Lopping trees, Christmas shopping, fighting locusts - it's all here!

My mate Steve gave me a call the other day - wanted to know if I'd help him bring down an old nearly dead wattle tree that had half blown down in the windy weather... It took a bit longer than the 15mins we'd given ourselves (yeah, right!), but that was cool - we had fun. Except of course when the stupid thing nearly went the other direction - ie over the fence and into the neighbours house... Thankfully, brute adrenalin induced strength and will prevented such an ending, and the tree is now down in the appropriate area. We videoed the collapse of the tree too just in case it went the wrong direction - we figured we'd send it to Funniest Home Videos if that occurred. As it ended up, we did a minor victory dance on the now postrate trunk instead, and the video won't be going national.


This is Steve - we did the identical photo with me, but he looks better!


This is the stump - I look better than the stump, but you don't get to see the stump unless I show it.

We did the reciprocal babysit thing today with friends - they got their Christmas shopping done in the morning and we did it in the afternoon. The kids had fun - especially Harry, who helped me with cutting up the aforementioned tree. For a young kid, he cut through some seriously thick wood! Onya Harry.


This is obviously posed, but you can see his work!


The girls - just chillin'


Toby - finally got the hang of the "trambabline"

The other thing worth mentioning in this post is the presence of an unbelievable amount of locusts in Wagga at the moment. At various times they were so thick in the air, that you couldn't see much beyond them. Even walking up the road was a trial - the stupid things just fly straight into you... Hopefully they are just passing through, but I can appreciate the potential damage they could cause to crops, and the frustrations that farmers would have with them. I've taken no photos of them - they will not have the victory!!