Annoying Trees, Part Two

In our city, you need a permit to remove (or even "prune" or so we're told) any tree. We have neighbors who have removed trees sans permit and have had the city show up at their door with an order to replace said tree (a neighbor told us that the city inspector said "I noticed on google..." when referring to the missing tree). I don't like it, but that's part of the price of living in a city and not really "owning" the land you pay so much taxes for...

Because we wanted to do this one "by the book" we made sure the arborist was someone who was comfortable working with the permit process. Today the city Tree Inspector General (my name for him) showed up and perused our place. He agreed vehemently with the assessment: remove the palm, remove most of the camphors. He showed us how someone had "topped" one of the camphors a long time ago. Honestly, I just don't care. I want those ugly trees out of there. I love trees, but not camphors. Would love a nice birch or three...

On the way out, the tree guy offered his thoughts on every other tree we have. "Yes, you can prune this one." "That's what we call a specimen tree, you can't even touch that one!" etc. He kept saying "just call me if you want to prune that..." I wonder if he really meant we could get his phone number and he'd race over to the house with a permit.

Begrudgingly, I guess he's a good guy, even if he is in charge of permits for tree pruning.

So it looks like we're all set to go and we'll get the tree guys out here soon.