Vermont’s Ash Trees Will Die

It was distressing to pick up the Burlington Free Press this morning and read Nancy Remsen’s story on the impending invasion of the emerald ash borer, which will kill the state’s beautiful ash trees.

Photo from Perdue University shows an emerald ash borer

 The beetle has already killed millions of the trees in the Midwest since turning up near Detroit in 2002. The closest the bug has been known to come to Vermont is a spot 17 miles south of Montreal. It’s inevitable the pest will arrive here.

The state is installing about 480 traps to detect the borer. You’ll see them all over roadsides, a bluish purple prism tied to trees.

Photo by Glenn Russell of the Burlington Free Press shows an ash borer monitoring trap in Vermont.

As Remsen notes in her story, ash trees comprise about 5 percent of Vermont’s forests, and are popular as street trees in towns and cities, as they resist damage from salt and pollutants.

The death of the state’s ash trees will be a real loss. They are useful as wood for furnture and other products, but I just like looking at them.

In the fall, their changing leaves offer a purple and gold counterpoint to the reds and oranges in the sugar maples. Ash tree leaves come out a little later in the spring than other tree species. So the ash leaves in May are these tender mint green colored splashes amid the darker green of mature leaves.

Ash trees offer nice shade in the summer, too.

It seems invasive pests kill the best stuff in Vermont and elsewhere, but nothing seems to harm pests. We’ve lost American chestnut trees and most of the state’s graceful elms to diiseases brought in from elsewhere in the world. Vermont’s beloved and economically crucial sugar maples could succumb to the Asian longhorn beetle.

Have you noticed that pests or diseases are killing off the the useful and important honeybees, but nothing seems to bother black flies, mosquitoes and deer flies?

Invasive, annoying plants like garlic mustard weed intrude on precious trillium flowers. Unpleasant animals like rats thrive; others are threatened by diseases.

So is the landscaping going to convert from something beautiful, varied and vibrant, like Vermont has now? Or is it just going to be a land of annoying weeds, biting insects, and barren slopes where gorgeous forests once stood?

I know that’s all hyperbole, but any time I see a plant, a tree, an animal that adds to the joy of living in rural Vermont come under attack and die,  I die just a bit, too.

Stop Looking At Me, Spammers

Spammers continue to think I need to fix my body.

I’ve ranted about this before, but it’s getting worse. The automatic spam distributers seem to be reading my blog, and have somehow taken a gander at my body, which is not displayed in the blog. These spammers do not like what they see when they look at me. 

Apparently, I need a tummy tuck, breast enlargement, breast reduction, a nose job, eyelid work, a better butt, a bigger wee-wee, smaller feet, larger feet, more hair, less hair, bigger biceps, a less wrinkled neck, higher cheekbones and teeth whitening.

Jeez, talk about giving me a complex. Yeah, my body could use a little work. I just thought a good diet and some exercise might help. But apparently, I’m a physical wreck.

The messages from the spammers come in as comments to my blog posts. WordPress, the host of this blog, does a great job of redirecting spam to a separate file, where I can decide whether to add them to my comments section or delete them.

But I still get to read them. The Spammers all think  the shape of my anatomy is somehow related to a post I write on say, how I mulched a Charlotte garden. But who am I to judge how people think?

 A lot of  spammers seem to seize on key words and  try to tailor their pitches to that. And they often fail spectacularly.

One post a day or so ago had the word “surgery” in the title, referring to how I repaired a half-dead tree. I got messages offering me a “tummy tuck and breast uplift.” in response.

You know, Spammers, it’s really rude to comment on another person’s body. I don’t  walk down the street, see an overweight woman and shout, “Lose some weight you tub of lard!” So spammers, my body is just fine, thank you. No comments please.  Didn’t your mother teach you any manners? 

The “surgery” post also inspired a message suggesting I would like to have sexual contact with cheerleaders and basketball players. Both? At the same time?

Another recent blog post had the word “Discipline” in the title. That inspired messages saying spanking is good for kids, spanking is bad for kids, that I need to go back to college, I need to learn Spanish, go to the gym and eat more of that dreaded acai berry. Whatever that is.

Uh, thanks, but I’m already really, really busy.

The most bizarre spam comes when I mention a certain friend in the blog.  And it’s only when I mention him, and not when I talk about anyone else.

I won’t repeat my friend’s name, because that will inspire more spam, but he lives in far northern Vermont and for this post, I will call him Sined.

