Friday the 13th
That was a fast week. We’ve been baking out here in the Midwest for the last few. I’m breaking on the P90x for today. I was up too late with the kids watching meteors. Shooting stars all over the sky. We were out at about 2:30 a.m. and seeing them pretty regularly. So fast. It was clear and dark, even with the other house lights around. It’s worth it to stay up because there’s just so much beyond our little world and the kids need to see for themselves. It’s hard to understand the vastness of space from books and tv until you see a flash and streak of light across the sky and know that we are in the middle of a moving universe.
But I feel loopy enough. I caught back up with my days. 31 for Core and 32 for Kenpo. I was feeling worn out and lumpy and had to push play and push through. I am thisclose to real, off-the-knee pushups. That Core dvd is killer. I don’t know if it’s because of the recovery week that my arm muscles feel stronger or because they just are. Either way, I was feeling good. Then I Kenpo’d in some tight running pants and my belly was looking kind of flabby. I could let it all hang or suck it in whenever I’m standing. Sometimes you just want to push it out and let it go! That’s when I knew I had to take the pics again. So I did. You really need to see the progress from Day 0 to Day 30 to Day 60 to Day90. I was skeptical, as usual, because I have no intention of ever letting anyone see these pictures. I hate looking at them. But I did and I do see some changes. Subtle. A little less hang here, a little more indent there. An actual horizontal dividing line on my upper arm from the muscle area and the fat area. I’m hoping for bone show but I’m not there yet. At least you can see that there is something underneath all that skin besides fat and cellulite! Yay!
But the pictures were not enough to make me put the Yoga in and get sweaty. I wanted to take a nice long shower and get dressed. I had alot of house things to do and school stuff to finish. Speaking of, I have all my books now for fall! Very exciting. After yesterdays workout I took the kids for the final school shopping blitz. Supplies, clothes, books (mine), and backpacks! Done done done. I have heard over the years that kids get more expensive as they get older but I didn’t believe that either. Well, it’s true. It’s not crazy expensive, but it’s not dollar-store-bargain-bin.
Well I just got word my tree is about to come down in 45 minutes so I have to go get some money to pay the people. And I have to read that damn motorcycle book again and answer the back questions. I have a test to take tomorrow if I want to get my license. Step 1 of 2. Then I have to pass the drive test. Nail bites!
Alright enough. I really have to go. I’m going to make myself sick worrying all over again. I should lay off the coffee. I think it’s giving me the shakes. I’ll be back. With pics. Later.
We interrupt this program for another appearance by Mother Nature
That Bitch!!
When I left a few days ago, happy, P90X’d on day 30, I was recovering from Core Synergistics. I am actually still sore but who has time to think about it when the natural world gives you so much more to do! Let me explain.
I have trees. Big trees. They keep falling down. Not the whole tree, just parts of the tree. Limbs crack and break and then lay across the yard or the fence or the neighbors garage or her house…it keeps happening. Every single time it storms I worry. Every single time a tree part falls on my neighbors house it is the calmest, clearest, least windy day EVER! Every. Single. Time. I leave, the tree is fine. I come home, BOOM, it’s laying on something. Then I have to get tools (now the BF and I have to get tools) and we cut it up and drag it to the nice wood/limb/branch pile I have going in my backyard. I’ve posted pictures of it. I’ll post again in case you don’t believe me. It’s ridiculous now because every time I get it mostly cleaned up, nice and neatly stacked for continued ease of disposal, more falls and the pile grows. It’s a joke to the neighbors now.
The far left side and the far right side wood piled up is the old stuff. Everything in the middle is from yesterday.It doesn't look like alot I guess in this pic, but trust, its all tangled and gnarly and high.
This time I really got a surprise. MN (Mother Nature) decided to shake things up by NOT felling the tree limb I was actually worried about but a completely different one that I never even considered! Tricky! I should have known. I took pics of this tree. Foam was coming out of the bottom. I do not know what that means in tree life, but it’s probably not good. Got pics of that too.
So anyway, this real dangerous, heavy, stretched out limb just hangs over my neighbors house looking menacing every day and extra scary in storms. The birds don’t care. The squirrels don’t care. They just keep adding weight to it, running up and down, just doing their thing. I panic thinking it will fall. It’s huge. It’s old. It has NO chance in hell of missing her house and landing neatly in between on the driveway. It’s just that kind of tree. But it’s expensive to remove this kind of tree. Thousand dollar or more type money, which I don’t have. So we wait, and hope, and cringe every time the wind blows, but so far so good.
