Let me sing you a song of chipping. Running things through a wood chipper has got to be one of the funnest things a person can do on a hot Monday morning. Pick up the tree, drag the tree, chip the tree, rinse and repeat. In all seriousness I really did have a very nice time today dragging dead trees into a wood chipper. There exists a certain kind of sick fascination in watching a very large something be swiftly transformed into very many tiny somethings. We were performing this alchemy as part of a project aimed at creating more grassland open space for birds, and to create park space for people (a twofer!) It seems strange to cut down trees to make habitat for birds, but when you suppress forest fires because you live in a place with million dollar mansions, natural grass land habitat can be a little hard to come by.

Other than reducing trees to little bits, I have been very busy. Besides all the working I have been doing, I have also been preparing myself mentally for Tess’ upcoming trip to China. She will be gone forever 6 weeks and I have to be strong and keep myself from making baby sounds the whole time she is gone. I will be going to see her Tuesday and Wednesday of this week, so I will not be around much.

I am glad The Sietch is once again up and running. I had a bit of a fight with some comment spammers this week (so bad that my host turned my CGI service off a couple of times). Lets hope that the defenses I have installed will hold back the flood. I apologize in advance for any slowness. If you know any good cheap VPS or dedicated server hosting let me know.