Duke Energy Has Started & I Am Chainsawing Away!
Time keeps ticking by and progress, however small, keeps happening. The forecast said there was going to be thunderstorms in the afternoon so I left really early for my hour and 45 min drive so I would have time to accomplish as much as possible before the rain began.
I arrived at the property and low-and-behold, as I drove past the front of the property, there was a new pole on the property! If it looks like an electric pole and acts like an electric pole then it probably is an electric pole, I say. I look across the street and the Duke Energy pole across the street seems to have been replaced too. I didn’t get out of the Jeep, instead I drove on into the property to see what I could see from the inside. I drove through the property down the path that I cleared for Duke, off to the fence we had opened for them and that I had put chains on.
Sure enough – Duke had installed a new pole right outside the fence opening where Duke had marked the ground with a stake. I then went back out side to survey the outside. It did look like they installed a new pole across the street to replace the old pole that was there … perhaps they had to upgrade it. Surrounding the pole on my property were all kinds of letters and numbers, spray painted on the grass in red, (which i assume meant something to them or aliens viewing from a higher perspective perhaps), and several flags each saying “BURIED POWER”!. I did an immediate happy dance just coz’ there was action!
I must admit I also got quite the chuckle out of the concept of BURIED POWER. I ran various comedic rants in my head about who buries their power and why they bury their power and concluded that I had no intention of burying my power but I was glad that Duke was going to bury their power for me to utilize. LOL
Now I am guessing that the next step is that Duke’s contractors will show up, dig the trench down the path I cleared and lead the cable underground to where they designated that their transformer will go. Next they will take the cable underground up to the electric station my electrician installed, near the home shipping container. The deadline date for all of this was 12/15 so if they continue the work the first part of the week IT WILL HAPPEN! OMG!!! Electric on the property!!! This will be a BIG win with all utilities (Well, Septic and now Electric) all DONE!! At a future date we will undo some f this and move to off-grid power … but for now I need that electricity to move everything forward.
Next chore for the day was to get a 4′ x 4′ x 6′ post installed and put a document box on it. A Document Box??? So many things to learn about. It seems those are those little boxes that go on a property that contain documents for the county and the contractors, including a notice of commencements, permits, etc. So away I went with the shovel and soon I had the hole ready and dropped the 6′ post in about a foot deep and screwed the box on. Every little thing is a celebration. Take note that I am only 5’2″ and so that damn piece of 4′ x 4′ was taller than me and had some weight to it. I allowed myself to be proud of it no matter how small it may seem to someone else. LOL Viola, DONE!
Now for the real work for the day! Last time I was here I discovered that I had a problem with a group of trees, on one side of the clearing, and saw palmettos, on the other side, that were going to be in the way of delivering the home shipping container delivery. So this week the game was to begin taking down those trees and saw palmettos.
First, I need to say that I hate the thought of taking down any tree or plant being. It doesn’t feel right to do so on multiple levels. And I know they must come down. So I stood with them and thanked them and asked the universe to take care of them. I let them know that I appreciated them and that would continue to do so. I didn’t know what else to say exactly but I honored them as best as I could.
I started with the brush cutter to begin to get the ground clear of bramble so I could see what I was doing. Then I was going to use my pole saw to begin to do initial cutting so I could reach deep into the saw palmettos, but the pole saw had a problem. The chain had gotten jacked up the last time I used it and I ordered a new chain. I put the new chain on but couldn’t get it to tighten properly. I tried multiple times following the directions (LOL, yep, I resorted to actually reading the directions since hacking at it hadn’t worked!). Finally I knew the storms were coming so I didn’t have time to play with it any longer and I put the pole saw down and just went straight for the chainsaw.
Away I went, bending, stooping, stretching with gloves and eye protection on, taking the saw palmetto down first (let’s start small). Then I started on the trees. They were young still …. only ranging in size from 6 – 12 inches in diameter except for one that was about 16′ in diameter … I would save that one for last. I followed what I had learned at YouTube University by cutting a V shaped cut in the side I wanted them to fall in and then making a straight cut in the opposite side of the V. I hammering a tree wedge in the straight cut side to do the final toppling. The first one gently bent toward the V side and fell exactly where I wanted it to! BAM! Victory!!! They weren’t big around but they were tall so after it hit the ground I cut it into smaller pieces so I could drag them off. Then I kept moving from tree to tree.
My chainsaw is a small battery operated 12″ one. OK, I know it is wimpy but so am I so it was what I got. Although light in comparison to most big gas chainsaws it still took something to hold it and maneuver it to cut each tree. I got through 9 of them and the battery died. At the same time it started thundering. Message delivered, it was time to stop. I went around and drug off all the tree pieces, branches and saw palmetto leaves to the side further off in the wooded area. No time to make a neat little pile of potential fire wood. I just needed to clear everything up so I could see what was still left to do. There were 8 left to take down and a little more of the saw palmetto patch still needed to be tackled in the other grouping.
I walked over to the area I had staked off for the home shipping container and stared into the area I had been clearing. The work I did looked good. I could see behind it where the truck would drive to back up now. I took the brush cutter and just cleaned up a little more in the area and I would now need to call it a day. I knew I could easily get the rest done next week and it would be in time still before any delivery will even be scheduled.
I must admit I was really proud of myself again. I have done a lot of manual ground clearing with the brush cutter and taken down a few broken branches myself but this was a real job. I had found myself worrying a little throughout the prior week about if I could really handle it and do so without injuring myself. Getting whacked by one branch I had chainsawed down, several months ago, had given me a healthy sense of how I could injure myself if I wasn’t careful. I do lean towards thinking I am still some sort of 20 year old superwoman and I have to really be present to the realities of what I am doing a lot of times on the property so I don’t get carried away. LOL.
Today I had come away accomplishing a lot with only a few scraps and bruises to show for it. Good work, Kym!!! I really keep proving to myself that I can do this. All in all it was a really successful day. Gracie had been great all day too, staying on the the back tailgate of the truck watching me, sleeping and occasionally barking at me to come play with her. I got the tools put back in the storage containers and got the tarp over everything and Gracie and I headed out. Just in time for the rain to start.
This week I posted videos, on the Freedom Acres YouTube Channel, of the before and after of the trees and saw palmettos, the rainwater collection tank weekly update, the DocBox installation and the new Duke energy poles. Feel free check it all out by clicking HERE. Also, feel free to subscribe and you can get notified when new videos go up! 🙂
This coming week we will in waiting mode again. I will still be checking the permit, on the county site, daily for signs of new activity. It is now more than halfway done with three more items to be completed as each department reviews it. One item got flagged as not having a form submitted that we know we submitted. Unfortunately, they lock the files once the permit is submitted and you cannot get into the portal to add anything else until all departments have done their review so we just have to wait to resubmit anything now. I am once again playing the game to have it completed this week.
When the permit is approved we get to run full speed ahead… maybe. LOL The concrete guy, who will come once the permit is approved, to put in the slab and piers for the shipping containers goes out of town after the 15th until Jan 10th. So, If the permit doesn’t go through in time this week then we either wait for him or find another concrete guy … tough to do during the holidays I suspect. The Universe is now teaching me new more advanced levels of patience the closer we get to finishing things.
As always, I welcome any of your good mojo, energy, vibration and or prayers, sent in anyway you send it, in our direction, for Freedom Acres, Gracie and I for all of the continued progress. It is more appreciated each step along the way!! Love and Freedom to you til I come back next week!
