That was close!

A line of severe thunderstorms barreled through our area last night. I'd seen the radar and knew it was coming sometime after 10 PM. About eleven-thirty, Deuce jumped to his paws and barked like someone was coming up the lane. I have a sensor that dings if that happens, and it was silent, but I knew he heard something. This morning I discovered what.

I always take Deuce out between six and seven every morning. What greeted us was a large tree limb in the middle of the parking area. No wonder the dog raised hell about it! I'll need to put the Brush Crusher 4200 on the tractor to move that to the brush pile. 

I can do that. I'm just grateful it missed hitting my Colorado. That would have made me very unhappy! 

When you live in the woods you expect these things to happen, but it seems the wind is getting worse. I suppose it's a direct result of the solar maximum and the solar flares. There's nothing much we can do except trim the trees closest to the house. Like I need more firewood at this point. (I don't.)

The branch will lie there until tomorrow. Another line of storms and rain is bearing down on us, and I'm not going to be sitting outside on a big chunk of metal when it gets here.

The Lady of Holly Tree Manor/The Hideaway

Holly Tree Manor, The Hideaway, storm damage, John Deere 1023, Brush Crusher 4200, country lifestyle, rural living, solar maximum, guard dogs, a writer's life

A dark ending to a great day

Yesterday, my cousin and I had a very successful yard sale. Many no longer needed items went to new homes and my cousin and I caught up with each other. It was a lot of work to pack up everything and haul it to my uncle's driveway, but the trip home was a lot lighter, ergo, easier. 

I had a great time with Linda, but I was happy to get home. The temps were in the upper 80sF, and there was barely a breeze. It was hot. I unloaded the pickup and then flopped on the bed for a quick rest. A line of thunderstorms was approaching so I didn't want to try to do anything outside. I didn't have time, so a flop-down was my best option. The wind ahead of the front was scary strong and I re-joined the Lord of the Manor to keep an eye on the blowing trees. At about 4:00 pm, we heard BOOM!! BOOMBOOMBOOM!!!

And the house went completely still. The electric power was out. I made the call to report the outage, and so did everyone else in our little enclave. We watched it rain and speculated how long it would take until the power was restored. Longer than we thought.

One of the cousins, being the curious sort, hopped into his truck and drove out to see if he could figure out where the BOOM! occurred and reported in to everyone else.

Just to the right of our bridge, the wind snapped the top out of a tree which fell across the power lines which snapped off the top of a pole that just happened to house a transformer. No wonder there was a big BOOM! 

The word from the power company was grim. We could expect power to be restored no later than 4 PM the next day. Well, crap. 

But country folk are generally prepared for these things. We went out and readied our old generator. I don't even remember what brand it is or the specs on it. All I know is it started and ran like the champ it is. And we heard the humming of other generators as other neighbors settled in for the siege and a few hours lived mostly in the dark.

Happily, the power was restored to us around 7:30 am, or thereabouts. The generator had done it jobs and kept the refrigerator and freezer running. We had water and Internet (sort of), and if it had rained to the point the sump pump was needed, we'd have power to it. 

It's the stormy time of the year. I think I'll leave the generator at the ready for a few more days, just in case. 

The Lady of The Hideaway

Holly Tree Manor, The Hideaway, power outages, generators, rural living, country lifestyle, preparedness, a writer's life, family, storm damage, trees

I heard a noise...

This past Wednesday our area experienced thunderstorms and heavy rain. I'm not complaining. It's summer and if you live in western Maryland, it's thunderstorm season. So, yeah. It arrived right on time. But thunderstorms also mean tree damage. 

We were watching it rain sideways when there was a flash, a pop, and a snap! The lights flickered but the power stayed on. The television didn't come back on, which was worrisome, so I investigated the situation and discovered one breaker had tripped. I reset it and all was well again, at least until we went outside to see if there was any damage. 

One of the maple trees between us and our younger cousin snapped about ten to twelve feet up the trunk and, unfortunately, the top fell in the direction of our shed. Deuce told a little story of how one of the branches landed on the John Deere's bucket, but Deuce didn't know to look up. Dogs are like that. They don't always look at what's over their heads. Anyway... getting this tree the rest of the way to the ground looked to be very problematic. 

I called my cousin to let him know we'd be cutting a tree on his property before it could land on our shed. He immediately came up for a look-see, and to see if we wanted the wood. It's his tree so no, we told him to take the wood. We settled on this morning to work together and bring it the rest of the way down safely. 

We got lucky. Last evening, I heard a tree fall, a sound I know well having lived in the woods for over forty years. Deuce started barking at the window so I knew which direction to look. The tree had snapped off completely and come down, landing just short of the shed and the John Deere 1023. I texted my cousin and he walked up again (we're curious that way). We all agreed it was a good thing because of our safety concerns. 

Today looks to be a hot one with the mercury rising into the nineties. The spousal unit will probably go out and cut the top out of the tree and use the Brush Crusher to haul the pieces to the burn pile. This will clear our "alley" behind the shed. I doubt we do any additional clearing until Monday is supposed to bring cooler temps. 

My cousin will come to cut the wood and we'll give him whatever help he needs. The "damage" will be cleared and the wood harvested instead of wasted. It's just the way things work here at the manor. 

The Lady of Holly Tree Manor (The Hideaway)

Holly Tree Manor, The Hideaway, fallen trees, country living, rural lifestyle, thunderstorms, cutting wood, storm damage, a writer's life, simple country pleasures, summer heat