In one shot I can show you both of the things I did today. First, in a rare occurence in Ferndale, it was too hot to be painting. An offshore breeze has warmed up the coast the last few days, and has been making for very pleasant weather, unless you want to paint the sunny side of a building. So I decided instead it was time to remove two willow trees that were forever growing over the house and wrecking the roof unless I kept after them. They were also in the way of building the next phase of our flood control project which I need to get done before winter so Lori doesn’t have to redo the herb garden again. I was very proud of myself for getting both trees completely down without dropping any limbs on the house or porch railing. Then came the task of cutting up the trees, and that’s when I realized I had a huge project on my hands.

I was in the process of shredding when I got a phone call from Bob Hamilton. Several years ago in an auction to raise money to help with the medical costs of a local baby, Bob offered a one hour flight. Ever since then, Bob and I have been trying to connect to work out a date that would work for both of us. Mechanical problems, both with the plane, and the hangar saboutaged several previous dates, and I always thought it would be best to do it in spring when the area is so green. But Bob is going to be selling his plane soon so we had to get it done. We flew up to Trinidad and then looped back to Ferndale, and it was fun seeing everything from the air, photography wise it was probably the worst day we could have picked. The smoke from the fires really made the sky hazy at fiying elevation and it was hard to see more than about a half mile. We did fly around our house before returning to the airport in Hydesville, so I was able to document the amount of downed branches that still need to be cleaned up.