Yesterday (and today) for that matter, I had jury duty, which is a whole separate post, that by necessity can't say very much.  The judge cut those of us who had to come back today loose in good enough time for me to go back to work, and I ended up staying an extra hour to try to pull together a couple of projects that were right on the verge of either blowing up or resolving.  I beat the storm to the office by minutes - as I walked across the parking lot, the lightening was continual.

When I got home, Bob was in the driveway with the chainsaw.  The big oak tree by the side door shed *another* big branch.  This was a big one - it knocked over the birdbath in the middle of my garden, stretched across the driveway turnaround, and stretched into the trees on the other side.  Additionally there was a lovely widowmaker hanging in one of the trees next to the turnaround.

Really?  Trees in the driveway again?  Didn't we cover that fairly exhaustively last Halloween?

Oh - yet again, it was NOT the branch that I need to have taken off.

Bob hadn't known what time I would be getting home, so he'd called Camma for help/reinforcements, and she got to the house shortly after I did.  That let me get some dinner in the little girl, and they could keep working while I got her fed and into bed.  Then I went out to help.  It's a mucking big branch.  We've got a chain saw with an 18" bar, and I thin it's right at the edge of the saw's capacity.  I may be wrong about that, but it's a mucking big branch.

Here's the thing.  That tree keeps shedding BIG branches.  I'm starting to think that the branch over the garage that I'm going to take off is the last large lateral branch that tree has.  So it's basically a huge stick with some leaves at the veeerrrryyyy top.  Waaaaayyyyyyy up there.  I'm also worried that it keeps shedding really big branches on the driveway, and sooner or later there's going to be a car under there.  Possibly one that's just visiting.  So I'm thinking I may need to take this tree down.

I hate to.  I think it's about three feet in diameter at the base, although I haven't measured it.  But it's big.  And it's old.  And I hate to cut down big old trees unless I have to (not to mention it's probably going to be LOT of money to have it down.  Probably four figures.)  But it's dropping big branches, there's a lot of beetle damage that I can see, and I'm starting to view it more as a hazard than an asset.

But here's what I'm thinking - there are these guys with portable sawmills in the state.  I'm toying with the idea of having the tree dropped, and then having it quartersawn.  Then while the tree will be gone, I can make beautiful things out of it.  Lots of beautiful things - it's a big tree.

But first, we need to get the damn branch out of my garden.