Tales of Fire

So, no pictures this time, but a lot has been happening. I just have been really bad about carrying my camera around lately, and hence... no posts. :( <-- sad face.

But, I thought I'd write something here showing that I am not dead. (Yay, no dead!)

So, what has happened that I normally would post about is that the Circuit Assembly and Pioneer meeting happened, I had my first CO visit, the bathroom is still not done, but I have had Lane, Austin and Aaron come to work on parts of it. It is coming along nicely and will probably be the subject of a post in about a week. I'll also post about a couple who recently moved in here from West Linn.

So, story time kiddies! actually it's more like a Moral, but I digress...

Moral #1: Things catch on fire if they get too hot...

So, a brother gifted me some firewood a couple of days ago, beautiful Tamarac. It burns clean, hot and for a long time. Problem is, it was all in rounds; it had to be split. So there I was, splittin a bunch of wood in the cool crisp air of early winter. The bitter hint of the Juniper berries fermenting on the trees wafting in with each breeze bellowing though the canyon. Nothing but the thud of the maul hitting a particularly rough spot in the normally clear grain of the well seasoned logs. This needed to be done promptly because if it rains on them or snows, the dried out logs may get soaked and then have to re-dry out. THIS... is no good. After about 30 minutes, I realize I've gone a bit axe happy and now, I have too much wood split to fit into my wood shed. SOLUTION: Stack it in my house next to my wood stove so that it's RIGHT THERE. Good idea? SEEMED so at the time... maybe you see where this is going.

So, I proceed to stack about 35 split pieces of this very dry wood about 6 inches from my inferno of a wood stove. I fail to see how I thought this was a logical decision, but at the time... GENIUS solution to my problem.

... fast forward about 30 minutes...

The room is nice and toasty. The intermittent crackle of the wood as it splits from the heat and as the fire makes it's way into the tiny air pockets in the wood, provide a symphonic melody merging in with the soft sounds of George Winstons Variations on the Kanon. The woody smell swirls in with the vapors rising from my rosemary roast being carved into slices in my kitchen. Brings back memories of winter weekends at the cabin and mellowing in the nostalgia... then... it smells a bit too woody.... then REALLY WOODY... then... "Are my contacts dirty? Why is everything blurry??"

Then I turn around...

SMOKE EVERYWHERE. Glad I took down my smoke detector a couple of weeks ago because it was "annoying". I run over to the wood stove, the source of the smoke, looking to see if I had closed the dampener too tight... NOPE, the entire wood pile is aflame! About 6 logs had full flames licking at the ends and at the frayed pieces of bark jutting out toward the white hot side panel of the wood stove. How hot does it need to get for something to be lit by RADIANT heat????? Although just the ends of the logs were on fire, the entire thing was REALLY HOT. At that moment I remember thinking to myself, "I'm glad I'm in shorts... and that's it." It must have been quite the sight if any of my neighbors had happened to be looking over in this direction as they see the Crazy Korean guy frantically running out into the snow in his boxers holding flaming logs with a towel, trying to douse out the flames in about an inch of snow.

NOT a good situation to find yourself in.

Moral of the story: Things catch on fire if they get too hot...

So simple... so complex.

Look for other morals to come.