It is finished. The rubber tree is no more. Thursday Rodney the tree guy came back out with his stump grinder and took out the rubber tree’s humongous stump. It took a couple of guys trading off to get the whole thing.They had a big grinder, but the stump didn’t go quietly. About halfway through the battle, Chuck turned to me and said, “Well, I guess I couldn’t have taken that out by myself.” No duh! Anyway, it took them about an hour and a half but the deed is done. We are now ready to start building The New and Improved Pond. With fish!

We also had our (now close personal) friends from Empire Plumbing and Electric out to give Chuck an estimate for his fire pit, Have I mentioned the fire pit scheme before? It’s a dream of the Chuckster’s. I had my doubts, given the size of the yard. I thought it would turn the yard into something from King Solomon’s Mines (the 1950 version with Stewart Granger – NOT the drecky remake with Richard Chamberlain), the sort of place where a family of cannibals would feel right at home and sacrificial goats and lambs had better stay clear if they knew what was good for them. Still, it was a dream. So the Empire guy walkwed around, scribbled notes, sighed a lot, then came up with a total – just (get this!) for the gas to fuel the fire pit – of $5200!!!!! Happily there was an upper limit on Chuck’s dream and that amount was way over it. He was disappointed but philosophical. We went to Lowe’s yesterday and found a perfectly nice portable fire pit for $167. Much more the thing. Conceivably you could sacrifice, say, a puppy or a kitten on it but that’s it.

We also picked out the trees that will be planted in the back and side yards. We’re going with all citrus fruit all the time: two orange trees, one lemon and one lime tree. They’ll be delivered next Friday. It’s starting to come together! Pics here of the great stump removal.