I can see the brewings of a ‘master project’ about to form this week. My husband left for Florida yesterday with our daughter, Betty. They will be away for 10 days. In his absence, two men will be working in our yard, and will be taking down five dead pine trees.

Our entire yard is covered in trees. We have 5 acres and no grass. So, removing pine trees won’t make a dent in the foliage that we have here.

What worries me is the part of the project that involves a chipper, and then spreading the chips around the yard in decorative places.

On top of that, my husband wants some other spindly trees removed because he thinks we look too penned in, having so many trees. Damn trees. What? Why? It’s like we’re living in a forest.

It’s the timing of the tree project that concerns me. We are leaving our house to live in a campground in less than a months’ time. Projects like these tend to escalate, causing us all-nighters. I have visions of us schlepping wood under headlamp to make our yard look beautiful. And, it will look nice, I’m sure. But, the effort. Flipping hell.