Trees Again

Posted on November 20, 2019 by kimerer_brian

We had to have some more trees removed for safety. Two of them were behind the house, so they brought in a huge crane.

Big Crane

DG was impressed.

DG impressed

Oops. Sorry. I had to censor that a bit. DG gets carried away sometimes.

If you look closely at the photo above, you can see the teeny tiny tree climber hooking up the tree. Here he is circled in white.

Tree Climber

It looks like the crane is about to topple over onto the house (OH NOOOOO!), but it is actually propped up on its stands.

Teetering

The crane is level, and the ground is slanting.

After they took the trees out, it was apparent that there was some rot in the trunks.

Rotten trunks

You can see all the way through that hole on the left.

Glad we had them taken down before they fell.

Stay tuned for some more terrifying tales of tall, treacherous tree trunks…… and more really bad alliteration.

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Leaves

Posted on November 10, 2019 by kimerer_brian

It’s not like I was complaining about raking the leaves or anything, but a friendly neighbor came by and informed me that there really can’t be an Infinite number of leaves on our lawn. After all, he posited, the set of all leaves is a “countable finite collection of objects with multiplicity but not order”……

There was a brief pause…… Then, DG offered him the rake.

DG Rake

The friendly neighbor demurred and departed the area.

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Happy Halloween

Posted on October 31, 2019 by kimerer_brian

DG got ambitious about Halloween this year, so he carved a pumpkin.

DG Pumpkin

Hmmm. That Jack-o’-lantern looks familiar.

 

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Happy Anniversary

Posted on October 11, 2019 by kimerer_brian

Today is the 10th anniversary of the creation of this blog. Here is a link to my very first post:

The Very First NHAT Blog Post

DG is pretty excited about this. He decided to celebrate.

DG Celebrating

Egad! I guess we need to get DG some speling lessons.

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Woollybear Ate my SPOTH

Posted on September 19, 2019 by kimerer_brian

We found a disconcerting guest in our basement….. a woollybear taking a nap next to a former SPOTH.

Former SPOTH

The decapitated plant in the pot used to be a SPOTH. Here is a closer look.

Closer look

On the left, you can see part of the plant with the bite marks in it.

Bite Marks

On the right is the miscreant taking a nap….. or perhaps recovering from a tummy ache.

Woolly Bear

And all those little black dots all over the floor…. well….. droppings.

Ick

At least, according to the wide brown band on the bear, it is going to be a mild winter. Look on the bright side.

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The Beast Rules

Posted on September 8, 2019 by kimerer_brian

Right after we moved into the new house, I procured “The Beast“, which is our generator…… also called “Brian’s Folly”. It was a waste of time and money, the experts said. I heard it all.

“Why did you buy that? You’ll never use it“.

“The power never goes out in this town for more than a few hours! Waste of money.”

“I have one, and the only time I ever run it is to test it.”

“The last time I ran mine, I made a pot of coffee with it.”

I have spent the last 9 years keeping The Beast running….. keeping fresh gasoline on hand…… changing the oil….. running it under load every few months….. testing the wires and connections…… just to have it sit in the garage….. idle…………. never used……… a silly waste of time and money.

Until…… last Wednesday evening, the tree in our front yard decided to do this.

Tree down

Which did this to our power connection.

Power down

We were cut off, with the lines trapped under the tree. The electric company had to cut the wires to keep it safe. So we were in the dark for 24 hours.

Undeterred….. I got out The Beast, and hooked her up.

The Beast

Right through the official Transfer Switch in the garage.

Transfer Switch

and she ran fine, and powered the essentials in the house…… the refrigerator, the sump pump, and……… the coffee pot……. long enough to get us connected back into the grid.

So there ya go. Emergency equipment is a waste of time and money….. until you need it.

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Volunteer SPOTH

Posted on August 25, 2019 by kimerer_brian

We have a volunteer SPOTH growing in our Alpine Garden. This is our Alpine garden:

Alpine Garden

The Alpine Garden is basically a pile of rocks that contains plants that usually grow on rocky mountain tops.  They are very hardy plants that grow on rocks in cold places. That’s nothin’ to sneeze at.

We had a volunteer plant show up in it. See it? No? There is a clue in the photo below. It’s under the tree, inside the white circle.

Circled shroom

A closer view.

Closer view of shroom

It’s a ‘shroom. We didn’t plant it, but it is strange enough to qualify for a SPOTH, so I blogged it anyway.

Actually, it’s kind of pretty.

Close up of shroom

I have no idea what its name is. So we can just call it “Fanny”.

No, wait. “Fanny Fungus” might be misinterpreted. How about “Farquhar”? Nah. Too hard to spell. OK. We’ll just stick with “Fred”.

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Groundhog ate our cheese squash

Posted on August 23, 2019 by kimerer_brian

Sometime yesterday, or the day before, the local groundhog got into our garden and did this to our baby cheese squash.

Half a squash

We had nurtured the plant from when it was just a seed. That squash was supposed to be our pumpkin pie for Thanksgiving. Grrrr.

I had to break the sad news to DG….. that the groundhog had eaten our Thanksgiving Pumpkin Pie. He was not pleased.

Angry DG

I tried to calm him down. “Well”, I said, “there are alternatives”.

Can

Ew.

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World’s Tallest SPOTH

Posted on August 19, 2019 by kimerer_brian

We have the world’s tallest SPOTH growing in our house. Check this out. Here is the pot that it is growing in.

The Pot

So we look up to see where the top of the plant is.

Looking up

Keep looking up.

Looking up

Look up even higher.

Looking up

Not there yet, so keep looking up.

Almost there. One more look.

There ya go. The top of the world’s tallest SPOTH.

OK. If I take out the drama and delays, here is a photo of the whole plant.

The whole plant

That isn’t quite as exciting as the Long Look Up, but even so… that is a 13 foot high ceiling. It’s nothing to sneeze at.

The name of the plant is “Dracaena marginata“, and while this one is probably not really the tallest Dracaena in the world, these house plants are usually a bit shorter than ours.

Anyway, thanks for looking….. and looking….. and looking……..

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We have stupid rabbits

Posted on August 6, 2019 by kimerer_brian

After the skunk incident, we put the trap back out with no bait in it other than the leftover stink from the skunk.

However….. the trap door was left open.

This afternoon, there was a bunny in the trap.

The Bunny

Why did it go in there? Duh. Stupid bunny. I wonder if it was just looking for a ride.

Anyway, we trekked it off to a more favorable home in the woods. When I opened the door to the trap, the bunny bounded off into its new home with a huge smile on its face…

Well. Maybe. Is this what a bunny smile looks like?

Bunny Smile

Regardless, it isn’t our bunny anymore.

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