Splitting Wood

A busy Monday. I tackled a couple of projects around the house--the most ambitious being to split and stack a bunch of wood left over from a tree that fell last year. It has been drying for the last year by the side the house since our landlord and his son-in-law cut up with a chainsaw. The landlord has been suggesting (for months and months) that I should split it up and use it for our fireplace. But, honestly, I've split wood by hand before, and it's one of those jobs that is best done with your shirt off to impress the Mrs. If your real purpose is to get wood ready for winter, than you ought to simply rent on buy a hydraulic wood splitter (IMHO).

The weather is turning in Ontario. Time to start packing up the deck furniture and get ready for the snow. If that wood is going to get split, I decided, it was doing to be me that does it! So I bit the bullet.

First stop, Canadian Tire. There I picked up a little 4-Ton Log Splitter. I don't think they sell many of these downtown in Toronto, but they managed to find one in the back! I took it home and was pleased with the performance--it had no trouble splitting everything I through at it. It has a little 1.74HP Electric Motor that runs a hydraulic pump that moves the ram. Bigger models are probably faster and can handle even bigger pieces, but this little guy is perfect for home use. But even with this little beauty it still took me about 3.5 hours to split the pile and stack it on the back deck. Ah, well.

I was inspired to tweet some Haiku:

A new power tool
Splitting wood in Autumn Air
Fall in Ontario

There is something very distinct about Fall in Ontario. I really need to get going on getting some apple cider fermenting in the basement. I also want to make some more apple sauce--I'm just using up the last of last year's batch and boy is it good stuff. And easy, too!

After I picked up Henry at the Daycare I got some take-out from my favourite Thai place: Flip Toss and Thai. Those of you living near the University should know about this place--terrific Thai food at a cheap price. The folks that work there are clearly a family, and enjoyed see Henry with me.

-t