Tree Fellers

Crazy Joe decided to trim my trees again.

We don't mind him doing so so long as he keeps his trimming limited to that which pokes over the fence. He is not allowed to start hacking down anything he simply doesn't like, and of late he has been OK with that.

Sunday morning his nephew knocks on the door to tell us what's planned and the guy he brought in offered to take down the Job tree while he was at it for a very reasonable fee. No sooner said than done, and they had it down to the seven foot tall stump in no time. I went over and explained we wanted the stump left because it formed a very useful braking mechanism for teenagers who lost the ability to drive by getting a license to do so. Not five minutes later I returned to the front garden to see him already halfway through sawing the stump at the two-foot mark.

What is it with tree cutters? We've had several over the years and every single one of them has done something irreversible they were explicitly asked not to. The first one we retained cut down an overhanging branch Mrs Stevie had been dreaming of hanging a swing from since we went into negotiation for the house. He paved the way for any number of other cloth-eared gits with chainsaws.

To ad insult to injury, when the guy had finally cut through the trunk of the tree, it fell backwards onto him and the fence and I had to run over and help him push it the other way. I looked at the huge hunk of maple and asked him how I was supposed to get it out of my garden. Fortunately he had a plan, which involved spending the whole afternoon sawing up the huge block of wood into slightly less huge blocks of wood. It is was his hope that overnight, flocks of fireplace-owners would descend on the pile of wood and spirit it away. I kind of doubted it, on account of each piece resembling the wheel off one of those trucks you see in open cast coal mines. It was all still there this morning.

I wonder if my other neighbour, Mr Singh, needs wood for his wood-fired stove?