Give us this day our seasonally inappropriate chore

I finished the winter with just under a tier and a half of firewood left in the hoop shed, and was very pleased with myself. Last Sunday when Landlady came over for coffee her dog Dharma detected a packrat in there, no surprise, and redecorated a bit. I wasn’t the least bit upset, because I had to haul all that stovewood out anyway. My brilliantly improvised woodshed worked pretty well all told, but the half-sidewalls I put up weren’t nearly sturdy enough and the weight of the wood was pushing them over. Couldn’t brace them back up with the wood in there.

This is not the sort of chore I normally schedule for July. But then again I don’t normally do my wood collection in May, either…

…but I unexpectedly did with that garbage-hauling paying gig, and I’m sure Ian would like me to get it out of his yard sometime before October. Why is it in Ian’s yard and not mine, you ask? Because Ian’s got lots of electricity he’s not using, that’s why. I need his place for the power saws.

Anyway this morning while it was cool(ish) and the woodshed was in the shadow of the Lair I hauled out most of the wood Dharma had already tumbled, braced up those sidewalls…

…and then re-stacked everything. It’s not quite at the top of the to-do list, but now I’m ready to cut wood for the winter.