How many college graduates does it take to cut down a tree?

So today was another tough day. We were short handed as the 7 from south bend left us this morning. The first job we hit was a debris removal job - these are always the worst. Often there is no one home (especially during early morning), so you don't really get any feedback. The things that you're removing are often still filled with sludge, or covered with mold. Not to mention that you're heaping all the possessions of a person or family in a large, foul smelling mountain in their front lawn, where it will smolder until its picked up by whomever. After that we called it lunch, and did some easier tree jobs in the afternoon. Tonight we'll be eating out for a change (I guess poor Ruth is tired of having a rowdy house full of laborers every evening).

There isn't alot of other new news, so perhaps I'll regale you with a story of how I was almost crushed by a tree last week. So I'm watching Dave cut a wedge in a large pine thats leaning up against this guys trailer at about a 60* angle. Part of it fell onto the owner's ladder which propped up the trunk. So, I suggest that, "hey, this tree is probably going to roll right towards all of us, maybe we should move." And Dave replies, "nah, we'll be fine."

Now for some reason, I don't know why, I decided to believe Dave. So he's cutting the wedge and Cherise (from the Chicago crew) is underneath trying to catch lizards, so we yell to her to move. And then I STILL stand there. The tree snaps, it starts moving towards me and my brain says, "run stupid." So, without thinking further I turn and run full speed into a large grill. The tree landed a foot or so from my feet. Moral of the story? There's probably a few good ones here, like, "always have an escape route to run while standing beneath falling trees." But I much prefer: "Don't ever listen to Dave Eger, when you're life is involved."

PS: We'll try and get some more photos up this evening.