See that tree arcing out at 40° ? That's coming down today, hopefully.

When he cleared the lot, the fucking builder left this maple tree on the side of our house. It's about 12 inches at the base, and is growing next to a big oak tree. Not just 'next to', it's touching the oak. And not just touching, either; one might think they were branches of the same tree. Except one's an oak and one's a maple. And the maple is getting the crappy end of the deal. The oak is basically pushing it over. We asked him to take it out after the house was done and he said he couldn't. Grrr.

So I was out mowing the lawn Saturday and I noticed that one of the maple's two big branches is resting on our roof. As you can see in the pic. It cracked enough to lose the ability to hold itself up, but didn't separate completely.

So the tree guy came out this morning to look at it. And he sensed the urgency and said he's going to try to take it down today, when the current rain stops, but before we get the line of thunderstorms that terrorized the mid-west over the weekend. If he doesn't get it down today, that branch could come a-tumblin through the side of our house. Also, because that tree is directly above our septic tank, he can't get his cherry picker under it, so he's going to have to try to get it down with a bunch of ropes and winches tied to the oak for leverage. He said climbing it would be 'suicide'. I'm glad I won't be there to watch.

$800.