Firewood take 3

Last Saturday was a beautiful early fall day—highs in the low 80's instead of the upper 90's. Sunshine, slight breeze. I had gone to a friend's place in Exton, PA, to pick up some firewood he had. I borrowed a neighbor's trailer (he's a friend, too) and loaded up some pretty big pieces of oak and walnut. He used his front-end loader. Fortunately, I was able to roll them off when I got home.

Then I went to work on that tree in the woods (see the previous two posts). I finished cutting up the tree except for one fork, which was just plain too big to cut. It is a fork, so I might experiment with cutting it into three pieces to see if I can do it. But that's for another day. Managed the whole task without getting the chain too dull to use. Now to get the pieces home. These babies are Heavy. Even though the tree had fallen a year ago, it's oak, and it retained most of its bark, so it also retained most of its moisture.

I called my boy, Josh Jr., down to help. He's a strapping, athletic 17-year old who does Civil Air Patrol and wrestling. He's inexperienced at working, but he follows directions well. I couldn't have done the job without him. I backed the pickup down a logging trail to within a few yards of the area, then we set a couple pieces of wood to make a ramp, and rolled the discs onto the truck bed. Sorry—no photo. We had our hands full of wood. The truck could hold maybe three pieces before it sat on whatever it sits on when the springs are fully compressed. We made two or three trips, I forget. Several pieces remain in the woods, including the one with the spider webs, and we'll get them on another day.

Here's what our wood yard looks like at the house. That small cart is holding the pieces of a small and a large chunk of wood that I split Sunday afternoon. The pack rat container holds some tools and model trains we don't have room for in the house or the sheds. It's replacing the canopy that came down last winter under the snow. Remember that snow? More is on the way. On the far left you can see a white shapeless white object. That's Tyvek vapor barrier, exposed because the contractor abandoned our addition halfway through. The state Attorney General's office is proving about as diligent prosecuting him as he was in working on the project. Both he and the AG office kept coming up with good-sounding excuses for inaction. But I digress.

I split the wood by hand. With a splitting maul, sometimes wedges. Hnngh. Good exercise. Make strong. Val took a picture or two of me swinging the maul for your edification and amusement. It turned out the best picture doesn't show me swinging the maul. It blurred and didn't fit in the picture—I get a pretty good swing in. Sorry, ladies—I have a loose T-shirt on, so you can't see my bulging muscles. However you can see my pedometer, which Val still calls my house arrest anklet.

That black thing on the end of the handle is a rubber cushion to protect the wooden handle from breaking should I happen to overshoot a swing or the wood splits crooked, with the same effect of catching on the handle. That device has save me dozens of handles. Don't buy a splitting maul without also getting one of those.

So there you have it. Maybe one of these days I'll show you my pile of split wood. It's almost all green. I'm still looking for a good pile of dry wood to start the heating season with. Got any firewood you want to get rid of?