The day began the way our days usually do. Early. Simple. Easy. Peaceful. The cabin was pleasantly cool. I started a small fire in the woodstove, just because.
I knew I had a mess to clean up down at the wood yard. Some of that pile needed splitting. All of it needed stacking.
The sun came up at 7:07am. I was swingin’ my ax before 8 o’clock.
As I discovered on Thursday, this oak wouldn’t put up much of a fight. It fairly flew apart.
I stacked it all on my latest pallet and made a major contribution toward filling it. Still, I wanted to do more before returning to the cabin.
Fat rounds from the roadside oak scratched that itch.
I split a pair of them with the Wood Grenade, then finished them off with the ax. In total, two rounds yielded 32 stove lengths. I added them to the pallet.
That felt like a good place to end the day’s woodswork.
“Widowmaker? No such thing. Not in your world. Not since September. 🤣 Be thankful. And be careful anyway, ok?”
(from a reader)
Smudge and I sat at the picnic table not long after noon on this clear, windy and warm (68°F) Friday. It’s early February, for cryin’ out loud, definitely still wintertime in Ozarkansas, and yet spring was in the air.
Leaving the Heeler behind and doing more work would disappoint her, but it seemed like the perfect day for it. And I still had the itch.
The Cajun fella who owns the property across our road lives out-of-state. He’s made it known to his neighbors at this end of the road that we’re welcome to harvest firewood from his land.
Although I hadn’t yet taken advantage of his kind offer (other than what’s come from pruning the roadside), while working windfall this week I thought I saw a few promising leaners over there, near the edge of the woods. Yesterday afternoon I grabbed the 20V saw from the shed and walked south a ways, looking.
At the first tree — an eight-inch oak, 20 feet off the road — I enjoyed this backdrop:
I felled that one, cut my log lengths and carried them up to the road. Ditto a five-inch hickory and a 12-inch oak. That last tree was a buzzkill — completely hollow, heartwood either missing or turned to dark pith. I brought out only eight feet of trunk and left the rest for critters.
Later, I came back with the Ranger, bucked the logs and hauled the wood to the yard.
More splitting. More stacking.
This pallet is now two-thirds finished. That was a good day’s work.
Take care of yourselves, Patriots. Stay calm. Stay sharp. Stay free.
#WiseUp #LibertyOrDeath #Ungovernable