How to get a black eye all by yourself

1) Decide it's time to take the Christmas Tree down.

2) Remove and store all of the ornaments, tinsel, lights and dispose of uneaten sugar canes.

3) Start wondering how to take one large, very dry Christmas tree downstairs and out of the house.

4) Consider dragging tree down main stairs but discard this idea due to amount of damage that may be caused.

5) Consider dragging tree through office, out onto deck and dropping it over the railing but discard this idea too due to risky position of HD TV and the amount of damage that may be caused.

6) Decide to dismember tree in situ.

7) Cut off all branches with secateurs and put them into town-sanctioned-for-green-materials paper bags

8) Wonder what to do with bare Christmas Tree trunk as it is over six feet tall and town rules say that it must be cut into two.

9) Retrieve reciprocating saw and pruner blade from garage. Cut tree trunk into two and place in another town-OK paper bag.

10) With reciprocating saw in hand, look out of window and see the oak saplings that are going to block the view of the water. Decide to do something about them immediately. Don't consider how many people you need: you have the saw!

11) Put on wellies and go out behind the raised garden and start cutting down the saplings.

12) Have a moment of panic after fourth sapling is cut because of using a vicious powered saw in an inaccessible area with no-one else home and what will happen if you cut off your leg because the saw slips?

13) Be really, really careful how you angle the saw blade and make sure that any slip will not cause saw blade to embed itself in your leg.

14) Decide to only cut two more because the battery will need recharging after that...

15)... and forget to pay attention to the sapling you are cutting which falls onto a patch of springy brambles and bounces back just like a snooker cue to hit you with the cut end right below your right eye...

(It's the cluster of trees behind the fence in this picture, to the left, the ones with dead leaves still attached. In summer the leaves will block the view of the water. They have obviously been cut down in the past, there are stumps everywhere, but there wasn't much woodlands husbandry done in the past couple of years. Best time to do this is now, before the sap starts rising again.)