Every time I mention Sined, I get tons of messages saying Sined is a Tea Party fanatic and I have to avoid him, or that he is not in the Tea Party, and is therefore un-American, so I must avoid him.

I don’t know what inspired all this, as I’ve never mentioned Sined’s political views in the blog.  Sined and I have never had long, in-depth discussions about the Tea Party.  I Googled Sined, just to be sure, and nothing came up relating him and the Tea Party.

Maybe Sined’s name isn’t as all-American as say, “John Smith” so you resent him for that? Well, ignore him then. I’m sure Sined won’t mind.

As you can see, the Spammers are a pretty contradictory bunch. So, Spammers, take a deep breath, make up your mind, then tell me what you want.

Better yet, just shut up, leave us alone and crawl back into your hole in the ground.

Vermont Heat is On

I’m really glad I didn’t go to the University of Vermont commencement yesterday.

Yeah, it was a really nice day. And all those graduates certainly deserve applause for obtaining their degrees.

But the thought of sitting for hours in the sun in a black synthetic, unbreathable graduation gown gives me the vapors.

As a non-graduate, I wouldn’t have to wear that get-up, of course. But just the sight of people suffering in those things would give me heat stroke.

In this Burlington Free Press photo by Ian Thomas Jansen-Lonnquist, a graduate endures the sun blasted ceremony at UVM.

Spring was early in Vermont and so is summer. The woods looks like it does in June or July, not May. The grass is turning brown a bit in the most sun-blasted areas. As I landscape, I stir up dust everywhere.  Mowing near a pond yesterday, I was sorely tempted to “accidentally” fall into it.

Temperatures over the next couple of days are supposed to be in the upper 80s and low 90s.  Records might fall. July is two months early.

I’m probably jinxing the summer just by mentioning this. I remember clearly the last time I remarked upon a summery, dry May. It was May 30, 1998.

The very next day a seemingly endless parade of severe, drenching thunderstorms raked Vermont.  A tornado trashed part of Bennington that day. The rest of the summer of 1998 turned out  to be by far the wettest on record. Some of the worst flash flooding in Vermont history struck in June.

Already, there are signs I just wrecked the summer. Memorial Day weekend might turn out chilly and cloudy, according to long range forecasts. So, I hope I didn’t just ruin your summer.

Landscaping: Minor Tree Surgery

In another life, I could have been a plastic surgeon.

On  a landscaping job yesterday, I landcaped at a house where workers had to dig a trench last year near an interesting everygreen tree. Due to root damage, a few branches died, and the ground beneath and around it was a rocky mess.

Enter me, the plastic surgeon, to get rid of the mess. There were lots of dead small branches mixed evenly among ones that were still alive. So I gingerly cut those, taking care to save the ones that were alive, or almost alive.

I wanted to save as much as I could because there’s nothing worse than a naked tree, right?

There were a few dead spots still visible on the tree after I was done. The dead parts are attached to live parts of the branches. I’m hoping the live parts grow, and the dead parts just shed. I’ll have to check back later and see.

Mulch would have looked lousy with all those rocks. Not to mention the holes, cracks and ridges left behind by the excavation, so it was a simple matter of getting rid of the rocks, evening up the ground and laying down some dark mulch.

Piece of cake, really, but it’s fun to tidy up a rough-hewn area. Pictures are before and after.

All of yesterday for me was really clean up work.  I did much more mulching and cleaning at this house with the tree.

Later, I, mucked out a little pool beneath a woman’s fountain in Richmond.  It was full of leaves, dirt, and a drowned mouse. Stupid little thing probably got depressed by the cold weather in the winter and commited suicide.

But it was a relief to both the woman and me not to have a swamp for a fountain by the front door.

I mowed her lawn, too. I’ve never seen a lawn that grows as thickly and fast as hers. It’s the only one of several lawns I do that I have to rake after the mowing.

In the evening, I started clearing out a debris-clogged drainage ditch elsewhere in Richmond

The nice thing: Some of the work was relatively strenuous. I loved the exercise.

I’m rarin’ to do more today.

I Need Discipline

I don’t work hard enough.

Yeah, I do put in some hours, I try to get things done, and some people are a little lazier than me. But I’ve got to push myself more. Much more.

An example: My lawn. I kept insisting I didn’t have a chance to get in and mow it during the past week.

It was growing and growing. A hay farmer would have been proud of my grass. Tall and luxurious.

Truth is, I could have mowed the lawn days ago,  had I just not insisted to myself that I “needed my rest.”

