“Did the tree trimmers tattle on me?” I asked the officer as he got out and approached us.
Yes, they had, the officer said, and I wasn’t the only one complaining. He agreed they had butchered the tree BUT we had a bigger problem to resolve. It seemed that the branches I’d moved to curbside were sticking out too far into the street, and I could be ticketed for impeding the flow of traffic.
“You’ve got to be kidding!” I said, along with some other choice words. The branches were probably sticking into the street about three feet from the curb. I thought they weren’t impeding anything. But, no, he wasn’t kidding.
“Well, if an ambulance happened to come through and a car was coming in the opposite direction….”
“The car would yield the right of way,” Big Bore said.
I was ranting on and on about how petty this was. I couldn’t believe I was going to have to move the branches again, and how the $#%@! trimming crew should have moved them in the first place--and for some reason Big Bore started complaining about the dogs in the neighborhood.
Oh, well, there was no use arguing. We moved the blasted branches the requested few feet, and the bewildered officer left, satisfied that we were law-abiding, hell-raising citizens.
I have written a letter to the local sheriff asking him why cars and trucks are allowed to park on the neighborhood streets since they stick out from the curb much farther than the branches were during my alleged crime in question. Two of the vehicles that are regularly parked on the street near our house belong to the city and the county--driven by the town animal control officer and a deputy sheriff. Are they not “impeding the flow of traffic,” too? Those vehicles are much more dangerous than a bunch of branches, for sure. I’m sure he’ll come back with some vague tree law that prohibits branches from being in the curb--even if they were cut down by Westar’s band of merry hoodlums and not the homeowner. But at least I’ll have the satisfaction of bitching some more.
Oh, and I have a letter ready to send to Westar, also. I want the company to know that 3/5 of their highly paid tree crew were nothing but gawkers who stood around twiddling their thumbs while on the time clock. If they are going to rat on me, I can rat back. Don’t mess with the Flaming Bore!!
2 comments:
Are you kidding me??? Wow thats just plain crazy!! And I can't wait to hear part 3 about the westar letter.
Well I help the blogging and letter-writing helped vent your frustrations because I'm still peeved. Those Westar jerks had no business calling the law on you when they came into your yard and destroyed your tree, ruined your flower bed, and then were absolutely no help in cleaning up the mess they so happily made. like I said, I hope the letter-writing subdued your frustrations, because I'm really still peeved about all of it!!!
PS- they might not have pressed you so hard if they knew you were a letter writer. Have you considered a letter to the editor of the Eureka Herald?
Might be something nice to clip out and mail to Westar, along with your letter. :-)
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