The biggest surprise was how heavy my little chain saw had gotten since last year. It's true that since the garden had gone past, I had become the vegetable. I had erroneously believed that knitting would be good exercise for my upper arms. Instead, all those days staying inside to avoid the awful road dust had left me with Weenie Arms. I had to rest periodically in order to be safe cutting limbs of the tree only.
The other surprise was how much good wood was down. The ends of the limbs were punky and covered with fungi. However, down the hill, beyond that tangle, were bigger and bigger limbs that looked like promising firewood.
That's very good news, because I had underestimated the firewood situation in the same manner as I did the hickory nuts. A cursory glance is never enough. I had already called my guy who has sold me firewood in the past and ordered a truck load.
Meanwhile, I have not been warm and toasty at all. There's always woolies, and I do knit a lot, but nothing beats a wood fire, especially one seen through the glass door of the Buck stove. That's probably why people get fireplace videos. It's not the same; we are not fooled.
Exercising without doing useful work has never appealed to me, or I would have brought the chain saw inside in the summer and waved it around, mimicking the real thing. If I had, I could have cut more than a puny half cart my first time out.
I left off in the middle of a rather nice limb, to encourage myself to return soon There also appears to be a whole winter's worth of kindling. Of all the trees I didn't want to lose a big limb, it's the basswood, with its exquisite blossoms that the bees made into honey. The limb that broke off was a massive one. I found that out when I'd cleared off several loads of kindling.
My prayers were answered when my son Chris, perhaps tired of me whining that the limbs were bigger than my puny saw, came up with his bigger saw and his bigger muscles.
He made short work of the limbs that would have been within the scope of my little chain saw, and then went on to the really big ones. I was the person who loaded the wood chunks into Rosie's cart and zipped them up to the house. I lost track of how many loads. My part may have given me some upper arm strength.
That went on for hours. The smallish stuff I stacked on the porch nearest the wood stove.
The big chunks I unloaded near the workshop, home of the electric log-splitter. Many hours of fun await me.
Anyway, I didn't exaggerate. They really were too big for my little saw.
