Codex Deano

Friday, October 21, 2011

Wood, wood and more wood!

I think it was around April of this year that I set to work in the 3 acre wood behind my house to clear out all the dead wood.  Since we built the house we have had several good New England storms and the stuff really piled up.  The ice storm of '08, the wind storm of '10, and the hurricane (downgraded to a tropical storm) of '11 just to name a few.

I began the battle armed with my father in-law's tractor, a chainsaw, an axe, a splitting maul and a couple of cast-iron wedges.  I had the use of a log splitter for a couple weeks but that was not meant to last.  I felt like a pioneer from a hundred years ago as I chopped away at the mammoth piles of logs all summer.  I worked under the hot sun...just like my ancestors did.  I dragged logs and stacked everything by hand...just like my ancestors did.  I blasted Natasha Bedingfield from the stereo and drank imported rum...in honor of the horrific injuries my ancestors must have sustained doing this.  It's no wonder people died younger back then!

It was Tuesday October 18th at 6:15 pm in the afternoon that I stacked the very last piece of wood for the year.  I was soooooooooooooooooo happy to be able to lay that project to rest.

Final count was about 10 cords of wood.  That should last about three years in my wood stove depending on how sever or mild the winter is in New Hampshire is this year.

Part of my fire wood project that spanned about six months.  This was taken in early September:

Googl+

So I finally broke down and set up a Google+ account. plus.google.com/102149929136910230015

I only know about six people on there right now and they only check the thing once a week at most.  I'm not sure that I need two social media accounts, but we'll see what the future brings my way in the land of "+1's" and "circles."

The last month...

I'm happy to report that my little girl is doing fine.  Every once in a while she says, "I really miss Scout."  But she has dealt with her feelings and moved on. I'm so proud of her. 

We have have picked up two new kittens recently and they get along fine with our dog, Patch.  But our veteran cat of 8+ years is less than thrilled.  We decided to let my son name the gray one and let my daughter name the tiger one.  They chose the names "Gray" & "Tiger."  It looks like I'm going to have to enroll them in some sort of activity that promotes creative thinking.

Here they are stalking the dog...
Here is Tiger playing with the dog's tail...
Here's poor Patch passed out after entertaining the kittens all day...

In other news, I took second place in my humorous speech contest.  Not bad for my first time out of the gate.  I plan on spending the rest of this year working with a mentor to improve my writing and technique.  See if I can't do better next year.