And oh yeah, there is also another limb that goes off it in the other direction, over my house, that looks fine. No worries. We noticed on Saturday when we got back from motorcycle class that it was dangling its leaves on the roof. Brushing ever so slightly like it was caressing the house. We tell ourselves, well we’ll have to get up there and trim those back. Not me…the BF…he’s much better at that sort of thing…plus it could start interfering with the satellite dish! Oh my! Can’t mess up the TV! He’s off on Monday (yesterday) so we can do it then.
So Saturday is class—sitting, talking, learning, then leaving. Expect to arrive early on Sunday and be prepared to ride the whole time! Ok. After class we take the kids clothes shopping for school, have a nice dinner and chill in the evening. Everyone’s happy! No P90, no other exercise except the brain stuff earlier.
Sunday 7 am. Off to class. Riding riding riding. It’s fun. It’s stressful. I feel worked out. 5 hours on a machine I have never set foot across in my life. And I get to control it and ride it and shift it and stop it…it’s too much fun! Not for everyone though. We did lose some people on the riding portion. 3 out of 12 had to go. As deemed by the instructors. Dropping the bike more than once or stalling it over and over in traffic, or actually flipping off of it, it did happen, right next to me, is pretty much instant exit. So needless to say, I was burning some stress calories and actual cals pushing that bike around. But I survived it and actually had a pretty good time. I am by no means ready for the road. I could drive it fine and turn it and stop it and all that, but I had some trouble with the quick, up and down shift (I think my boots were too fat and I couldn’t get my toe under the gear lever smoothly every time) and apparently I go WAY too slow for the other people! I’ll admit I was putt-putting it, but I shouldn’t be the leader. I need to follow someone else to gain speed! It’s not my fault!
After we got home, the kids are going to hang with their dad and he shows up to get them and notices that lovely, dangling, brushing, tree branch is now sitting on the damn roof solid. Crap. Seriously?? It must have cracked at a seam overnight (no storms, no wind) and laid itself gently to rest on the roof. Nice. So what is the afternoon like now? Up on the roof, the BF, not me, cutting branches and getting the limb up and off, then call someone to remove the rest because it is heavy and big and probably too much for us. Accomplished. The BF managed to use a handsaw to remove enough of the branches that it is up about 6 inches and if it continues to lean it will just rest back on the roof and not cause any major damage. It did crinkle the nice furnace exhaust pipe thing that our friend Jeff put up last fall but thank fully that was easily straightened.
If you look close you can see the crack. The left side is the main trunk to the ground, go across the limb to the dead knob and it's right underneath like a gash in the side. Just enough to bring it down. But not too much that it crashes on to the roof.
Here’s another question. Why, after all these years, have I never purchased a chain saw? I have needed one almost every spring and summer since I moved into this house. That money spent would have proven itself worthy over and over again. Well, we own one now. A big, nasty, loud, long-bladed monster tree cutter. A few inches short of the commercial kind. I’m not spending 500 dollars on one, but I can handle 200. After removing enough and watching it basically lean right back on over to the roof and then calling some tree services and getting a quote for 1000 dollars (WTF?? Seriously?? We already took half that shit off and it’s practically stand-up accessible) Then for another $1300, he’ll take off that other limb that is super-giant, super-heavy, and hanging so far over the neighbors house that it could be considered a whole tree all by itself. Really? Only 300 extra dollars to take off the giant limb as opposed to the half cut one? I was nice and didn’t say anything. What a rip. They have a bucket! I guess that’s what we pay for. Either that or he just didn’t want to do it so he throws out a ridiculous number hoping we would laugh and tell him to move along.
So I get the idea that since it’s obviously just going to lean back on the roof, we can go get a chainsaw and hack that sucker off ourselves. We can get it on the roof and just hope we can cut it back enough it will swing and miss the house when it goes all down. Ha! Lofty goals on Sunday night! Monday morning. Different story when my shaky ass is standing on the roof, on that treacherous angle, trying to hold limbs and not fall to my death on chainsaw chips and debris. I REALLY underestimated my ability to stand on a roof with confidence and move around. I was constantly afraid of falling off, therefore I was afraid to move too much and therefore not much help in the removal process. The longer I was up there I felt a little better, but those slippery chips were too much for me. Bright ideas look 100 times better from the ground looking up.
I have to give every kind of respect for people that can work on a roof with no problem. That is an awesome balance thing and confidence and surefootedness that I do not have! Your job is tough and scary and I can see why people pay you the money to do it.
