Wednesday again.  I worked at home today and got a lot done.  Late this afternoon a cold front was moving through our area and the weather turned off chilly.  We had a little rain but the wind really kicked up around 4:30 p.m.  I was sitting at the computer and suddenly heard what I thought was thunder.  It was a large cracking sound that lasted four or five seconds.  My wife asked me if it was “that tree” meaning an old sweet gum that has been slowly rotting away for the past few years.  I told her, “Nah, just thunder.”

    Well, it was that tree.  When our house was built twelve years ago the guy clearing the land ran his bulldozer into nearly every tree around the perimeter of the house.  Those that he didn’t knock a chunk out of, he pushed dirt up around the base which eventually killed them.  This was one of the last two close to the house.  I have had to cut down so many trees over the last eleven years it isn’t funny. 

    Talking about lucky!  The wind was coming out of the north and the tree was rotten on the north side.  I would guess it was sixty or seventy feet tall and only about twenty feet from the house.  It could have been horrific.  Oh well, now I’ve got something to do this weekend.  Ol’ Marcel will have to break out the chainsaw.