The Fay Family » General

Record High Today

How crazy is it that I didn’t wear a jacket to work today? Can you believe how warm it is supposed to get in the DC area? Al Roker of NBC’s Today show suggests it will be 80 degrees in DC today!

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Pine Tree Removal - Lessons Learned

We’ve had a crazy few weeks. We have a 40+ year old pine tree in the front yard that needed to be removed. The last few winters have ruined its beauty - ice storms causing many limbs to break and fall. The tree became such an eye sore that we knew we needed to get the tree cut down, but we could just never justify spending $1000 when we could use the money somewhere else.

Enter the scam. Joseph Adkins, of Strongbow Tree Removal Services, 443-496-1133, came by our home and offered to remove the tree and stump for $700. This was the best estimate we had received. Seemed great, but I just wasn’t ready. Then the following week Joseph came by and offered to do the job for $575 since he was supposedly doing other jobs in the area. Well, we jumped at this offer.

Joseph and crew arrived the next day with a pickup truck and a couple of chainsaws. They cut down one limb, which promptly destroyed the lamppost light and destroyed a large part of Laurel’s beloved dogwood tree. I won’t drag the story out, but the short of it is that they mentioned that they needed to come back the next day to finish the job, and they never returned, despite many repeated phone calls.

Our mistake is that we didn’t ask for paperwork proof of insurance coverage and licensure - a little tidbit that our new service mentioned to us. Apparently, they said that a few people have been going through Prince George’s county, MD without insurance, and offering to provide tree removal services. The problem is that if they get hurt, they can sue you.

We were fortunate. We only lost a $200 deposit. Unfortunately, we will not easily be able to track these guys down since they did not offer a mailing address. Although it cost us a bit more (but a realistic estimate), we highly recommend Adirondack Tree Experts for their professionalism, honesty, and speed - they completed the job in 1.5 hours!

Here are some before and after photos:

Here are photos from the set:

Tags: [Joseph Adkins, Strongbow Tree Removal Services, scam, Adirondack Tree Experts, lessons learned]

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The Greenwich Castle

I happened upon the annual Forbes article on the most expensive homes for sale in the Northeast, and what caught my eye was one home in particular.

Greenwich, CT home for sale: $38 million
© Christie’s Great Estates

Back in my college years I worked for a landscape company for two summers. Many of the homes we went to were in affluent Fairfield County, Connecticut. Although the homes we went to were not owned by celebrities (unless you count hedge fund managers celebrities), we did work on properties very close to homes owned by such notables as Martha Stewart, Tom Cruise, and Paul Newman (or so I was told).

For small properties, I was able to use the professional lawnmowers. For large properties, I had the fortune of using the weed wacker/eater/trimmer. We dubbed this Greenwich, Connecticut home the “Castle” because of one of the stone siding and tower-looking-portions of the structure.

Guess how long it takes to trim 22 acres of property?

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A Warm Day in January

The weather has been pretty crazy here in Maryland. As I write this, it feels like 20 degrees outside, and the wind is really blowing like crazy. I cannot believe just this past Monday, MLK day, that it was close to 70 degrees outside. We went with Grandpa Vince to the park, fed the ducks, and played on the swings.

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Merry Christmas!

We wish you a wonderful season full of laughter and love.

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Holiday Wallpaper

I thought I’d share some holiday wallpaper you might want to put on your computer desktop, courtesy of The Deskstop. To download the original size, first click on the desired image below, choose “Different Sizes” under “Additional Information” on the right-hand side of the image, and then save the original image size.

Can you recommend any festive wallpapers? Enjoy!