Yeah, as if I was some old codger in a rest home.

What kind of example is a a hayfield to my landscape clients? You can see  the before and after pictures of the Diet Coke can in the grass. It shows how ridiculous my lawn got.

I finally did mow it last evening. I had to use a headlamp to see during the last 45 minutes of it, but it’s done. I’m sure the neighbors loved the sight of someone who looked like a coal minor with a headlamp mowing the lawn in the gathering darkness, accompanied by a nice cloud of mosquitoes. But there you go.

Of course I’m not satisfied when I finished last night  because there were weeds to get rid of, compost to turn, a stone wall to build. Instead, I was a bum as usual and went to bed.

I’m behind in my landscaping client work, too. I’ll knuckle down today, but I’ve got to make sure I don’t convince myself I’m “tired.” Too often, I quit for the day, after talking myself into the idea that I can’t go on. This, when there’s still a couple hours of daylight left. The days are long this time of year. I should take full advantage of it.

That I get lazy means I don’t have time for the important things. A friend of mine could have used some company last night, but I was mowing. Had I gotten on the stick earlier in the week, gotten some work done, this wouldn’t have been a problem.

I need somebody with a whip. Get out there! Get it done, dammit! No excuses! Move it! Discipline!

I need self-discipline in all areas of my life. Classic examples:  I need to shed some body fat. An in-shape friend of mine I was with earlier this week had no trouble passing up the beer and chocolate cake. Me, I indulged. I had no right to do that!

I was visiting a very busy friend the other day, and stayed overnight.  He had no time to finish his spring landscaping. I could have gotten up early and helped do it before I had to leave.

Instead the sun began rising, I looked up, then crashed down onto the pillow and fell back asleep. Snoozed ’til 6 a.m. like a fat, elderly  house cat. By then I had to go home and I didn’t do any work at his house.  Another demerit for me!

Hey, all work and no play makes Johnny a dull boy, I get that cliche. Nothing wrong with a little partying, a few laughs. And nobody’s perfect; I can’t do everything just right, I fully realize.

Still, I’ll try almost anything to improve my discipline. I’m trying some public self-flogging here in this post to motivate me. Something’s got to work.

You only have one life to live. Somehow, I need to learn to work harder, play harder, and get ‘er done!

Last Glimpse of Vermont Winter

Take a last look at winter white:

The photo shows ski slopes on part of the Jay Peak ski resort, Friday morning, May 21,2010.

There are still patches of mostly man-made snow left over from the ski season.

It’s the last dregs of winter. Up on Mount Mansfield, there are 11 inches of snow left at the measuring stick near the top of the mountain.

Summer temperatures are due in Vermont from today through at least the middle of next week, so says the National Weather Service in South Burlington.

It will get well into the 80s during the first half of next week. Which means those last patches of snow on the mountain tops will disappear.

Bon voyage and good riddance, until next fall. Snow can be a lot of fun, but I don’t want to think more about it for awhile.

News Media: Gulf Oil Off Limits?

I caught a video that said CBS news crews were threatened with arrest for trying to film oil washing up on Lousiana shore. Coast Guard guy said those were BP rules.

If true, since when does BP get to decide what we can see and not see. Can BP revoke the First Amendment? They have some ‘splainin’ to do! And it better be good.

The only innocent explanation I can think of is it was unsafe. But that had better be really, really true if that’s the case.

Watch the brief CBS report:

Southern Silliness Skids To Vermont

Daddy was a preacher, but momma was a go-go girl.

Ok, I’m not talking about my family, but it was fun to think about the concept Tuesday night as I watched the band Southern Culture on the Skids play the song at their show  in South Burlington, Vt.

Their schtick is twisted fun. They sing about the down market aspects of all that we love about the south, or rural Vermont for that matter.  Double Wides.  ’69 El Caminos. Something about “Swamp fox in a halter top, walking down the street shakin’ what she’s got.”

Can’t you picture the swamp fox turning heads as she walks through downtown Barton?

The band calls their music “toe sucking geek rock,” and call themselves “bards of downward mobility.” So when they played, I felt right at home.

I’ve always been attracted to sort of down market rural charms. I’ve never been able to fully embrace it myself, but it’s fun to watch, and sometimes participate in. Back yard bathtub Virgin Marys. Beer bashes at the quarry featuring Old Milwaukee Lite, stale Doritos and Lynyrd Skynyrd. Ratty wife beater t-shirts and shabby baseball caps advertising farm supplies.

