger

Spencer called up to me from the garage on Thursday morning, "Mom! Come quick! There's a giant crane!"

Puzzling as to whether he was suddenly a budding ornithologist or construction worker I put on my shoes and joined him in the driveway to see what was indeed a giant crane--of the steel variety--poking up among the trees in the neighboring cul-de-sac.

We followed the stream of kids on bikes to where a house up the street was removing trees from their back yard. However, they weren't doing it the old-fashioned way (where one chops and chops and sweats) they had hired a tree service to come in and do the job for them--and efficient they most definitely were.

The crane had backed up into the home's driveway, lowered the crane over the clusters of lacy birches and suddenly there was a Godzilla-sized tree dangling from the sky. Before our Arbor Society sensibilities could even be aroused, it was lowered to street level to where it was fed trunk first into a waiting tree chipper that greedily devoured it down to the very last leaf. One only hopes that there were no baby birds waiting for mom to come back with a worm.

We stood there, watching, as they pulled up tree after tree--six I think total--and fed them into the chipper with a highly satisfactory grinding and clawing noise that completely fed my dormant and highly unrespectable desire for destruction. It was sad but yet it was something you wanted to cheer--like watching a building being imploded or a car being smashed at the junk yard. Sad to see something so beautiful that took 50 years to create reduced to sawdust in 50 seconds but yet I suppose the homeowners were clearing out the backyard so that it could actually be enjoyed, free of mosquitoes in summer and leaves in autumn. It's hard to use a back yard that is a tree farm and as you can see from the video below it's not as if we're lacking for vegetation around here.

The tree chipper guys smiled at us all grouped around to watch the action. They even stopped to wave and once it was all over we went back home but it was the talk of the dinner table that evening.



P.S. Today is our 18th anniversary. Can you believe we're so old as that?

Sponsored by Beau-Coup for unique baby shower favors.

22 comments:

Jennifer@ Family Musings said...

The geeky part is that you posted the video. :)

Congrats on 18 years!

Scribbit said...

Who else shows up to a tree chipping with a camera? :)

Kim N said...

Happy anniversary!

That was really cool. I had to go get my husband to show him.

Linds said...

Happy Anniversary! And I love watching the tree specialists at work. My neighbours had masses of trees removed so I could see it all from my house without having to go anywhere. Much more fun than watching tv!

owlfan said...

Happy Anniversary! But don't be calling yourself old, or you'll be calling me old - my 20th anniversary is this winter.

I took pictures when we had the tree guys in to remove some dead/dying trees. And my kids were absolutely fascinated by the chipper.

Peruby said...

Holy cow! That was something else.

And, Happy Anniversary.

branda50 said...

I started to watch it then I stopped and got my husband...So when I read KimN's comment I giggled..
I have not seen anything like this before, I knew they chipped branches but not whole trees...I will also show my grandson...
Very cool..Thanks Spencer for getting Mom...
"Happy Anniversary"

Geekwif said...

Wow, that chipping goes fast! I may have to track down a tree chipping around here. All I could think was that all those chips would make a lovely garden mulch.

Mimi N said...

The county came by and took down a tree in my yard. My first thought? How can I blog about this and how many cool photos could I take to add to it?! Then I thought it was a lame idea. Who cares about a tree. Then comes your post and I think, that's soo cool. LOL Maybe next time. hahahah

~Mimi

RoeH said...

I hate those chippers. That's what I always think. How many nests are going into them. When they took a lot out of a large tree in my front yard I made them swear on a Bible that if they saw any baby birds they would NOT cut them down and pulverize them to smitherines. But I bet they did it anyway. Boo!

The Source said...

Wow...I would have been terrified that the chains/ropes/whatever would snap or come loose and the tree would fall right through my roof, making shish-kabobs of my kids!

It's unreal how quickly that humongous tree was chewed up!

Nancy from Two Mountains said...

My boys enjoyed watching the video. Cool said my youngest. LOL They really know their work.

HAPPY ANNIVERSARY !

Heart2Heart said...

Michelle,

Oh how sad! This post should be called the murder of innocent trees. I find it sad that the owners of the home were removing so many of them and turning them into mulch.

Seems like such a waste, like you said to take a 50 year old tree and mulch it up.

By the way, here is hoping that you and Mr. Andrew do something amazing for your anniversary and celebrate all 18 years together. Wishing you both, many, many more years together.

Love and Hugs ~ Kat

zakkalife said...

Ah, the true life of a blogger, always thinking "how can I get a post out of this?" ;)

Happy Anniversary!

Annette Lyon said...

Whoa!

Viki said...

Happy Belated Anniversary. That video was neat. I've never seen them grab the whole tree before and put it in the chipper. Wow!!

Amber Lynae said...

Hope you had a happy anniversary. 18 years that is great.

Anonymous said...

Couldn't someone have used that
wood to heat their home? mulch
vs firewood..in Alaska this
kind of surprises me.
mm, vancouver, wa

minority loans for women said...

Really cool and Happy Anniversary! :)

CountessLaurie said...

Of course you aren't old. You got married when you were fifteen, right? That makes you 33. Youngun!! Happy Anniversary!!

Still waiting for the geekiness to emerge, btw!

Holly said...

Wow, you're old. :) Many more happy years for you.....

Your kids must think you're awesome!

Steph said...

Congrats on 18 years!!!

I am always sad to see a big tree go down. So much history goes with them. We have a serious shortage of trees here though so it's more obvious. On the other hand we had two 30 year old trees in our yard before our house burned and I cussed those darn things incessantly. Such a mess!! I sure do miss them now though!!

I would have been there watching too, only my son would have been the one taking pictures because he loves machinery!