Oh, My Aching Muscles!

Lying dormant for six months isn't good. When spring comes and the yard work resumes, all of those muscles that had lain fallow over the winter have to be pumped up all over again. I know.....pumping up is not exactly something that we are particularly fond of, especially when it comes to upper body muscles, but when there is work to be done and no one to do it for you, there's not much choice. My legs stayed in shape over the winter, from riding my stationary bike, but I didn't realize how much my upper body had deteriorated, until I went out yesterday and pushed the lawnmower around for a couple of hours, and then went out again today and raked gravel off of my grass, back onto about 150 ft. of the road out front. The gravel had been pushed onto my grass, when snow on the road out front was plowed several times this past winter. The gravel had to be raked off the grass, or my lawnmower blade would have been destroyed after a couple of mowings.

The raking really took it out of me, but I also wanted to bring down and cut up the big pine tree limb, resting in the shoulder of another branch of the tree it broke out of during the last big winter storm.

If you click on the picture and enlarge it, you can see the limb in question, leaning against the tree it broke out of. The heftiest part of the limb is up in the tree, and out of sight.

I was worried about trying to cut this huge 10" diameter limb, while the bulk of it still rested up in the tree, so I tied a piece of coax cable I had leftover from when I installed my satellite system to it, and tied the other end to the trailer hitch hole on my truck's rear bumper, then I simply put the truck in gear and drug it to the ground.

The chainsaw that I got for an absolute steal from my support group girlfriend and fellow blogger, Sophie, worked like an absolute charm in dismembering this giant limb and it's branches. The saw, which I purchased from her for a third of the price of a new one, was in nearly brand new condition, and started up easily, with only a few pulls required. The blade was sharp, and it cut through the limb like a hot knife through butter. I wanted to cut up some more storm debris, but by then two hours of raking and limb dismembering had taken it's toll on my withered muscles, and I had to call it quits for the day for safety's sake. Handling a chainsaw is something I don't like to do when I am fatigued. The nearest hospital is a good forty miles away.

Melissa XX