In fact, I wore a ratty wife beater to the Southern Culture show. I figured I had to make an impression.

On stage, I particularly liked band member Mary Huff, who had a huge elaborate semi-bouffant hairdo. Between every song, she’d pull out her compact mirror and brush her hair, apply another layer of lipstick or spritz herself with perfume. Kind of like what you’d see a tacky gal with aspirations of greatness  do at some low rent roadhouse somewhere.

And of course they played one song that could fit that type of woman perfectly. It goes, “She’s liquored up and lacquered down. She’s got the biggest hair in town.”

So you can take your Saks Fifth Avenue, your Versace, your Louis Vuitton and stuff it. Give me Wal-Mart, 7-11, Family Dollar and Big Lots.

Because I can wear my greasy John Deere baseball cap to Wal-Mart and look dressed to the nines. But just try getting into Versace store on New York’s Fifth Avenue with that get-up.

Denis Day in Vermont

Let’s all give a shout-out to Denis Desjarlais of Jay, Vermont, who is celebrating a birthday today.

Part of the reason for this announcement is to complete the time-honored tradition of embarrassing a friend celebrating a birthday by making a big deal out of it.

But I’m going to embarrass Denis further by using him as Exhibit A for  the point of this post: That the good ones out there don’t get the publicity.

I spend a lot of time on this blog skewering the stupid, the hypocritical and the wacko. They’re easy targets. Just like everyone else in the media I focus on the train wrecks. They’re flashy and exciting and make great tabloid fodder.

Denis makes completely lousy tabloid fodder. No inane stupidity from him, right, Britney? No icky scandals involving strange people and complicated kinky situations,  right, George Rekers and John Edwards?  No crimes committed in a drunk or druggy haze. I guess Denis is just never going to get a call from the National Enquirer.

See, Denis is the type of person who gives us TIME to wallow in the tabloid manure pit. He’s one of those relatively quiet types that get a ton of stuff done for all of us when we’re being lazy and and looking at the latest death-warmed-over pics of Elizabeth Taylor. 

I purposely used a picture of Denis in this post with his back to the camera because I’m not 100 percent sure he’d appreciate a face shot. Hell, I’m not even sure he’d want me to write about him like, this, but I’ll take the chance.

I snapped the picture of him last month on the Burlington Waterfront. He had just given me another dollop of great advice.

He practically runs the town of Jay, he’s on so many boards, committees and volunteer organizations. He’s always doing favors for friends and families. If I had to pay him a  salary for all the things he’s done for me, I’d have to rob every bank in Vermont to come up with the cash.

 I think today he is celebrating his birthday by helping to gut and renovate the bathrooms in his family home.

Yeah, Denis is a real glamour boy.

There are probably quite a few people out there like Denis.  They just don’t like to take center stage, so we don’t notice them as readily.

If there weren’t around,  I think everything would just fall apart. Somebody has to keep things together while we’re catching up on Tiger Woods’ sexual hijinks and what Lady Gaga is wearing this time. 

It’s not like Denis is some drudge who keeps doing grunt work or something like that.  People like Denis may not be ready for the tabloid headlines, but they’re certainly not boring workhorses mired in drudgery.

 The charm of people like Denis is they’re smart, funny, interested, interesting, sensible, offbeat and give terrific advice. But never unsolicited advice.   Many people want to spend a lot of time with Denis. He has a lot of friends, so he sure is entertaining, just not in a Jerry Springer sort of way.

You always feel better after hanging around with Denis.

So, my unsolicited advice to everybody out in blogland is to find people like Denis and tell them how crucial they are to our happy lives.  I always count my blessings that I ran into Denis a couple years back and took the time to get to know him.

I’m a lot smarter and a lot better because of that.

So, happy Birthday Denis! Maybe I won’t find you on TMZ, Access Hollywood or in tell-all books. But you’re the man in my book.

Hellish Hail

In my other blog, Weather Rapport for the Burlington Free Press, I offered video of a hailstorm in Oklahoma.

The storm was so breathtaking, I decided to offer a couple different videos here. It’s amazing things that big could fall from the sky. Note the table top in the patio breaking at about 2:23 into the  first video.

Another video of the hail, wrecking an apartment complex:

Don’t think you’re safe from this, Vermont. Similar hail fell in Westford last July. It wrecked cars and smashed windows. And killed some chickens caught outside at a farm in Westford.