Being a man of the modern age, I am quite fond of power. Not the kind of power that allows you to lord over people, no. I’m much fonder of the kind of power that lights my house and runs my internet.

When I first moved to Seattle, I only envisioned a few things. I knew it rained a lot there, and that Microsoft and Nintendo of America were headquartered there. I also heard they had a mediocre basketball team and a horrible baseball team. And it had a needle. Which, why would I care about that? We had needles in every place I’ve lived. Other than that, I had no pre-existing conditions or thoughts in my mind about it.

One of the things I didn’t know about until I was fully invested in living there, was that they lost power a lot. It didn’t make any sense to me though. Seattle and its suburbs were part of the modern era, right? We’re not talking about a city that is stuck in the 1880’s, right? As I spoke of before, Seattle is home to some of the most technologically advanced companies in the world. Microsoft, Nintendo, Amazon, Expedia, and T-Mobile are just a few of the tech companies located in the Seattle area. Just knowing they were there should have made power itself fear ever turning off.

How did it happen? The worst part is that when your power went out, it wasn’t just for a few hours. It was for a minimum of a day and sometimes up to a week. I’m usually pretty observant (you have to be to be a bitter blogger). After the first time we lost power, it was obvious why. In order to have power, you need power lines. You probably don’t notice them, but they are everywhere. When a power line goes down, so does your power.

Needless to say, it would make sense to keep anything clear of those power lines. In Seattle there is thing that the people are obsessed with. Trees. Evergreen, Western Hemlock, Douglas-Fir, Western Red Cedar, and other such dumb things. Whatever you do, don’t ever threaten to cut down a tree in Seattle. You might as well threaten to cut their very soul from their body.

I know trees provide oxygen or whatever, but we have way less trees in Utah, and somehow, you can still breathe here.

Seattle has so many trees that power lines and trees live together like the Old Woman in the shoe with her many kids. If you haven’t picked up on the obviousness that trees and power lines might clash from time to time, maybe you need more Captain Obvious in your life. Mix in the rain and wind that the Pacific Northwest is famous for, and you have yourself a little infrastructure problem.

If you were the Seattle city planner, would you maybe think about the domestic disputes that come with power lines and trees living together before they were a committed couple? I’m no city planner, but that might be the first thing on my mind. Maybe trees and power lines should be required to go to couples counseling before they moved in together, considering that any disagreements caused thousands of people to lose their power. Unfortunately, Seattleites cared more about trees than power lines.

In the 15 years we lived in Seattle, we lost power every single year. Always at least for a day, and sometimes up to a week. Some people for more than that. Since we’ve moved back to Utah 7 years ago, we’ve lost power once. And it was only for like 30 minutes. And it was a crisis to people around here.

What am I trying to say? Trees are the worst. Other than offering a little oxygen (though we offer carbon dioxide in exchange), and wood for things we use wood for, what do trees actually do? They violently knock over power lines. They aggressively drop leaves in your yard, without offering to clean them up (reminds me of a certain offspring of mine). They sway at night, creeping out our kids (and in Hogwarts they are even more aggressive). They fall in the road. They block our views.

One day on my Microsoft screensaver, an informational video popped up and talked about this thing called tree-shaping. They displayed a bridge that was designed by a person that manipulated the branches to create the bridge. It took that person years of effort to organically create the bridge.

I’ve designed a much more efficient way to build a bridge. Tell a bunch of boy scouts they can cut down a tree, cut those pieces of wood and then cobble those peices together with some nails. It isn’t as fancy or natural as the one done over a decade, but it will do the job. And that tree was suffering anyways. It needed to be put out of its misery.

And just like that, you have one less tree that will fall on a power line. I can now get back to googling why trees are so destructive and bent on destroying our power grids. But most importantly, causing delays in the Bitter Friday Giftures. Speaking of which…

I really like power…

And not this kind either…

I only knew a few things about Seattle…

They also had Microsoft Windows…

What I didn’t know about Seattle before I moved there…

The reason why we lost power all the time…

When evil trees came along…

And attacked the power lines…

But heaven forbid if you threatened to cut down an evil tree in Seattle…

They would rather…

Than to see any harm…

That would envelope…

All we want is a little power to light our homes and our TV’s and power our internet. All trees want to do is take away that power. Our power to live with some internet, and Xbox and bright lights so we can’t sleep. Until the end of time, we will be locked in an eternal struggle for power and trying to take down the evil trees and their lust to destroy our power so it can have its own. May we always have the power to fight the power for the power. With help from the Power Rangers.

ARRRGGGHHHHHH

Bitter Power Struggle Ben