wodden it be nice.....

Things seem to have a way of making themselves complex here in the wilds of West Wales.

I mean:

Sharpen the chainsaw and cut some wood. How could something that simple be that complex?

Lets go back a few days...

Now I am not a big fan of chainsaws, offering as they do a huge variety of means of ending up in casualty if not being put in the ground by grieving friends and relatives.

So when our sharpenologist decided to persuade me to get my own sharpening machine the phrase "not too sure about that" sprung to mind. Of course, having bought the contraption I had to work out how it is you use it.

Having designated an old chest of drawers as chain saw station I set to the important task of fitting the new toy and making it work.

45 minutes later, I resorted to looking on the internet. Even more head scratching and eventually it was sorted.

That was the best part of an hour and nothing achieved. Tentaive fiddling and I had what seemed to be a sharp chain, a lot more fiddling and everything was back together. So far so good.

Or was it, the saw fired up ran for 30 seconds then died. Classic fuel problems. slowly there was more and more mechanical bits on the bench and less on the chain saw. Only one thing for it strip the carb and take it down the garage and blast it through with the airline, the garage, ahh yes closed on Sunday.

Still we could allways unload the truck ready to go and get more wood in the morning. One load off, decided the hoops on the top of the truck are a pain so "we'll take them off!!! rounding up the kids we set too lifting the large complex assembly and getting it to the floor.

In hindsight I think it might have been better to dismantle it but anyway much swearing and lifting it was ready to come off. Lowering a set of hoops for a 7.5 ton truck is something that maybe should have warranted a bit more in the way of thought and maybe even a hint of planning. With the tangle of pipes half way off the truck things developed a mind of their own and away the whole thing flew.

Now personally I would not have tried to stop it but of course I would never presume to lecture management on how to do things but even she admitted that perhaps using her face as a brake was not the wisest thing to do.

Back to the house we went to consider our options and do lunch.

Taking our generous collection of bruises outside I finished stripping the chainsaw and left the fuel filter to dry on the aga. Thinking that if is was clogged with very fine wood dust i might be able to blow it clear if it was completly dry.

SErious heaving and sweating later the truck was empty.

Time to blow the fuel filter clean then, damn me if this wasn't enough and soon the chain saw was revving furiously and the last few huge lumps of hardwood could be cut into manageable sizes before they came off the back of the long suffering Bedford truck.

But a mornings work has taken a whole day and we are still short of cut wood, very short.

Tallie has been in strimmer monster mode, he has decided he needs his own compost heap and is cutting as much grass as he can to fill it.

Management has had enough, she has walked down to see her little mates in the bottom of the valley, Strange though normally she would take the car. Today, now looking a bit like a boxer at the end of a bad day, she has decided to walk, I wonder why she prefers not to be driving home????

Me?

I am going to put a bottle of wine in the fridge and go and lie down for an hour.