Monday, Monday. Virginia tech school shooting

We had a pretty good day. Got some stuff done. What's that? What exactly did we get done? Well, I decided around noon that I would get some mowing done. After all the sun has been out for a couple of days and thus the grass was dry enough. But before I really got into mowing, I went and grabbed the heavy duty twig loppers and cut down and cut the roots of a few Poplar babies that've been growing since last summer. You see, we've decided we don't really like them because they're messy, and not only that, they're invasive. Meaning that they grow root sprouts all along their roots (hence the name. *grin*). There are two right by the pool that drop leaves into it all summer long, because when Poplars (ours at least) get heat stressed they drop their leaves. Anyway, we'll be downing those two... eventually. Speaking of downing trees, we went out a couple of evenings ago because we didn't have any more dry wood in the wood-shed and we knew that we had (still have) a few dead Sassafras trees that could be turned into firewood. The tree we decided would suit our needs was out in an area where it was surrounded by other dead trees and the Oak. Couldn't have it falling one way because then it would've fell into the power lines, couldn't fall to the sides because, well, there were trees on each side. It had to fall precisely in between the Oak tree and the other ones. And I was able to cut it *just* right and it indeed fell in the direction I wanted it too. *smile* I've never been all that good at doing that, so I was pretty proud of myself. *grin* Back to today, I got the areas where we had removed brush from where the grass was still high, mowed. I also hooked a rope to the back of the mower and pulled 3 large branches that'd fallen off of the Ash tree, and towed them to the big brush pile. While I was doing all that other stuff, Rain started racking some of the grass, putting it into the wagon, and putting it into a garden area as mulch. She eventually got the kids outside to help her, so at least they got some fresh air. Looks like we're going to have to buy *another* filter pump for the pool because ours crapped out (we had to buy a new one last summer too). *sigh*

Okay, enough about me. I was watching the Simpsons earlier when I saw a new bulletin scrolling of the bottom of the screen about some "situation" that would be followed and was being told about on other stations. So I flipped to another station on a commercial break and saw that their had been a shooting at Virginia tech. Here's an except from an article that described what happened...

Thirty-one people, including the gunman, were killed at Norris Hall, bringing the total death toll to 33. Fifteen more were being treated at area hospitals. The suspect was reportedly carrying two handguns including at least one 9mm handgun equipped with several clips holding 15 bullets apiece. He carried no identification and has not been identified, police said. http://tinyurl.com/3bmuse

Tags: virginia tech, school shooting, poplar, lopper, filter pump, mower