
Yes, you read that right, I climbed the above tree with a chainsaw. Why you may ask, because there were dead limbs that I am wanting to build things under, I’m too cheap to even consider hiring someone to come do it for me, I momentarily was left unsupervised, and Pretty Lady didn’t think I could do it.
In my defense, I have been using a chainsaw since I was a kid (something about growing up in southern Indiana), and I have been climbing trees since I was very very little. My mother likes to tell a story about one time when we were visiting my grandmother when I was little (3 or 4). Mom was in the Kitchen with Grandma doing the dishes and she looks out the window to see me up the apple tree. Grandma leans over, looks at me and say’s “just break his knees now, it’ll save you a lot of grief”

Well I am pleased to say Mom did not take Grandma’s advice, and after about a half hour of climbing and a little bit of creative positioning I managed to cut down the dead limbs without any injury to myself. I also received the honor of being told by the Tiny Terrorist to be careful.

Once the limbs were down, cleaning up around the tree became a family project. And by that I mean I dragged off the big limbs and then left Caitlyn and Grant to clean out the rest of the junk while played with the chainsaw elsewhere. The list of things they found in that pile includes, but is not limited to, various styles of wire fencing, various types of fence posts, vines, a hammer, and bricks.

Luckily I had trained Grant in the fine art of brick stacking the day before with the family project of clearing junk away from the drive way.


As you can see, my parents got Grant “Grant” sized tools for his birthday. As you can see above, he had a bit of a learning curve on how to use his shovel. That being said, he did spend the majority of a morning helping spread gravel.


Grant did however take a break from shoveling gravel to “tune up” my lawn mower… Or at least I think that’s what he thought he was doing when I found him.

I’m not going to lie, watching him try to figure out a crescent wrench was adorable, unfortunately teaching him the first rule of using your fathers tools resulted in a melt down… Put it back where you found it when you’re done! I mean seriously kid, I am letting you have free reign over the tools in the garage (ok, only the ones he can reach and yes I make sure the dangerous ones are out of reach), but the least you can do is put the wrench back on the nail when you’re done.

I have to say, the tool melt down was at least understandable, unlike the above photo. This melt down was brought to you by a mean mommy who wouldn’t come downstairs to change the TV show. Apparently I am incapable of doing it, even though I was sitting next to him holding the remote when he grabbed it and started to demand Mom come and do it.


Thankfully we all are getting breaks from each other a few time a week when my Mom watches Grant. She does this so Caitlyn can work on school stuff uninterrupted, but I will admit we have dragged our feet a bit on picking him up… I honestly have no clue what all they do, but apparently there is some fort building, and tower building, and a whole lot of quality grandma time. I really don’t know how she does it, but he is worn out and actually volunteers for a nap after spending a few hours with his “Gammy B”… So Yes, we drag our feet on picking him up a little bit…


Speaking of my parents and the mysterious ways they operate. Last night Dad, Bob, and I worked on Jeff until almost 2am.
At one point in time I see Dad using electrical tape to attached a rubber host to the end of a shop vac… It was one of those, “this is either going to be genius, or dumb” ideas… So I had to ask what he was doing. He was devising a way to suck out the oil and any debris that had fallen into the cylinder. Well, it worked… He used the hill-jack engineered device to clean out the cylinder to everyones satisfaction.
A few hours later, Jeff was reassembled and we turned the key in the ignition. I want to go on record as stating that Jeff started right up and ran beautifully! Ok, so there was an antifreeze colored geyser coming out of the hole in the head block that none of use noticed until then, but Jeff ran!!! Apparently the new head block has a hole in it that the old one did not, none of use noticed it until the geyser and we did not have a plug for said hole, so Jeff was left sitting over night. That being said, I am claiming the 10 points for getting Jeff back up and running.

Days Unemployed: 14
Unemployed adventure points earned on this update: 5 points for Tiny Terrorist going to time out (1 each), 2 points for tiny terrorist telling me to be careful while climbing with a chainsaw, 2 points for doing something that should get me killed (climbing with chainsaw), 10 points for getting Jeff up and running, 2 points for getting the weed eater up and running.
To see the full list of how I can earn points, check out: http://amanajeepnorealplan.com/tylers-coronavirus-unemployment-adventure-point-system/
This Update’s total points: 21
Total to date: 34
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