Well we’ve got some fine weather at the moment and it seems set to last for a few days. Fine weather, in N Wales, is defined as not raining and wind that doesn’t blow you off your feet. So I’m getting a bit of time outside on the plot
Today (Saturday) was spent mainly in the big shed though. When I popped my shredder and leaf vacuum onto Ebay I couldn’t resist taking a look around and since they’ve both achieved their reserve, spending some of the money. So I bought a hydraulic log-splitter.
The log-splitter is great for those larger pieces that the maul just bounces off. It’s got a blade at either end and so doubles the effective force from 5 to 10 tonnes. Unless we get another cold snap, we’re only having a fire at night now so I guess much of the wood I split now will not get burnt until next winter arrives. Still, it will be very nice and dry by then.
We’d run out of dry, prepared wood so burned coal for a few days. I really prefer wood, there’s a smell to burning coal that I don’t like but burning wood always smells good. Coal seems really expensive now, I paid £15 a sack for our last delivery and it just doesn’t last. I reckon we’ll have gone through £40 worth this year and it’s been a really mild one.
I’ve a lot of hawthorn which is nicely dried so me and my trusty chain saw spent 3 hours turning the long logs into short ones that will fit into the woodburner. I’m getting very precious about the chainsaw now. Watching a TV program where a couple cut down their own Christmas tree I was getting quite hot under the collar. No protective gear whatsoever and swinging the thing around like the guy from the Evil Dead film. Seriously, an accident waiting to happen.
And I’m the guy who rails against the over-protective, nanny state, health and safety culture we seem to have nowadays.
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