I’m glad I subscribe to the theory that planning too far out is simply a waste of time. Embrace that loosey-goosey lifestyle!
I was supposed to install a chimney & woodstove this week for a client. The night before I was to start the job, the customer informed me that she was no longer interested in a woodstove. It seems a mutual acquaintance, another contractor in fact, told her she didn’t want to deal with firewood. The damn busy-body! The cost of heating oil isn’t dropping anytime soon, hot shot.
Ahem…
What really annoys me is that she’s going to change her mind back and want the stove installed in October, when we have a nice layer of snow up on the roof. Why do it now when we don’t have a cloud in the sky?
On the plus side, she has about ten cords of downed birch & spruce stacked near the cabin. “If you need firewood, take what you need,” she says to me.
So I’ve been hauling, cutting, splitting and stacking firewood this week. It was 85 degs here today, which is not ideal wood cutting weather. I realize that I won’t be getting any sympathy from South Texas, but 85 is still hot to those of us within a short drive of the Arctic Circle, and I’ve been sweating up a storm this week.
Normally, we’d be seeing rain and weather twenty degrees cooler about now, but there is still no rain in the forecast. Not that I’m complaining about that, since I’m trying to get a nice roof job yet this month.
With the excessively dry weather, the Borough and State have banned woodcutting in the public areas dedicated to that. With the high heating oil prices, the price of firewood is bound to climb as well. So free firewood is just as good as getting paid to install a chimney.
August 9th, 2013 at 5:37 AM
Your so right about the cost of oil. My 16×20 cabin burns about $2,600 a year in oil. No it’s not one of those Toyo but an old drip and is either on off or blasting. If had a heart that worked i would have switched to wood long ago!
August 9th, 2013 at 7:44 AM
Congratulations on the firewood. I’ve been filling my woodshed and still have quite a ways to go filling it, but do have more already than I had for last winter. My home is large, but I use less than 10 cord a year heating it. Wood heat feels so much better, anyway, I prefer it over oil heat, even if I had access to it.