The planned sale of my gym fell through, I think due to financing issues, so I consider that a good thing since new ownership would have a good reason to raise the monthly rates, in my mind. The equipment is pretty old, with some of the machines having developed rips in the vinyl padding, but they still work just as good. 

Today I did the treadmill for 45 minutes (!) at a 3.5 mph walking rate and peak heart rate of 107. As long as I have something to watch on TV, I can do it, but otherwise, it's deadly dull. I don't like to use earphones so that's out. There are maybe 6 or 7 treadmills and only 2 TVs, so you have to always hope you get a treadmill in front of a TV. You can watch a TV from an adjacent treadmill, but then you're craning your neck at an uncomfortable angle and maybe it's something that doesn't interest you but you can't change the channel.

I have been thinking more about continuing to organize litter cleanups in my hometown. I've done about 4 here last year and the year before while still being active wtih my statewide litter group, but that group has been inactive for at least a year now, so I decided to focus on just my town.

However, picking up roadside litter is not a low-risk activity. I am going to ask every volunteer who shows up to sign a liabaility waiver (adapted from my state litter group's form) whose main purpose is to keep myself from being sued should someone get hurt. People have a way of wanting to blame someone else for their own actions when something goes wrong. After doing some research reading various legal blogs and so forth, I realized that even if a parent signed a liability waiver for their minor child, that waiver would have no standing in court, because even a parent can't sign away a child's rights. So out of an abundance of caution, I am limiting involvement to those 18 and older.

I have designed the flyer I'll be posting on our town FB page once we get some warmer weather around here, probably in April. The flyer will state, "This is an adult activity for those 18 and older." I just KNOW that someone is going to challenge me on that so I am prepared to defend my position so I don't look like a total dickhead for excluding dear children. There are several groups that don't have age restrictions, but they focus solely on public beaches, where presumably the risk of getting hit by a car would be low. But they are a 40-minute or more drive away. Or, people could organize litter cleanups on their own streets.  I just hope no one glosses over the "This is an adult activity" line in the flyer and then shows up with their 10-year-old. Then what do I do? Look like a jerk and turn them away? Or let them stay, possibly creating further problems if others observe I'm not really enforcing my own rules?  

Anyway, after my gym workout, I did a drive-by of the road I plan to do this spring; it's actually the 2nd half of the road we started in September but didn't have time to finish as it's about a mile long. There was noticeably more trash on the end we didn't touch than the part we did do. This road runs parallel to a small brook, and on the other side of the brook is an interstate highway. I could clearly see how people had thrown trash over the guard rail and how it has migrated down the enbankment, into and across the river and so on. 

Tabs mentioned a dead tree he wants gone close to his place. I've had much the same thing in mind following a rainstorm with heavy winds 2 nights ago. During the peak of the storm, I watched the top half of a massive Norway Spruce sway to and fro. Having a tree fall on my house has long been a worry for me during strong storms. Over the years, I have eliminated a number of them for this reason. I also feel less bad about getting rid of this Norway spruce because it is not native and offers little benefit to pollinators. I would definitely be planting higher value shrubbery in its place, maybe small trees like a flowering dogwood or river birch, but no massive trees!

Norway spruces are especially prone to coming down in a strong storm because they have a shallow root system, which can fail when the ground is totally saturated; also, their arching branches act like a sail that catches high winds.

It might not look so big in this photo, but the photo was taken leaning out my upstairs bathroom window, which overlooks the garage.  Just the tops of those dried hydrangea flowers you see behind the garage roof are about 7 feet high.

I texted my tree guy, who just finished pruning a giant silver maple on the other side of the yard a few weeks ago, and told him what I was thinking about, maybe for him to do this fall or winter. To my surprise, he already gave me a price: $1,400 to remove everything but the stump. Which to me seems VERY reasonable; I'd been anticipating several thousand dollars. I like to leave a snag, actually, maybe 8 feet high, not just a stump, as it's a big benefit for wildlife. Some people might consider it an eyesore, but I don't.