I Don't Have A Wooden Heart....Maybe A Few Splinters

The rain set in more steadily today without any breaks at all. This was quite depressing as I had an early phone call from the firewood merchant saying he was delivering the macrocarpa at 8.30am. Sure enough right on the dot he arrived in his truck and looked disbelievingly at me when I told him I was going to put the whole cord away by myself. To be honest I didn't think I could do it either. However he turned the truck around on the sodden lawn and dumped the wood near the top of the drive away from the worst of the small creeks that are streaming down the full length of the shingle driveway.


I began to barrow wood to the back carport and stack them next to the ramp as I had with the previous load of pine (pictured to the left on a sunny day in May). Then I began piling wood on the front doorsteps as these were one of the few surfaces that were dry. Seeing that the entire shingle floor of the front carport was wet I had no choice but to start stacking macrocarpa there but after three hours my stacking deteriorated and I was just rushing with barrows stacked with wood and throwing them in one great central pile in order to get them out of the rain. After this I collected as much bark and kindling as I could pile in the wheelbarrow and pushed this through a now very boggy pathway into the carport where it is still sitting.

I have been assured the wood is dry as the trees were cut down over a year ago so I hope the rain will dry off it very quickly as the weather tonight forecast a cold blast (with more rain) arriving on Sunday and I foresee many days spent next to the fire.

Tonight as I write this I am hunched over the keyboard shaped like a pretzel, the tips of my fingers raw as if I have been playing The Devil Went Down To Georgia on rusty banjo strings. However my hands smell delightfully woody and I still cannot believe I shifted all that wood in three hours in the rain. What an idiot!