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Spring is here?

Submitted entry: Who knows - I highly doubt that it is really here but it’s in the 60’s outside now - the door to the yurt is open as is the dome and the air has a cool nip to it that feels refreshing and reminds me that winter is really what’s happening now. Okay, I think I really figured out our smoke problem with the stove this time. It occurred to me last night when we were having trouble with it again. The damper was open, there was a roaring fire, and despite that smoke was coming from between the joints in the pipe inside until I closed the damper. Then I went outside - same thing - except worse - smoke is pouring from the cap where you clean the chimney from and the joint between two of the chimney pipes. Then it occurred to me - something was preventing the smoke from going out the top as it should and it could only be creosote. We have a mesh screen on it to keep birds out and sparks in. So this morning I climbed a ladder and beat on the cap until a bunch of creosote rained down into the cleanout. Then I started a fire inside despite it being really warm. No smoke indoors. For a while we’d been burning big pieces of wood to try to get through the night that we cut when we cleared two big nearly-dead trees from the yurt site. The wood, even after sitting through a six month drought was still pretty green but we’re terrible judges of that so we tried it anyway - it kept us fairly warm but smoked a bunch. Go figure. So as it smoldered we were building up creosote in the pipes (which I got out when I cleaned the chimney earlier this week). I didn’t get the cap cleaned though as I wasn’t really thinking.

The good news is that last night we still were able to have a fire as long as we didn’t open the damper and bottom draft of the stove. This we did with smaller wood that we gathered from around the forest. This wood, from fallen trees, broken branches, etc. is very dry and burns wonderfully. Since the biggest of it may be 3-4 inches in diameter I was pessimistic about the prospect of it staying warm all night. Last night, though, not wanting to burn anything really smoky, I used exclusively that wood (which Kitey calls “bones of the forest” as it most often has no smaller branches or bark on it and looks and feels somewhat bony). Very successful though - I put an amount of that smaller wood in the stove equivalent to a large log, let it catch then damped it down. It stayed extremely warm all night and at points was actually uncomfortably warm despite it’s being in the high 20’s outside. That we can use this wood is great news. Not only is there a tremendous amount of it - enough for years - it’s constantly being renewed as trees die, are blown over or are broken by ice/snowfall. Not only that it is so much easier than gathering big wood. Getting big wood can be done with a bowsaw but it’s labor intensive - after about 4 pieces you’re exhausted and it’s been a couple hours. The alternative is to use a chainsaw which I’m not really feeling ready to do - look at all the minor mistakes we made earlier in the year out of ignorance (the chimney cap, the Coleman lantern, trying to work during the hot part of a summer day - the list goes on and on) - now imagine me making the same kind of mistake with a chainsaw and sawing my head off. Nope, I’m happy with using the bowsaw. Not only that - the small wood can often be broken by hand either by hitting it on something or breaking it across your knee so a saw isn’t even necessary. Oh, and picture this - I’ve got a piece of white oak about 3 feet long and an inch and a half in diameter. I whack it on a rock to split it into two pieces that will fit into the stove. It worked great except for one thing. One of the pieces came up and hit me in the face splitting my lip and hurting like the dickens (gad, I’m sounding like my grandparents now…) Okay, now imagine me with a chainsaw - see?

As usual after seeing older kids Paul is inspired. He’s been trying out words of all shapes and sizes now - cheetah, dogwood tree, rock, dogs, broccoli, bamboo, carrots, onions, garlic. He’s also eating more solid food and nursing less. This of course has led to our realization that we have to eat better ourselves and have more veggies. So yesterday in town we bought all sorts of veggies, broccoli, cauliflower, zucchini, yams, brussels sprouts (Sage’s idea - she doesn’t like them, I don’t but who knows - Paul might like them - he did, after all, insist that we stay later at a Chinese buffet just so that he could eat more broccoli). Then we looked for a steamer since that’s a good quick way to get veggies cooked. We hit Walmart (”We don’t sell those anymore”), the Dollar store (”sorry…”), and the grocery store (”nope…don’t have those…”). We’re a town of 3,000 people - can’t anyone find a vegetable steamer here? Well, Kitey reminded me this morning that a metal colander will do okay in a pinch and since we need a new colander anyway that’ll probably be what we do.

And thankfully my last computer job in town canceled on me. I wasn’t really looking forward to it since there’s often more talking than working involved. Or at least listening on my part. Last time I felt like a stereotypical hairdresser - hearing all their problems. So that’s over. Now we can focus on the web business. I’ve identified several more likely clients in the area so once we have time after finishing the sites we’re currently working on I’ll try calling around. I’m not fond of being a salesperson and didn’t really enjoy it when I was doing it as a part of my job as a project leader in the pharmaceutical industry but it’s going to be essential if we intend to make a living, isn’t it? Some work has been referred to us but we can’t count on that. I am looking forward to getting to focus on the web work, though. Now that I’m feeling more proficient at it I enjoy it as much as I did the computer work - and so far the web clients have all been wonderful to work with.

So I think I’ll end things here - I have to haul some water back here, get a little more wood (hopefully not hurting myself further) or maybe I’ll just continue with the book I’m reading Haroun and the Sea of Stories by Salman Rushdie. It’s a wonderful young adult book - so wonderful that I’m hooked. I don’t think I would have picked it up myself but a reader of this site sent it to us (Thanks STN!). Oh, and more coffee - definitely more coffee…

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