AHPP

I’m pretty sure I remember you saying you didn’t like poles because they make lazy climbers! I’ve upgraded mine to a telescopic one but buggered up the coat hook position so it’s harder to loft a rope with now. Still useful.

I agree with everyone above. Remove is most sensible decision by miles. If they really really really want to keep it: Leave it alone and you might be lucky or a dead bit as thick as your arm might smash a gutter or some tiles if you’re unlucky. But they want it safe so dead and hangers (and the potential for future ones) won’t help their peace of mind. Top it at ladder height and condemn it to regular re-topping but at least you won’t have to climb very high or use big saws (will make ongoing maintenance viable for them). A nice bit of silky or 150 work every two or three years but bear in mind if the regrowth is over the house and gets too big to cut and hold, you’ve got the serious pain in the arse of a weak tree with basically no tie in or rigging points. Edited to add: Access looks good though so a relatively small cherry picker from road or garden would be a relatively cheap get out of jail free card there. I definitely wouldn’t cut the top third or half off. You’d be creating shit unions at a height that’s financially prohibitive to get to and therefore with bigger wood that has further to fall. All shit options though. Remove it.

What would Soloman do?

It's written as much for (non-pro) firewooders. Equal if not more likely buyers. The aforementioned helpful fellows on facebook had enough time to point out I'd spent too much time writing a thorough ad. I know, I know... I've also just sold an eighteen-year-old MOT failed van. Imagine those negotiations.

I've got a good 250 for sale for £200. Private message if interested. Here's the advert I've currently got up for it on facebook. Only interest so far is from some very helpful fellows on treebay.

They sound delicious.

Good thread.

I like his suggestions.

Just because they say they own it doesn’t mean they own it.

Employer NI/pension contributions?

Yeah. Looked again. I think I might change my answer to rigging more of the branches (with groundsman with a tagline/pole+hook). If a rigging rope comes in horizontally ish from another tree , you'll be putting the trunk in compression relatively nicely. Or just keep the guys and rig from each stub. Fishpoling or trunk wrapping might make a tiny difference to the bowing or might just make you feel better. Or a rigging line from another tree could be used as a cradle so you're not lowering over the building. That might even stand the tree up under load. One of the branches looks to go off more vertical than the others and might take a redirect from another tree or even a main point on a base tie, either set with a pole/throwline? Like the rigging line coming in horizontally, a climbing line coming in horizontally from another tree will put a reasonable compression load on the branch/tree and you could make it a bit of guyline if you're happy with your climbing line taking that (pretty static) strain. That's a bit of a ramble isn't it. Hope something of use in there. Hard to say from pictures obviously but it looks doable. I've done similar. Not elegant. A lot of straddling etc. Put the ply over the Velux windows. Khriss might be right of course.

Climbed and cut and chucked, maybe zipping or rigging a bit (probably on my tail). If it seemed bad while spiking up, I'd have walked a pair of guy lines up with me (and back down as I chunked).

Which bit exactly?

Get in the sea, you chancing poofters.

Broadly agreed. Lower tax rates tend to increase total tax income because people don’t hide it etc. That leaves me in a quandary. Do I want the government to have no money so it can’t afford to be a cunt to people or do I want lower and fairer taxes? On balance, I think I’d prefer the latter as long as the government’s remit is pretty small: defence, enforcement of contracts and property rights, that sort of thing.

Do you think the amount you love and care for your kids is fairly typical?

Would you let your children get ill and go untreated? Would you let them go uneducated? Would you let them tip rubbish?

What’s your gimlet recipe and what’s the worst excuse for one you’ve ever been served?

I got fed up trying to argue with someone on this thread who kept putting words in my mouth etc but I'll dip back in to put a couple of ideas out there. I say tax is bad because (among other things) it funds bad stuff. Some people say it's good because it funds good stuff. Good stuff to them is, for example, roads, hospitals and schools (though we should always remember that value is subjective). These things that people want/need are built and run by people. They get paid. In a system where the state wasn't providing these services, someone else would. The people who build and run the services would still get paid. The difference is that you don't have to pay politicians, civil servants and all the fucking rest as well. A second argument can arise from the first. Some people contend that, without the government, nobody would provide certain services that people need/want. To that, I ask the question, "Do people really want/need whatever service?" If people do want/need it, they'd pay for it voluntarily. If they don't want/need it, why is the state sticking guns in people's faces to force them to pay for something they don't want/need? The argument then usually goes towards, "How on earth do you expect people to pay for this very expensive thing?!" There are two answers: (1)If the state isn't taxing people like gang bang victims, they'll have more money. (2)If the state isn't destroying competition by operating a monopoly, competition will happen and the market will provide people with what they want for a price they can afford.

Sorry to disappoint...

I know when I'm beaten. Well done.

You could perhaps begin by familiarising yourself with the political landscape. You don’t understand the difference between authoritarianism (communism is an authoritarian doctrine) and libertarianism (which is the opposite). Education, healthcare, roads, bin collection etc. All possible without government. I do most of that. And, respectfully, you’ve said twice now that I ‘pick and choose’ or am otherwise ideologically hypocritical. I don’t, I’m not and you’ve had no reason to think otherwise. Don’t invent things to try and help your argument. It’s undermining it. I’m perfectly happy to spend time sharing ideas on how to live freer and better but only with open minded people. Were you in the army by any chance?

You might laugh but that’s possibly because you don’t understand what I’m talking about and can’t be bothered to research it. I pretty diligently avoid things paid for by taxation (and I’ve no idea what made you assert otherwise) and the nature of my philosophical and political ideology is that I don’t need to know the answers to everything because a lot of stuff simply isn’t any of my business. I just recognise that people are best sorting their own needs out rather than being stolen from and then provided with what other people think they need.

If you want stuff, you can buy it. If enough people want it, someone will be there to sell it to you. And you’ll have shitloads of money to spend. And am I fuck a communist! I’m a middle ground libertarian.

Still a big question but I think I can see what you’re driving at. Tax money is to pay for stuff so if states don’t pay for as much stuff, they won’t need the money. Dial back on war for a start.