Once the BF and I realized there was no way we could do it ourselves, because of my chicken-shitness and his lack of reach over the house and up to the limb, we decided to use the trim, wait, let the tree limb lay back on the house, trim, wait, lay, etc…method of removal. It might take awhile but the lower the limb comes down, the easier it is to remove. The person we finally got to take a look and remove it for us said that method is not going to work and is not really smart. He’s a 20 year tree guy and he has removed stuff for us before. He’s back in the biz after hurting himself some years ago, and ready to take on some small jobs! Ha! Small jobs! That’s what he considers it. I don’t care because he’s cutting us a really good deal and he knows what he’s doing. He hopped onto the roof to look at the tree like he was walking on the flat ground. Jealous!
Anyway, so there it sits now, about three feet off the roof, maybe four. Alot of the weight is off and if it starts lowering, our tree guy said just leave it. Don’t be fussing with it anymore. But, again, I have a giant pile of branches and limbs and leaves and sticks and junk in my yard. So this week is cutting and stacking neatly to make room for all the rest that is about to come. This might be the most yet! Seriously. I just thought about it this minute. We are going to have basically a tree’s worth of trunk and limbs in the yard. I really got to wrap this up and get outside. Those lazy kids of mine are still sleeping and I’m wasting hours typing and we have some work to do. I’m going to need some bribery options to really light a fire under their asses. I’d like to get all of what we presently have cut up today if possible. That’s prob going to save us alot of time and pain down the road. Especially if it starts storming like its supposed to.
Ugh! I may skip P90X again today. I was going to sneak it in (I have missed 3 days already!!) and I’m feeling nervous and agitated, but this might have to take precedence. Ugh! Kenpo too. It’s fun. I don’t HAVE to do it. It’s my choice. It’s voluntary but I feel guilty. I don’t even know why! It’s ridiculous the things that go thru my head. I’ll try to do it later. I swear. It’s not like I’m going to turn into a lump of fat in 4 days. But still…I also have the stress of this cycle class, the test is next weekend. I have to read the book. I have my real school starting the next week and I have to read that material. I have no money. All my savings money is going to stop a tree from poking through my roof. I have laundry and house stuff, and frankly I’m feeling a bit queasy right now thinking about it all. I let myself stress way too much about things I can’t even control. AND things that aren’t even going to happen for 2 weeks! (I’m thinking school. I’m trying to tell myself I need to make it fun like I did when I first started. I love it. I’m afraid of failure. But I love it. Nursing is the best job in the world and I just have to get through. I think I need some BF support tonight. Help!! Thanks honey!! I love you. Sorry for being a baby. Love you!) I feel like an old lady shaking her fist to the sky cursing the powers that be. Ugh!
Enough of the whining. Stop thinking. Start doing. Alright. The tree limb is still high and mighty for now. The crack is still cracky but not split all the way through. I will get dressed, cut limbs, exercise, figure out the money situation for the week and do laundry until it doesn’t matter. I will read and absorb and take it one little day at a time. Hour here. Hour there.
If you are still reading this, WOW!, and thank you. It’s like listening in to someone’s therapy. I hope to never look at it again! The internet is a great big toilet bowl of random crazy and I just laid a big old load down! Feels better! And you helped wipe! Alright, eeww, that’s probably enough there.
We need a picture of calm. A picture of soothing. I don’t know what I have, butt, I’ll find something.
Oh man. The hilarity never stops around here. I think it’s bad when you have to add a whole new category to your site, dedicated to tree trouble because it just keeps happening. Ugh! The picture below is much better. I found it trolling for something to illustrate all this text.
Just breath and relax:
Sunday Bug
I have two more left. This was technically the last bug on the tour, but I am putting it second-to-last because I want to go out with a bigger bang! Bumblebee Big! You’ll have to look tomorrow!
Anyway, I still have to go to my sissy’s and it doesn’t look like I am getting outdoors to do any actual exercise today, so I’ll quickly post these things that are outside, in nature, and that will kind of have to be good enough.
You will also have to excuse the extra people in the pictures. For some reason, everyone globbed up right at the end, talking to their friends, pulling snacks out of strollers, on the phone, kids laying all over the grass… and wouldn’t get out of picture range for all the rest of us. But you can still see the bug.
Come on people! Get out of the way!! Go talk on your cell phone out of picture range!
And back to the Bugs!
We are almost to the end. I think this is third to last. I just found out the Arboretum where they had this display is having a 5K race in the fall through all their paths, or some of their paths; the place is huge. So, more to look forward to. Pictures of trees. IN AUTUMN! Yowzer! Stick around! Even with a (hopefully) not-too-crazy school schedule, I want to keep running and keep writing. It’s a good stress buster. Corny.
