Wednesday, April 19, 2017

"SQUIRREL!" or Just Try and Finish a Project Around Here!

"Up!" is a favorite animated feature film of ours. The movie makes us laugh, tugs at the heartstrings (yes I cry a tiny bit, Scott and Paula both make fun of me), and root for Carl and Russell and Dug the dog. In the movie Dug and the other dogs are quickly distracted by squirrels. The mere mention of squirrels completely derails the dogs from any task or thought. Sounds familiar.

Both Scott and I are victims of squirrel syndrome, especially when it comes to working around the house. There are so many tasks to complete, so many things where a little attention moves the needle forward, it's hard to stay focused on the task at hand. Soon we are working on something else leaving the previous project behind, hopefully to be revisited before days end, or not.

The perfect example of squirrel syndrome, this time Scott, happened this week. Scott had previously taken down some of the large bushes at the left of the driveway (see previous posts) and there was a large pile of smallish logs by the side of the house. I came home Monday evening and Scott was out front making the logs smaller to fit in the yard waste bin and bags. I went in the house to change and when I returned Scott was gone. Still lots of brush and logs, but no Scott.

I turned the corner around the house and spied Scott in the back removing lower branches from the very tall arborvitae hedge between our backyard and the neighboring yard. I understand how he got there. Every time you walk to the backyard you have to brush by the hedge. The trees are in poor shape, lots and lots of dead branches and our neighbor mentioned that she would like to trim her side up so the branches didn't interfere with her garden. And Scott had a saw in his hand, so here it was 6:00 pm in mid April (getting a bit cooler and darker) and Scott had started a new project.

After an hour or so, removing many branches both alive and dead, Scott made good progress trimming up the lower branches of three of the eight trees in the back hedge. He also managed to triple the size of the brush pile. I was trying to keep up, making large brush small enough to fit in the yard bin. We finished cleaning up the brush and much of the log pile Tuesday evening, when I decided that the large gangly bush at the back of the driveway needed a bit of a trim. See? It happens to both of us!

Also in the category "Made progress, but not complete", this week Scott put a third coat of paint on the furnace wall in the garage, leaving only two walls, cabinets, ceiling and trim to complete. The blinds arrived and were installed in the master bedroom and bath and the laundry room (really emphasizing the need for paint in the laundry - another project). We are awaiting additional hardware to hang the blinds in the office. And we pulled the trigger on the chimney tuck pointing, but are still awaiting the schedule.

Master bedroom with new roman shade!


Laundry with flat roman shade!