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December 10, 2007
Helpful Hints from joeeze: Levitating* Christmas Tree
This came in back in June from my Iceland correspondent Anna Rögnvaldsdóttir as a comment on my Levitating Lamp post of June 12 but since at the time it seemed a bit early even for me to start thinking about Christmas I tabled it until today.
- Levitating Christmas Tree
For years I've had levitating Christmas trees. They conveniently hover about 3-5 inches from the ground so all I have to do is place a large water-filled earthenware bowl on the floor and slide it under the tree so the sawn-off end is suspended in water. Keeping an eye on the water level and replenishing it is simple and easy.
Thing is, these Christmas tree contraptions (and the whole business of trying to fix things so that the tree stands straight) used to drive me to the brink of insanity — which doesn't do much for the hollyday spirit. Then I hit upon the simplest solution imaginable: just suspend the f***ing tree from the ceiling. All that's needed is a small metal hook in the ceiling.
Genius.
If you use transparent fishing line, it really will appear to be levitating.
*As in "illusion of"
You know how to do that, don't you?
December 10, 2007 at 03:01 PM | Permalink
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Comments
I love this idea, but how exactly does one DO this? All you need is a "small metal hook in the ceiling"? If I just drilled a hole in my plaster ceiling and screwed a small hook in there, and hung a 7-foot tree (real or artificial) from it, I would wind up with a tree laid out on its side, two evergreeny-smelling cats -- bellies stuffed with whatever fell off the tree that they consider would be fun to eat and positively beside themselves with joy and rapture at their phenomenal giant toy-covered toy -- and a big pile of plaster and various house guts that lurk behind that on top of the tree and the cats. And a huge hole in my ceiling, of course.
Maybe the people that this works so simply for have huge foot-wide oaken beams running across their ceilings that make the installation of a simple screw a snap. Otherwise, wouldn't it take some going up into the attic and crawling around and installing some kind of reinforcing thing and doing drilling and whatnot, and -- oh, and finding the best place to PUT the screw because the place you want might not be the place that could withstand the weight the best at all, and that kind of thing?
Why can't the tree just go ahead and actually levitate, anyway? It IS Christmas. Wouldn't some levitating trees be good PR? I really wanted a tree this year but there's these two feline demolition experts... **heavy sigh** Maybe just a TINY tree hoisted clean up to the ceiling so they couldn't get at it -- which brings me back to the hook in the ceiling. Hmmm...maybe a trompe l'oeil tree...or trompe l'oeil cats...
Posted by: Flautist | Dec 10, 2007 10:17:34 PM
My dad has been doing this since he was a kid. His brother kept knocking over the tree, so finally my dad got fed up and strung it up to hang from a hook in the ceiling. No crooked tree, no knocking it over, and the treetop decoration does a lovely job of hiding the wire. I didn't know other people didn't do this until I saw a tree stand in a store, and asked what it was for.
Posted by: Rena | Dec 10, 2007 5:42:38 PM
