Internal and External Storms

The last time I posted, I wrote about Duke Energy's hired crews coming in to trim the trees around the power lines.  That has lead to major turmoil.

The crews came back the next day to hack away at our oak tree.  They did not bring in a bucket; instead, two men climbed the tree while a third remained on the ground to haul away the downed limbs and branches.  At first the men were very high in the tree.  The only problem we had with that was that they had no regard for where they dropped the branches that they cut.  At least a half dozen fairly large branches were dropped on the roof of the shed on the property behind our house.  OK, the shed is old and starting to rust, and the house has been vacant for two years; however, their disregard for that property resulted in several 6 - 8" dents in the metal roof of the shed.  If the shed roof did not leak before, I am sure that it will leak now.  Their disregard for property had us wondering about putting in a fence someday.

Our oak before the tree trimmers attacked it.

The oak after the trimming.  The workers were going to
cut some of the lower branches from the right-hand portion!

As the men descended the tree, one got to the branch that hangs over our back yard.  They had already cut away the branches near the line.  Then, with his power saw going, he started out onto the major limb that we paid $250 earlier this year for a professional tree service to trim.  The Duke Energy hired worker was about to cut down even more!  Rick stood under the branch (in the "Drop Zone") and told the man that there was no need to cut any of those branches.  Note that the branches were UNDER the wires and growing downward and away from the wires anyway. The man started to argue with Rick that they needed to trim more branches.  At that point, Rick totally lost it and told them all, "Get the hell off of my property, now!"

To make matters worse, when Rick tried to talk to one worker, the man said that he spoke no English.  Rick demanded to talk to a supervisor who did speak English.  When the supervisor came, the man who "spoke no English" spoke perfect English in explaining to the supervisor what the problem was.  That sent Rick over the edge.  Dishonesty drives him insane.  Just be honest.  If the worker did not want to deal with Rick's questions and rage, then he should have said, "I cannot answer your questions.  Let me get a supervisor."  We both hate it when people try to play the race card.  Just be honest.

The supervisor came and tried to explain what rules they had to follow.  Rick asked them all to leave our property, and since they were done with most of their hacking anyway, the did leave.  Rick put a call in to the city arborist to come back to our yard to look at what they had done.

Now totally upset, Rick was in a foul mood for two days.  He was ready to put the house on the market and to walk away from all of our hard work.  We have gotten to the point where we are almost done with the outside.  He has one more final coat of paint on the soffit behind the garage, and the overhead painting is then complete.  I have to wash the windows and screens and put them back up.  I also have to scrape and paint the windowsills on the Florida room east and north sides and the windowsill on the garage.  Then our painting of the house will be complete.

Meanwhile, another concern is the house kitty-corner from us in the back.  That house is in foreclosure, so the renters were asked to leave.  When they tried to buy the house, the bank (for whatever reason) refused to sell to them. The house now has been vandalized and is standing wide open.  We made a call to the Code Enforcement office, left a message, and actually received a call back.  We feel good about what the city is doing to monitor the vacant or foreclosed properties.  The man Rick talked to told us he is monitoring that house weekly, and that he is in the process of getting the bank to take action to repair the vandalism and to replace the doors to the house.  They also are aware of several propane tanks in the back yard and other problems with the house.

When Rick told him about the damaged shed in the house behind us, the man said that the shed is within the 5-foot easement at the back of the property and that it will probably be removed.  He also told us that utility companies and the city have the right to go into that area and do whatever they want.

That information did not give us a warm, fuzzy feeling.  If we put a fence there, they could ask us to move it if the city needed to come into that area.  We talked yesterday and today about moving the fence six feet forward into our yard to avoid possible problems in the future.  That would cause another problem, though.  We would still be responsible for adding a gate so we could go back there to trim the "no man's land" area between our moved-forward fence and the actual property line.  What a no-win situation! One solution causes another problem.

A second option that we discussed was just forgetting a fence along the back and putting in shrubs to give us privacy.  That is what the former owners of Gladys did; unfortunately, by the time that we took possession of the house, everything back there was totally overgrown.  I was shocked to discover, though, that Rick and I had totally different perceptions of what we should plant.

I wanted a soft-scape of various shrubs (some flowering) that would give us privacy while also providing different colors and textures to the whole back of our property. Shrubs like Bush Allamanda have beautiful yellow flowers all year long, and bougainvillea with its pink, white, red, or purple flowers can be trained to climb a well-placed trellis.  Bougainvillea also flower all year long. A Powderpuff shrub has pink or red flowers to add color to a yard, and Florida Privet, Small Anise, Dwarf Oleander, Bay-Cedar, or Cleyera offer various textures and hues of green as well as the potential for seasonal flowers. What I did not want was a uniform, all-green, structured hedge like we see across the street from us in Wisconsin.  They are a pain-in-the-rear to keep trimmed, and, in my opinion, are just plain booooring!

When we discussed shrubs today, Rick showed me a picture of a green, structured shrub and said that is the only thing he would consider.  Wow!  Talk about opposite opinions.  He did not want "something scraggly that is growing all over,"  and I did not want something that was hard to maintain and that reminded me of Wisconsin.  I want the gardens to be tropical, not northern.

Sigh.  OK.  So since neither of us was willing to compromise, we scratch the shrub idea.  I will plant some shrubs later for accents, but nothing as a hedge.  Soooo... that leads us back to the fence.  If we put it on the property line, we run a risk of it getting damaged or of us having to remove part of it (which would be virtually impossible if each post is anchored with 150 pounds of stone and cement).  Otherwise, we can move it six feet forward which would rob us of yard space, add an awkward view of the tree, add the cost of another gate, and make us go behind the fence to mow it. Dilemma. We put out string lines to see where such a fence would be placed.

One thing we did learn (thankfully now) was that we do not want to put a shed within the five-foot easement area on our property, since THAT the city may ask us to move.  We can change our plans to put the future shed elsewhere.

Today Art came back to look at our trees.  He said that everything Duke Energy cut down would grow back within three years, but he also was glad that Rick stepped under the tree when he did.  Art also told us to NOT move the fence forward.  He said that moving the fence would not necessarily protect it from danger or damage, and that the city has so many buckets and lifts and gadgets, that they probably would never ask us to take part of the fence down.  He said, without really saying so, that we would not encounter any problems from the city with the fence just within the property line.  He said we would not want to block the view of the tree, and that we would not want the hassle of going behind a moved-forward fence to mow.  If someone from the city assures me that the city will not ask us to move the fence, I can live with that opinion.  I hope that we can put the fence in as originally planned.

The hammock is great, but the pillow needs a cover!

Today greeted us with torrential thunderstorms, so we spent the day indoors.  While Rick investigated yard drains and other future projects, I took out my sewing machine and made four covers for our hammock pillows.  We are now ready to give it a test drive when the weather finally cooperates with us... which may not be until next Monday.

Fun, tropical fabrics add a bit of flair to the hammock
while protecting the pillows from the elements.

Our options on how to proceed are numerous, but the more we learn, the easier it is to decide the best courses of action.  We do not totally agree, but in the end, I hope that we make decisions that will allow us to relax and to enjoy what we have done to Gladys and to her yard.  So far we are happy with the inside.  Next year our attention and decisions will focus on the outside.