I don't know why I suddenly remembered this story. Maybe because it is spring, and in spring firewood is about the last thing I think of, yet today in my travels I saw someone getting a truckload of firewood delivered. This happened very early on, perhaps even before we were Officially Married, so we're talking WELL over twenty years ago.

Anyway, Back In the Day, Mojo and her Favorite Husband were this cooperative machine-like team when it came to firewood. (Well, we still are, only lately we've gotten lazy and have it delivered instead of wasting our spare time scrounging around for it. But I digress.) We were renting a house with a wood stove in the basement. The Favorite Husband's job was to cut and collect the firewood from somewhere on the property, throw it in the pickup, drive back to the house, back up to the cellar hatchway and fling the firewood down into the cellar. My job was to lurk in the cellar and stack the wood while avoiding getting beaned with the firewood my Favorite Husband was flinging down upon me. You can probably surmise where this story is going to go, knowing the way Mojo's luck generally runs, but THIS time the story will run COUNTER to your guess!  MORE Mojo! »

So here are the before photos. We are in the 12"--18" range--that's INCHES, if you're a Spinal Tap fan--I wholeheartedly agree twelve to eighteen FEET would be Too Much Snow. Mojo considers anything over a foot to be a good snow. Anything less is just an eye-rolling inconvenience.

Anyway, Mojo has plenty of food--gonna put some chicken stew on the stove once I'm done here--plenty of firewood inside (and out, if need be), batteries, flashlights and candles. We've done this before. Many times.  MORE Mojo! »

Or, "'Tis the Season..." The season of Mojo vaguely wondering WHY I bother to get dressed in the morning, since the last thing I do before leaving the house is, I load the stove full of wood. And, as careful and delicate as I try to be, I invariably end up looking like pre-ball Cinderella, just head to foot with ashes.

'Tis also the season when the tiniest bit of strife enters my otherwise happy marriage, for my Favorite Husband and I view the stove--and fire in general--quite differently. When camping, for example, Mojo is all for Prudence and Decorum, while the Favorite Husband cannot relax until our campfire is raging at least five feet in height. Since Mojo is too lazy to seriously intervene, her job is to move back from the scalding flames as they reach for her and all she holds dear, and occasionally suggesting Helpful Things like "Um, I think that's enough wood for now." He can go through what I would consider an entire NIGHT's worth of firewood in about an hour.  MORE Mojo! »

A: She's busy. Can't you leave her alone for two seconds? She has a new kitty, she's working hard on stuff, fall is arriving and she has yet to get any firewood, and now poor Rosie has officially become Ugly Lumpy-Nose, due to a histiocytoma that suddenly erupted on her nose. Vet says it will go away on its own in a month or two, but in the meantime, on top of her many other concerns and responsibilites, Mojo is further burdened with One Ugly Dog!

So last weekend I decided to just blow through the rest of the dry firewood and have one last nice fire. We still have maybe half a cord or so, now that the snow is mostly gone, but it's been essentially under water all winter, so it's not gonna burn anytime soon. (I have since brought some of it in anyway, in the foolish, foolish notion that it could conceivably "dry out" in a week, even though I know in my heart of hearts that drying out firewood takes MONTHS. But let's leave Mojo to her delusion and hope there's not a subzero power outage within the next month or so.)  MORE Mojo! »

So now that it's approaching the end of the woodburning season--especially since we will probably run out of wood this week, and what we have left to burn is still under a foot and a half of snow, so it's not going to burn too good--Mojo has, since Friday, been suffering from the occasional bane of the firewood hauler--the Phantom Splinter in her finger.

I can feel it. I know it's there. But darned if I can find the blasted thing. Believe me, every spare moment the past few days I have spent staring at my finger like an idiot. I have studied it about as closely as one can when one does not have easy access to an electron microscope. I can't see ANYTHING. No entry wound, no discoloration, no tiny pinpricks of blood, nothing foreign lurking under the skin. Yet it's there. Driving me nuts.

Mojo

Short answer: No.

Long answer: Pffft! No.

Maybe today. Unless something better comes along.

In the meantime, Mojo has come up with a new experience that has been the most painful, EVER. Sunday night I was loading the stove for the evening when I stepped on a live coal that had tumbled out during the process. (We have a huge honkin' hearth I installed when we put in the stove, so no worries there). If you've ever seen the cartoon with Yosemite Sam screaming "AAAH!!! Mah biscuits are burnin'!" as he zooms up in the air like a rocket and then dances around, well, you can maybe enjoy the picture of Mojo doing a similar thing with her foot. It all happened so fast I was holding onto a stick of firewood trying to put it in the stove, and I did this full backward Aikido roll (I haven't done one of those in a few years!) and hopped up after its completion still holding the log.  MORE Mojo! »

As of 7:08 last night. I had JUST gone to bed, and had JUST got the blankets warmed up, when my old nemesis the well pump started up.  MORE Mojo! »

Mojo would be happiest if the leaf people would stay away, but a lifetime of living in New England has taught her That Will Never Be. So instead I enjoy the pre-leaf season, before the tourists clog up the roads Mojo lives on. The temperatures start to drop, the air is crisp and clear, and Mojo's nesting instinct goes haywire as she starts laying in firewood and making sure the house has enough candles to last a couple of weeks.  MORE Mojo! »

In honor of her 45th birthday today, since you know darn well no one else is going to do it properly, or even care enough....