The middle agers group. (Upper 30s,40s & 50ish folks)

I practiced some river rescue skills today. It wasn't just practice, but it wasn't a rescue.

I made a 3:1 mechanical advantage with progress capture (Z-drag) correctly the first time without using any instructions. It worked great.

I have a Princess Tree in my back yard that was a volunteer in a place I had to take out a large willow several years ago. It's kind of a neat tree, but grows really fast, is brittle, and will fall apart. I should have pruned it back or cut it down a year or two ago. It had become large enough I didn't want to just try to take it down. I have a few friends who have made "bonsai" out of them. I decided to give it a try. I got my pole saw out and took off some of the upper branches. I put an extension ladder up near a place I wanted to take off two parts of the top before dropping a big chunk. It didn't feel safe. I could only reach so high on my step ladder. I needed it to fall in a particular direction so it didn't crush a well house, take out the neighbor's power line, or break other trees. Not to mention I didn't want it to come down on top of me while I was trying to scramble down a stepladder!

So I took my handy spectra throw bag, hitched up above where I wanted to make the cut, tied it off, then got a sling and made an anchor over on a tree in the direction I wanted it to fall. I grabbed a couple carabiners and used two prussiks to set up a 3:1 mechanical advantage with progress capture. I loaded it up, and it held.






I gave it a couple more tugs, and started cutting. I came back down and gave it some more tension, then went up and continued cutting. When I heard the first crack, I climbed down and gave the haul line one more good heave.

Down came the top.



I had do go up and make one more cut to bring the tree to the size I wanted, and now I'll try to keep it around that height.

Groovy, eh?

Morning middle agers!
Can't believe it's Monday again, urgh why can't weekends be three days? All good here, hoping for a less manic time in work this week but at the moment it's full on. I work in logistics and our neighbours are really messing things up for us with Brexit, especially since we're the only country with an actual land border to the UK.

At least we have Biden on our side, apparently he's Irish somewhere in his roots.

IslandGal3 wrote: »

Good morning everyone. Wishing you all a wonderful week!

You too

Morning all of you beautiful people. Hope your Monday is as productive as you want it to be!!

Hubs came home yesterday early from work and went to get tested...so back on quarantine at least until results come back...ughhh, so frustrating

We are pretty much the best of the best around here

Good morning all. Enjoying the crazy warm weather here for one more day. Not sure how long I'll be working in place yet (I work in a school) since the whole covid thing is getting worse but for today, I'm here.

@cgrout78 - that is frustrating. I hope he gets his results quickly.

@AliNouveau - that is so strange! I hope it's just some weird dust or something on the tv?? (and that it doesn't get worse)

We don't have pets, hubs is allergic. I'm pretty sure it is molds from the leaves falling. It's been unseasonably warm here and seem to recall about 20 years ago this would happen every year. Then I'd be prescribed an inhaler and end up with a sore throat. I need to rake the leaves so I'll just wear one of my masks.

Or I'll blame the stupid tv hubs bought haha. I think we need to get a new house to fit the darn tv in

LunaTheFatCat wrote: »

Hahaha, it's a tv allergy for sure! I'm allergic for mine too, as husband here likes to watch it on volume 10, drives me absolutely bonkers. We're forever arguing over the volume button on that thing.

Speaking of pets, in a roundabout way, we'll be getting a kitten soon! We lost a cat 2 months ago in a freak incident when she escaped her cat carrier and we never found her back. So now we only have our Fat Cat Luna. We got Luna via a cat foster family who two days ago received another cat plus her 5 kittens for fostering. They're too small for adoption now, but in about 3 weeks we can collect our new fluff ball.

Oooh yay for kittens. We'll need lots of pics of course

thorenkate wrote: »

Im not new to MFP but back in it to prepare for my 40th birthday! Want to shed 15 lbs. Would love to find a support group of similar people looking to do the same. Definitely missing the support!

The support here is awesome! Welcome!

Steve

30 🙌🏼

LunaTheFatCat wrote: »

Happy Hump Day sweetie pies! Hope this day will be good for you
Fairly boring week here, we're still on lockdown, but numbers dropping big time, think we had only 270 cases yesterday, so we're definitely going in the right direction again.

Wow hopefully you'll be out of lockdown soon.
We're still under restrictions but I think they need to lock down. Our cases have been steadily climbing for the past week. One of the suburbs isn't doing well at all. Hopefully they can get it under control.

It's November 11, Remembrance Day, Lest we forget. A sombre day to remember those who gave their lives so we can live ours