Carnival of Fun

 

We had a manifold mission for the weekend that took us to Le Chateau au Chat Gris and to the home of olden days. 99 and I loaded the compact white whale and began our voyage. On our arrival au chateau, we immediately commenced the festivities, beginning with celebratory weed-pulling. We harvested three wagon loads or more of the cursed crop, both getting pricked multiple times by the dried stickers that congregated at the base of the foul flora. On the plus side, we had arrived in time to execute our vile vegetation eviction revelry during the hottest part of the day.

After we had disposed of the verdant corpses, I analyzed the next scheduled event in our carnival of fun. There had been a storm and the old maple tree, exuberantly cavorting like a featured performer in Cirque du Soleil, became apprised of the fact that her limbs were no longer suited for the gymnastics of a sapling and thus broke a hip. The said fracture was over 20 feet off the ground. The limb had not broken cleanly and the old girl refused to release the useless appendage. A dose of pushing, pulling, and shaking failed to convince her to set it free. I was going to have to perform surgery.

 My original estimate placed the fracture higher than my mightiest ladder would reach. Nevertheless, I brought out the ladder and my bow saw. I also tried ascending via the patient's own form, but soon abandoned that course because of the obstacles she placed in my way. Finally, I extended the ladder to its fullest length and 99 and I and raised it to penetrate the protective foliage to discover that it just reached the injured limb. I jammed the ladder beneath the limb and contemplated the wisdom of ascending to perform the surgery. 

Initially, a little voice suggested that it would be extremely unwise to trust my life and health to the slender aluminum projection held aloft only by the friction of its top rung against the branch. I agreed with the little voice because it was the same thing my gut was telling me. I've seen enough videos of people getting hurt in trees to know that once I cut away the damaged part, the limb would rise without the extra weight holding it down. If the limb rose, my ladder would tumble, and down would come baby, cradle and all.

The whole situation annoyed me, so I decided to ignore the little voice. That proved difficult because 99 kept talking, telling me that I couldn't and shouldn't try it. I tried a little binding to silence the voice. It wasn't entirely successful, but I did get the top of the ladder bound to the limb so the aluminum trail-to-the-sky couldn't collapse for lack of support. I also attached a rope to the broken appendage and gave instructions to 99 on how to pull so the branch wouldn't scrape me from the ladder or knock me unconscious as it plummeted from directly over my head.

The plan was pure genius, in a Maxwell Smart or Wiley Coyote sort of way, but actually worked to perfection--surprising wife, me, and the tree. Neither KAOS nor the Road Runner is safe from my keen intellect and sharp saw.

We resumed the carnival of fun the next day, mowing, moving obstacles, and tracking down and removing weeds that had failed to comply with verbal notices to vacate the premises. 

An hour or two after we left for part two of our mission, I remembered that I had forgotten to shut off the sprinkler. Fortunately, I was able to track down a good friend who was suffering from early onset retirement to turn off the water for me.

The second half of the mission went off successfully. It was the second reception for child 5 and was helped immeasurably by the fact that there was ice cream.