The old tree in our yard out front was rotten. It had a big vertical notch in the base of the trunk that a full grown adult could stand in. Actually, two people could fit. We even had our neighbor have a couple of her senior pictures done with it as a background prop. It was a beautiful tree up to this year. Now half the canopy was barren of leaves. No nutrients were getting to them, and that was the end of this tree. We called a company that does tree removal in Nassau County to come take it down.

They cut it from the top down using a bucket truck and even climbing gear and ropes. I could hear the sections of big limbs hit the ground with a thud. The tree company leveled every divot from falling branches and planted grass where the stump used to be. They had the tree down fast. They cut a couple of slices from a big branch and the trunk. They told us we could save them and turn them into clocks or a tabletop. We decided to make three clocks. One big one and two little ones. The big one is hanging on our back porch. It looks nice in its thick polyurethane coating.

It is odd having the tree gone. However, I am glad we had it taken out before it feel down. There was not much holding it up. They tree cutters said it was amazing that it was still standing, especially since we had the major windstorm just a few weeks ago. We still have a lot of pictures and video of the hollowed out trunk that has been a place where imaginations of children of our neighbors have grown over the years. It is interesting how attached you can become to a tree.

My wife and I watch the DIY channel a lot an often we get home improvement ideas. Recently we had the idea of making over the bathrooms and contacted a company for custom mirrors in Brooklyn. The mirrors would be the main attraction of the bathrooms, and combined with new modern style sinks and touch less faucets, the bathrooms would look like something that you would normally find in a fancy hotel. This would be our first attempt at doing a makeover on a bathroom. I bought some books on the subject to make things easier, but they really didn’t help.

Since a professional was installing the mirrors, my wife and I tried to do everything else ourselves. For the most part, putting new tile on the bathroom floor was easy, and inside the shower as well. It was a lot of work, but we did it without much problems. Installing the new sinks and the faucets were an entirely different story. Even though I had the book to help me, and a manual in front of me, installing them were still pretty difficult. Eventually, we called a friend to help us with the installation.

When my friend installed the sinks and faucets, he made it look easy. I guess since he’s done more installations that we have, stuff like this comes pretty easy to him. We finally had the bathrooms we wanted, and the first time I used the touch less sink was when I washed all of the grime off my hands from the work. I waved my hand in front of the sink and the water came on automatically. I could even adjust the temperature by waving my hand over each controller for hot and cold water. It’s amazing the kind of technology people can think of when they use their minds.

The roach problem in my home was unbearable a few months ago. I couldn’t really figure out where they were coming from, but I knew that I wanted them gone. I tried using some stuff that I got from the store and sprayed it everywhere, but none of that stuff worked. I put down various baits and traps, and even used some natural items that were said to stop roaches, all with no success. The final straw was when I installed an electric powered repeller that only attached more. I called for pest control in Brooklyn to deal with these nasty bugs.

The pest control workers came dressed in their uniforms and had all kinds of equipment attached to them. It was like something out of that movie where the guys are driving around catching ghosts. The workers put down different gels for the roaches to feed on, which would kill them and other roaches when they share the food with each other. For any other roaches that didn’t eat the food they sprayed some liquid spray around the baseboards of the rooms. I had to leave my home for a few hours to avoid the smell of the fumes.

Seeing the dead roach bodies after a few days was a great sight to me. I didn’t care that I had to sweep them up, I was just glad that they were dead, and that I wouldn’t be seeing them for a while. The pest control workers told me that I might want to seal up any cracks that I have in my home to prevent more roaches from getting in. I went to the hardware store and bought some sealant to put into every crack and crevice that I could find. I made my home as air tight as possible.