Something's goat to give... (February 2025 scapegoat blame thread)

@ItalianScallion Sorry
(not really)

@PhysAssist If it gets much colder thaw your firewood inside before you put it in the wood burning stove. It will then put the fire out if you don’t. Don’t ask me how I know that.

@PhysAssist Considering when winter starts you should have had the firewood split last month. I think we really know who is to blame here.

@Kidsandliz
Thanks for the advice, but we’ve been heating with wood for 30+ years and knew that.

Besides, the wood is so cold that when I bring it in, it gets condensation on it, so we let it sit and warm up [and dry back off] anyway.

@yakkoTDI

You do wood your way, we do it ours.

It has been cut to length and stored in firewood bags on pallets since early last summer [under cover from rain and snow but in the sun]- so it’s scrupulously dry so splitting it and hauling it inside is my winter exercise [besides snow removal].

@PhysAssist @yakkoTDI Up in Canada we were burning wood (pine no less - how dumb was that but that basically was the only wood up there to cut) that wasn’t seasoned enough. Can you say creosote fires? We finally drilled holes in trays, tied them to the chimney and left ladders against the buildings. Then when we’d have a fire someone would climb the ladder and cover the chimney while someone inside would cut off the air to the wood burning stove. That would kill it pretty quickly. Of course then without enough oxygen the thing would make nose and try to dance across the room a bit.

We’d also lie in bed at 3am pretending to be sleeping until someone gave up and got up to put more wood on the fire. I know in most homes that are wood heated you don’t have to do that but these houses that were not very well insulated and the stoves were homemade out of 2/3 of a metal 55 gallon container. Even in heavy socks you’d freeze your feet doing that due to the cold coming up under the floor (we build snowbanks around the houses but that only sort of helped).

I was working for an outdoor adventure program at the time (dog sledding and cross country skiing) so often we were sleeping on the trail in snow sort of caves we’d make (big opening at the top; it was 30-60 below at night so we needed the sort of insulation and some way to keep some heat in without suffocating people when the snow turned to ice) and so didn’t have to deal with it all that often.

We also had a creosote still going on with the metal chimney pipe in one building with no actual chimney so we ran a pipe outside and then at the right angle bend (so it would then send the smoke to the sky) that stuff could drip into a #10 can. As we were a 4 hour drive NE of Thunderbay off of a logging road we didn’t have to worry about codes and compliance with what we were doing. I am surprised we didn’t burn something down.

Living there that winter with no electricity, running water (and so yes outhouses too besides having, eventually, an 8’ hole in the ice the lake we’d have to keep open to get water once a week - gas portable pump to do so), nor indoor heat other than the wood burning stoves it was an interesting experience. Something that was fun at the time but I am not sure at this point in time I’d like to repeat. Makes me respect what our ancestors went through. Takes a heck of a lot of time to do basic things. I sometimes wonder how they had time for anything else other than the tasks of daily living back then.

@Kidsandliz @yakkoTDI
Yeah well, you havta use whatever’s thrre, and an old friend of mine told me that they burned almost exclusively pine, while they were living what was essentially a subsistence existence in the front range of Colorado.

I mean they were hunting mule deer with a single-shot.22 long rifle for meat [along with squirrel, rabbit, and other small game].

Similar problems with creosote, and low tech solutions for same ensued.

The snow dragon sounds amazing, I agree pictures would have been great, but I also remember life without cellphones.

@PhysAssist @yakkoTDI We at least didn’t kill our food. We kept the vehicle batteries inside so they’d be warm enough to start the vehicles and go to Thunderbay (we were around 4 hours NE of that) periodically for a big stock up on people food and dog food. Stove was propane as one one light in the kitchen (the only fuel that could keep enough pressure in the outside tank to be able to use). Lights elsewhere were kerosene. There was one brand that gave out white light and was around 100 watts (don’t remember which one now) and the rest were night light bright and yellow light. We’d put 3 or 4 of them on a table to be able to see better. It got light around 10am and dark around 3pm we were that far north. (of course in the summer we only had about 4 hours of dark - midnight to 4am). Fantastic northern lights to the point that they were a “normal and usual” occurrence. Those were amazing. I also realized that I was not a fan of it being dark so much and realized just how much I liked sunshine.

@PhysAssist
I can’t control the weather. But if you broke something or someone died… HE EHE HE. That would be more a long my specifications.

@PhysAssist @yakkoTDI I wish I had a photo of it too. Back then I didn’t even own a camera and developing film was so expensive.

@chienfou The idea of “had a good run” or “lived a good life” helped me to accept my dad’s death a few years ago. May you always have good memories of your dad!

@chienfou

@chienfou Glad you had a dad for so long!

@chienfou Sunday would have been my mom’s 103rd. Sadly, we lost her just shy of her 82nd.

@macromeh
It’s not the numbers on the tombstone that are important… it’s the dash.

@ItalianScallion

/giphy that is fantastic

@ItalianScallion
Bravo…well done!

@ItalianScallion

/giphy congratulations

@ItalianScallion Have you considered a Mazda Miata?

@macromeh That would be really nice if I didn’t need to have a least some cargo space and a modicum of ability to drive in the snow. I’m thinking more along the lines of a Subaru. I was happy with my '98 Forester, except for the crappy fuel economy.

I retract part of the blame regarding the snow storm. It was only six inches and it didn’t take long to clear the driveway and sidewalk.

But I might have to throw some blame this Sunday if our next storm turns out to be an ungodly mix of snow, rain, and ice.

@ItalianScallion SNICE STORM