Coldest winter in twenty years

Bad weather follows me around. Everywhere I have lived has had some form of record breaking weather while I was there. When we moved to Vegas there was some bad flooding and when we first moved here we got hit by hurricane Rita after everyone assured me that hurricanes never come this far inland. This is the first winter I have been home for in three years, so of course it has to be freezing.
This is what is left of the half cord of wood we bought for sixty-five bucks about a month and a half ago. More than one person has laughed when mentioned that we bought when we live surrounded by woods. Around half the stack hasn't been seasoned long enough and is hard to keep burning unless you mix it with drier wood. This is probably about and 1/8 th of a cord and we could easily burn this in a week if we have a fire at night. If wood was our only source of heat we would probably go through it faster. Luckily most of the time the winters here are joke compared to back east or the Midwest. If we had had to cut and split all of own wood for winter I would be in much better shape and I think we would need about 10 cords of wood.

Firewood isn't something you can just go cut up and burn right away for the most part. Like alot of country life it requires planning. This spring I need to be out cutting and splitting in order to have wood for winter. I think if I cut all the downed trees around the property I would have around eight cords of wood. We have beech, oak and walnut down that need to be cut. Even though they are down they still need time to season. some fall and continue to grow, but even this beech that has been dead for three years still had enough moisture in it that it is hard to burn. This is one reason I want to clear out a couple acres of pasture pines and plant some hard woods. So that in twenty or thirty maybe me or my kids won't have to buy firewood.

the big chill is coming

Rain had been coming down for a few hours when night fall began. The two combined made for the first cool, even slightly chilly evening. For a while I considered starting a fire, but realized I'd be sweating soon after, besides we don't have much firewood left. Soon we will have to buy another cord. My parents found this hillarious. Yes, we live surronded by woods and we buy fire wood. Partly, this is because firewood is one of those things you have to plan ahead of time. I should have started looking for trees to cut up in the spring so it can be split and left to dry for at least one summer. Even one summer may not be long enough. Really I should be cutting, splitting and stacking now for next winter or the winter after. The other reason is that the wood around us is mostly pine. Pine has lots of pitch and when burned this can build up in your chimeny and eventually catch on fire. Of course if you were dependent on wood for heat you would just have to be diligent about cleaning your flu.
The house we live in was built before power lines came out here way before the time of central heat and air. Personally, I don't think I could hack it. It's just to damn hot in the summer and cutting enough fire wood with a buck saw and an ax would be a nightmare. What I need to do is use what is use at least what is around us. Our pear tree had a big limb fall off a couple years ago after the huricane. This should have been cut up and stacked, but I left it until it was half rotted and had to cut it and dump it into the woods to finish rotting.
Not much I could do tonight as far as cutting, so I dug around in my tool boxes for a while until I found my chain saw file. I sat on the back porch and listened to rain while I sharped the teeth on my chain and cleaned off the pitch with acetone. The same day you get a chain saw you should get a file to keep the teeth sharp. It doesn't take long for them to dull and start bogging down. I would at least give teeth quick once over every morning I was going to be cutting.
On a sad side note the man who we have bought firewood from the last two years was murdered last spring during a robbery at his firewood operation. Even in a place that sometimes seems like Mayberry, the real world rears its ugly head.