a holston, Ken meant 'compartmentalization', and this is the ability of woody plants to wall off injury through chemical and physical means. It is an interesting subject, but not something that can be briefly covered. At least, not something I'm up to laying out right at the moment! Suffice to say though that the tree either will or will not be able to close this wound-both externally and internally-and that all you can do to aid this process is the usual stuff that helps trees. The biggest thing, practically the only thing, is to ensure the tree is not suffering from drought. And if you do elect to water it, realize that this means watering the entire area. Conversely, if you're fortunate enough to not be in a drought-stricken area, then even this is unwarranted. But keep it in mind for a year or two hence, if it gets dry then. Trees have been getting dinged up-though not by cars-for millennia, and they've developed means to deal with it. No fancy snake oil is going to help. It could be warranted to fertilize the entire root zone, but that's controversial as heck. If you do decide, hopefully after doing some research, go easy with the stuff. A little might do some good but a lot won't do more good. +oM

What wonderful comfort this must have been to the little boy. This remeinds me when my daughter first starting teaching. She taught in a very poor district. She dearly loved the children, some of the parents "NOT." One afternoon she was leaving school and heard tires squeal. She ran around the building and a little 10 year old girl was hit by a car. She ran to the girl while someone called 911. The mom lived just down the street and came runing. It wasn't long before the Dad came. Mom and dad just stood in the middle of the road yelling at each other. Our daughter felt so sorry for the little girl. Our daughter followed the ambulance to the hospital. They ended up making the parents leave the building until they decided to stop yelling. To this day the little girl always comes into our daughters classroom to see her. They have a special bond.. Susie

(((alisande))) Here, I'll make it the third one? Maybe. I was driving home the other day, and I had a blowout! Not just a flat tire. We heard BANG! and I said, what was that? He said maybe we ran over a rock? And then the car started to try to swerve. I did keep control and then I heard it--a flat tire. As I pulled over, it was smoking! Smelled like burned rubber to me, and it practically welded the tire to the axle?! What's worse? I just got the car in July (used, it's 18 years old) and I hadn't checked the spare to make sure it fit and was in good shape :O The equipment to change the tire didn't really fit or work well :( The jack would only turn a half turn at a time. The tire iron was too long? It kept hitting the ground. What was cool though? Someone else had fixed a flat in the exact same spot, and accidentally left a tire iron-that fit my bolts. I had another shorter tire iron, but it too, did not fit. So it took three tire irons, a lot of turning for the jack, and holding my breath for the tire to work. Yep, the tire turned out ok. I had planned to buy new tires next month, but now, I will have new tires this weekend. Two more days instead of two more weeks... hurray! Back to normal then. Whew. Now, we don't need a third car incident. How's that for closing the loop? Well, I tried!

Xedos, Not sure I'm understanding (but thank you so much for advising me on this). For the contract, I will have as much spelled out as I can. As for speaking to the contractors initially to get estimates, I have not been asking for specific waterproofing methods. Based on the conversations I've had with contractors around here it looks like Laticrete is the only vendor around here with a real presence. It's the only product that multiple contractors mentioned using. I haven't spoken to anyone who has said .. I've used laticrete, redguard and ditra ... which one would you prefer. After weeding through the contractors that don't waterproof the walls, and the ones that don't preslope the floor when using a vinyl pan, I feel like if I filter contractors by a specific kind of waterproofing before they even give me an estimate, I will never find someone. Ok, I'm off to email my newly drafted scope of work to a contractor that I got off the CTEF website. Please continue to advise!