Mother Nature Does Her Thing

Recently, we noticed that a branch from our neighbor's tree was drooping into our yard. Jim contacted a tree guy, but he hadn't yet scheduled a time to look at it, when this happened:

August 2, 2014

Apparently, the branch had broken in the past, and was only being supported by our AT&T line. This, of course, made the line hang lower than normal. A truck driving by our house caught the line, and it snapped, letting the branch fall to the ground. This left us with no landline, no internet, and no cable.

We finally found a phone bill with a customer service number listed on it (hint: if you eliminate the paper copies of your bills, you should write down the contact number somewhere; looking it up online was not an option). Jim called, and spoke with a sympathetic operator who scheduled the repair, and said it would probably be fixed on Tuesday (this was Friday night). Happily, an AT&T truck showed up Saturday afternoon, and after a couple hours, we were good to go again.

Handley's Tree Service came by on Monday (after Jim reached out to them again), to scope things out, and on Tuesday made quick work of the downed branch, as well as trimming and thinning our maple. (They'll be back after Thanksgiving to thin the oak as well.)

Here are "before" and "after" photos of the maple. The trees hadn't completely filled out in that May photo, so it doesn't show how much those lower branches were drooping. At least you can see that the lower trunk is more open now. It should be much easier to mow under there!

Before - late May

After

Sometimes Mother Nature offers less drama and more beauty. Here are photos of the latter, from some of my recent beagle walks: