Thomas W(h)ispered

I’ve finally gotten around to dropping and splitting the Maple Tree that had been dropping limbs. It turned out to be a three day task of which two of have been successfully completed. ‘Success’ being measured as returning to the house each day with all appendages attached in the same condition and location they were previously parked. A chainsaw can be a cruel mistress.

My 71 year old back is bitching like a teenager prom queen with sand in her pussy, so it will be another day before it’s loaded up and moved to the woodlot for stacking.

Maple burns hot and fast and feeding the fireplace and poking at the embers every 15 minutes, while spiritually satisfying (damn near zen-like), is better experienced at a greater interval, so I split this a little larger than I have in the past. When seasoned (it’ll be a least a year before it can be used) I’ll get a longer burn time than I’m currently experiencing.

Cutting and stacking wood is an exercise in optimism.

I’ve finally dialed in my fireplace.  I haven’t used it much over the last couple of years because I couldn’t keep the damn thing from smoldering and setting off the smoke alarms.  Quite by accident I discovered why it was performing so poorly: the exterior air supply to the firebox was blocked.  I’ve freed it up and now it fires up and draws like a champ. . . as long as the glass doors remain closed.     Previously when the doors were closed it could not draw enough air for combustion and die down and smoke would infiltrate through the small gaps on the folding glass doors.  With the doors open it would push the smoke and gasses into the house. 

I’ve got a little wood put up for this winter and am making good progress against next year’s needs.   I bought, sight unseen, two ricks of what was said to be seasoned hardwood.  It wasn’t seasoned and it wasn’t two ricks.  I felt so sorry for the couple that delivered it that I just paid them and smiled.  There is always someone worse off than you or I and these were two of them.  Their clothes were worn, torn and tired: I don’t think trousers that he wore would have survived a tour in a washing machine. 

The tires were bald on the beat-up old chevy and it leaked oil in the barn where we stacked the wood.  As a guess he and his wife drove around finding downed trees and cut them.  One rick was Red Oak and included so many ‘pieces and parts’ of limbs that very little of it was split main trunk logs.  The second ‘rick’ was about a half rick and was some pretty good-looking split Hickory; it may be dry by next winter.

What I have ready to burn (below 20 percent moisture)  came from my farm:  — a rick and a half of seasoned Maple, a rick of White Oak, a half of Persimmon, half of Beech, and a rick of Hickory.  I’ve got a little under a half-rick of ‘ancient’ wood and the rounds/logs salvaged from an Apple Tree.  All together about 5 ricks.  Three ricks is a cord.    

For next year I have the rick and a half delivered as mentioned above, two full ricks of Red Oak and a rick of Maple.  They say that when you heat with wood you get warm twice, it’s actually 6 times: cut, load, unload, split, stack, and the warm glow from the fireplace.   Anyway, I was layered with a long sleeve shirt over a short sleeve and as I warmed up dropping  a Maple I removed my long sleeve shirt while cutting it in to ‘rounds’.  What my skinny ass should have done was give the Poison Ivy vines on those rounds the respect it deserved and left my longs sleeve shirt on.  All of this leads us to the word for the day (actually the last several painful days):  urushiol (u-ROO-she-ol).

I’m going to drop a large dead Maple that’s been shedding some large limbs this weekend.  Earlier, when it had all of its limbs, I thought that it would drop to the west. . . into the fence that kept the neighbor’s cattle at bay.  It now seems to be leaning north and will drop safely into my field.  I suppose it is 40 or 50 feet high and is around 3 or 4 ft in diameter at the base .  This tree is on flat land which means that I can take the log splitter to where I’m cutting the rounds instead of lifting/tossing 60-90 rounds on to the trailer and, once arriving at the wood stacking area, lifting them off the trailer and onto the splitter. 

Two more items have been checked off of the dwindling list of mods/repairs/upgrades for my Jeep.

This photo shows the vanity plate I ordered a couple of weeks ago. Picked it up this morning in Pulaski, TN.

Other recent adds are the tire cover, taillight cover, and an upgraded gas cap housing unit.

The other upgrade was swapping out the stock air filter assembly for one designed to provide cool air to the throttle body. Old and new configuration:

Why Jeep allowed a maniac near the CAD equipment is one of those secrets that will never be disclosed, but one thing for certain is singularly responsible for adding tons of plastic waste to our world. Here are two views of removed air cleaner .

One upgrade task still remains: 3/4 inch leveling blocks for the front springs to regain the ‘stance’ I lost when adding a steel bumper and heavy winch.

I have one repair to do; replace a faulty wheel sensor. I’m pretty sure that it’s the one on the passenger side rear, but I’ve ordered a complete set and will change them all out (saving those replaced) when I get the Jeep up on a rack. Jeff (over at Amazon) will send a set to my door step for 27 bucks.

Auto Zone will sell me a single one for 38 bucks providing I travel to their place to pick it up.

We were fortunate to get a little rain on Thursday evening, about an hours worth. It hadn’t rained in about a month so the cows and landscape were pleased. I would have been also, but when the rain moved in it came with a storm that chose to remind us of just how powerful maw nature can be.

I had three trees adjacent to the gated entry to the farm. Now I have two trees and a big mess. The photo above is entry (detail below). The tree still sanding on the right and the one that was snapped off are/were deciduous. A tall pine still stands just out of frame on the left.

The gate is in the background and the trunk of the tree that blew over is at the tip of the red arrow. Here (below) is is another view. Again, the red arrow points at where tree trunk broke off.

This final picture provides a reference (the Jeep) that hints at the size of the tree: both trees were identical in size.

The good/bad news story is:
–Good: had the tree fallen the other way it would have taken out the (electric) gate and a good stretch of barbed wire fencing.
–Bad: when it snapped parts of it fell into the adjacent tree (didn’t come completely down) and has embedded its limbs into the adjacent canopy. If you interlock your fingers (like the cops sometimes respectfully request you do) you can see what a challenge it is to clean out the dead-fall.

They say that ‘chance favors the prepared mind’ and as fortune would have it I had just received the two new chainsaw blades I’d ordered from Amazon (thanks Jeff!) . I have (had) a gallon of 50:1 fuel mixed and a gallon of bar/chain oil. All of these essentials support a Husqvarna 460 Rancher with a 20″ bar.

As it turns out the hard part is not making little sticks out of big sticks, it’s placing all of the little sticks onto the 12 foot trailer and hauling them off one of the eight burn piles I’ve been assembling. 5 hour of work in 100 degree temps yesterday have reduced the problem by half. Today’s weather promise to be much more accommodating.

I’ll get after it again this morning and hopefully have it wiped out by the time Alabama shows us how It’s new head coach is working out.

A few short years ago I captured a couple of images along the Elk River in North Alabama. I thought I’d share them once again. photo’s located here