Now look at these big bugs!
You see that expanse of space behind the sculpture? Big land. Tired kids. But all four are in there.
Hey guys! There's a giant bug sitting in the weeds right in front of you! We could look in the mud at home. For free. 3 out of 4 captivated by dirty water. I had to put it in though, because it's just too cute.
I didn’t really think it would turn out
The deer pictures. I have two, well, I have about a hundred pictures, that upon closer inspection on the big screen are composed of a lot of grass, trees, leaves, shrubs, weeds, and sky shots, with a small, blurry, deer-shaped smudge in the center, or off to the side, or at the bottom. Just your basic professional camera-phone, nature-photo photography. It’s mostly crap.
But this came out pretty good. I’ll only bore you with one, because the other one looks just like this except the deer might have tilted his/her head ever-so-slightly to the left. (Nope, actually, I change that thought—one below—one above, if that isn’t confusing enough) I notice the change in color too, now that I have it here. One seems darker and more natural. Almost the same shot, from the same distance, from the same spot on the trail. All I had to wait for in between was my phone to save the picture.
And all you thought you were getting was long, rambling stories about nothing and here it’s a (could be) college-level (generous) type discussion on the technical and and artistic capabilities of camera phone technology. I am sure I can make up any number of time-frame-exposure-light sentences for you to read and we can all feel extra smart during our day today!
But, it’s the usual, simple, at my favorite running trail, deers so close they are trying to jump on me! See past post for THAT exciting story! Even the babies are bigger than you want bumping into you!
Ah yes, you have learned well grasshopper…
Or something like that. If you don’t “get” the above headline, then it doesn’t matter if I got it wrong. Please just forget it and look at the pictures!
More bugs! It’s a grasshopper!
I know! That was alot of grasshoppers! Last shot. WITH the kids. Looking at this picture now, I notice they all seem so suspicious...and tired of sitting next to big bugs made of shiny sticks. That they can't even touch! They are so over it. But we still have, like, three more! At this point they were probably walking half a mile or more already. It's a BIG place!
Here's an extra shot that kind of shows "vastness". No bugs. Just land. (And water)
CrazyBugs!
It all came together in the middle for a brief moment, captured forever in photographic evidence. Four kids and a Ladybug. And we were only half way done!
Crazy for the Lady's...
Zee Bug of zee Day…”ant’s” ya’ glad ya’ tuned in! (heeheehee)
If you’ve been following along…this is the “ANT” post. Grab a can of Raid and look at these:
I'm not sure how many the artist made of these giant ants, but there were three in the Arboretum and a whole bunch more on the grounds outside, when you passed it on the highway.
Large and in charge!
Creepy!
Still unable to get all 4 kids, BUT, got a picture with Ethen, who still doesn't like to be photographed, AND he's smiling!
And since we are doing spiders…
Today’s Big Bug is a BIG spider! If it looks impressive to you in these photos, it was even better close up! Creepy-crawly!
But stay tuned here in the next few days because the artist did ants too. Giant, sprawling-across-the-grass, ants. Ants are my biggest bug problem. Spiders are pretty scary too, check out this dedication post to a brave but crazy spider that was living in our house, but ants are the ones that get me rolling.
Not to go off subject, but we live on a slab foundation, and as anyone who may live on one knows, ants love to live in the cracks underneath the house. Except in winter or rainy times when they like to migrate indoors, say onto your living room floor or bedroom or closet or tables or kitchen or anywhere they can crawl their teeny-tiny bodies around too. These are a particular kind of ant, slab ants. They’re small, really small, but they can get everywhere fast and before-you-know-it. You can just be sitting on a chair when you suddenly notice a small movement on the floor or near a wall, and you go to take a close look…OMG! Seriously, there could be like a hundred, in a trail with that one crumb of food the vacuum didn’t get. It sucks, and it sucks worse when you have small children who like to crawl around on the floor but now you don’t even want them to walk on it because an ant might crawl on them. Yuk yuk yuk! Thankfully there are awesome exterminators who will come and eliminate the problem for you! We found a great one and the ants only make a minor appearance, maybe, once every few years now. It’s lovely. Plus it makes you vacuum a whole lot more, and who doesn’t like to be forced to keep their house clean so vermin doesn’t set up camp?? Not me!
Anyway…here’s the spider:
Buggy Bug Bugs
Of the day! I’m fading fast here….my brain is being vodclouded as I type. 1000 words and all that…(fyi, that lady and her booty is not me or my sister. She was just another mom getting in the way of my picture, in case you were wondering)
just shy of pretty 