Yesterday was a finish to an absolute nightmare job. Doing work for "family of an employee": take down of a 40 ft. Tree of Hell impeding the neighbor's house, and then removal of a 50+ foot lead off the parent Tree of Hell (tree is at least 90' tall) with structural issues threatening the owner's deck/house in a tight back yard.. Gave him a "family & friend's price" for a 8-10 hour job in September, but weather/scheduling made it impossible to get to until just last week. Bonus, he's ~60 miles away, so long ass drive in the trucks. Renegotiated to cover short trip one day for the small tree and rigging setup for the lead, then a medium size day the next to do the lead, chip, stack wood and clean up. So here's the timeline of the fun that occurred:
Day One, 11/29: Relative brush monkey and I headed up in pickup, took down small tree, then spent 2+ hours setting the retrievable rings and climb rope throw lines for the lead removal the next day. The tree was surrounded by smaller, limb filled trees from all yards around, and numerous limbs in every possible angle on itself, so my line throwing options were limited. Multiple Big-Shot attempts, had to retrieve a wayward, snagged line/weight, and do multiple re-positions to get the throw line for my climb line straight. Left throw lines in place to run ropes next morning. This was the best day (6 hrs. total, only 1 hr. longer than expected).
Day 2, 11/30: Headed up early, took almost 90 mins to get there due to speed limit of chip truck, unloaded and prepped area to go to work. Donned my gear and then looked around and had to exclaim "Guys, where's the climbing rope bag?!?!?" One of them had left it next to the pickup in my driveway, so it was now a 2+ hour round trip to go back and get it! (AAAARRRRRGGGGHHHHHH!!!!!) Put a heavy foot on the ride back in the pickup while they stayed behind and helped the relative with some small add-ons, and wonderful day, the transmission in the pickup crapped out. Limped home (thankfully didn't need a tow), but ended up burning an extra hour swapping into the SUV and grabbing extra gear for the return trip. By the time I got back, only had enough time to de-limb the lead b4 daylight ran out, and I had a family affair I had to attend to, so had to leave it incomplete and plan a return trip the following weekend for the 45" of stem wood that needed to be rigged out due to tight quarters (I'm still nursing the corporate gig until year end, so weekends only). BONUS: Weather forecasted 12-18 inches of wet, heavy snow the next day, so we had to pull all the gear/lines and do it again next weekend. 11.5 hrs total, and not finished (I can feel the splintered telephone pole now entering my sphincter
).
Day 3, 12/8: Knew I should only need 1-1.5 hrs to get the lead rigged/down and cut up, but had to deal with the nightmare of resetting the lines again. BONUS 2: The snow hadn't fully melted, so the lead was covered with 3" of snow and ice, making it all the more fun to shimmy and climb. (Amusing aside, as I didn't need the chip truck, the crew and I pulled a "Dan the Tree Man" and went up in the family mini-van. Bonus to those who get that reference
). Managed to screw 2 throwlines this time, and that added 2 hours of extra fun getting them out. Plus, the homeowner started to haggle on the renegotiated price, even though I had explained it fully up front, and I was not charging for the extra trips/time back up. What should have been a four hour day turned into 8 hours, and by the time I got back, missed out on some daylight estimates and the firehouse Santa ride I was supposed to be on. I made almost no money on the job, and to boot, anything left is going towards the rebuilt trans on the pickup.
A hell of a learning experience, and thankfully, I still had the Taliskers Distillers left to somewhat soothe me and keep me from being a total nightmare to deal with back home.
Hope y'all enjoyed this "Tale from the Crypt"....
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