Useful modernities

 As we have this incredible controversial relationship with the wind, last year I tried to pragmatically buy a "Weather station" that could support, at least mentally, our handling of extreme weather situations.

I will never be tired to repeat that, as every project for us, things take its time and now, one month and one week later, we are finally able to have the "weather station" up and running, to enjoy being obsessed about temperature and m/s when the wind blows.

The main interface of the weather station: you can read indoor and outdoor temperature, how much it has been raining, what time is it, and how strong the wind is. It also predicts the coming weather

It is of course something that does stick out a bit in the structure of the house. But I doubt i would have ever managed to find something "jugend" inspired ;-)

We need to get happy we could sacrifice the "pumps" house, that has an half painted door, odd tiles and well, it is at least placed in the most wind sensitive part of the garden (that is why we have mounted the wind sensor there).

The wind sensor

We also sacrificed the look of the balcony. Well, that balcony has nothing to do with the original balcony, really. Plus, since it has been probably built in some cheap/fast/unorthodox way, it does look like it would need a hand of paint, or two, or some love and care.

Anyway, I must confess that the rain sensor is just horrible... 

Rain sensor on our beautiful balcony

Now, will all of this help us out to defeat the worst storms that will ever attempt to lift pool roofs and slam trees on the ground?

Let's see if this is just a toy or something useful...

The saga of a Platanus

 In our garden there is a quite big tree, a Platanus, that has been possibly be brutally cut down before we moved in.

Still, despite the cut, branches have been growing up from the top and, although not as impressive as it was probably before, it has been still a fascinating tree. Covered by a lot of ivy, which we have bothered relatively little to remove, it has been one of the few trees that are welcoming to climb (thanks to the ivy, I guess).

This tree is probably one of the oldest ones that we have in our garden and all the Swedes I talk to are always mesmerized we have such a tree in our property.

The crack 

  

Today, our arborist came by for the annual apple trees treatment and I asked him if he could check the other trees around. He then noticed a big crack on the plane. I am pretty sure that that has been there for quite some time, it can't have been appearing from nowwhere, but on the other hand, the tree has been covered by ivy and I have attempted recently to clean it a bit.

A big chunk got off

The risk that it would fall and harm something is small, at worse it would damage the hedge, but better to take precautions as we usually don't have much luck with trees that are old and fall. So, we agreed on removing the dangerous parts.

One can see how big the trunk is (or better, was)

From the other side, the part that got removed

I believe we have a mixture of branches and ivy

It is an old tree and it is not in its best shape. I believe this was the main reason why its crown was cut before our arrival. But it is still beautiful to see, with those enormous leaves that when it is autumn and winter (and partially spring), fly around. 

Good to have firewood out of the cutting of the tree

What is left of the tree got secured and stabilized. Let's see what will happen to it.