I’ve been away from Houston for the last couple of months in what has turned out to be sort of an experiment in long distance landlording. A couple of days ago I got an alarming phone call from the neighbor of a property I own in the suburbs informing me that the large tree that was in the front yard of the house had blown over in a storm and was lying across the street.

The tree, it turns out, was dead. Last time I’d driven past the property was early spring, and I noted that the tree seemed a little late in sprouting leaves. I made a mental note to follow up on this, but never got around to it. That was a mistake, and one that could have been costly had the tree fallen on the house, on someone’s car – or worse of all had hurt someone. As it turns out a gusty windstorm blew it over into the road where it caused a minor inconvenience but no real damage.

The neighbor has a chain saw and a truck so I paid him to haul it away. I don’t know what killed the tree – it was fine last year but for some reason didn’t bounce back this year. But I’m happy that I’m writing about a close call and minor annoyance instead of a major incident.