Was at a social gathering a while ago. Chatting with a nice gentleman when talk turned to wood heat. Anyone who has ever wrangled with wood heat as their main heat source has tales to tell, as we all know.
We talked about various species of wood and how they perform in the furnace. Long slow fires, short hot fires. We talked about splitting by hand versus electric splitters or tractor driven splitters. We talked about the all summer task of hunting for fallen trees and then getting to them before some other wood hunter does. We talked about buying it by the semi load. We discussed the fine art of splitting the dry product. Avoid the knot, look for the natural split and aim for that. Should one use a maul or axe? I said I favour an 5 pound maul, while I can only swing it with any sort of accurate aim a few times, the hefty weight almost guarantees a split, where I am not as skilled with the much lighter axe as Hubby is.
All of a sudden this fellow stops talking and looks at me. He says, "You are the first woman I've ever been able to talk to about firewood!" People, I am here to tell you I felt proud. I took that as a compliment. It goes against my nature to accept a compliment, don't want to be vain. But it's true, I have hacked a lot of big, ugly wood and I know a thing or two. Thank you.
This ties, in a weird way, into something that R.Roo said in a post of his, made a comment about someone having an extremely high IQ. I have been around enough people long enough to know that an IQ score tells you absolutely nothing about a person's intelligence. All it tells you is their IQ in any given context or culture, but it is NOT a reflection, in any way, upon the helpful, useful or applicable knowledge that they hold. You can be utterly brilliant at reading and writing tests, but freeze to death on a camping trip because you can't make a fire to save your soul. In my books, no matter how high your IQ, that makes you a functional idiot.
Once, late at night on our snowy mountain road, came upon two young men who were seriously in the ditch and were attmepting to dig their truck out of the snow. Did you know there is a right and wrong way to dig? An effective and ineffective way to use a shovel? I was also told once by an elderly gentleman that I was pretty good on a shovel. Oh yeah, I have perfected a technique, as all long time shovellers do. I might have the lowest IQ score on the planet, but at least I know how to dig myself out of a snowbank, unlike the two bufoons I encountered that night on the road.
I am not and never will be impressed with IQ scores. It is a known fact that a person can score high on one test written with them in mind and score as mildly retarded in a different test, looking for different intelligence.
When it's all said and done if I can split the wood, recognize problems in my animals when I see them, dig myself out of the snow and keep the manure cleaned up, I am going to feel like a pretty well rounded person. A person who can talk firewood. A person who can talk chickens. Won't ace any tests, nor lay claim to any high faluttin scores, but pass as useful just the same. Does this apply to you too? Then I wood like to compliment you on that. Well done!
We talked about various species of wood and how they perform in the furnace. Long slow fires, short hot fires. We talked about splitting by hand versus electric splitters or tractor driven splitters. We talked about the all summer task of hunting for fallen trees and then getting to them before some other wood hunter does. We talked about buying it by the semi load. We discussed the fine art of splitting the dry product. Avoid the knot, look for the natural split and aim for that. Should one use a maul or axe? I said I favour an 5 pound maul, while I can only swing it with any sort of accurate aim a few times, the hefty weight almost guarantees a split, where I am not as skilled with the much lighter axe as Hubby is.
All of a sudden this fellow stops talking and looks at me. He says, "You are the first woman I've ever been able to talk to about firewood!" People, I am here to tell you I felt proud. I took that as a compliment. It goes against my nature to accept a compliment, don't want to be vain. But it's true, I have hacked a lot of big, ugly wood and I know a thing or two. Thank you.
This ties, in a weird way, into something that R.Roo said in a post of his, made a comment about someone having an extremely high IQ. I have been around enough people long enough to know that an IQ score tells you absolutely nothing about a person's intelligence. All it tells you is their IQ in any given context or culture, but it is NOT a reflection, in any way, upon the helpful, useful or applicable knowledge that they hold. You can be utterly brilliant at reading and writing tests, but freeze to death on a camping trip because you can't make a fire to save your soul. In my books, no matter how high your IQ, that makes you a functional idiot.
Once, late at night on our snowy mountain road, came upon two young men who were seriously in the ditch and were attmepting to dig their truck out of the snow. Did you know there is a right and wrong way to dig? An effective and ineffective way to use a shovel? I was also told once by an elderly gentleman that I was pretty good on a shovel. Oh yeah, I have perfected a technique, as all long time shovellers do. I might have the lowest IQ score on the planet, but at least I know how to dig myself out of a snowbank, unlike the two bufoons I encountered that night on the road.
I am not and never will be impressed with IQ scores. It is a known fact that a person can score high on one test written with them in mind and score as mildly retarded in a different test, looking for different intelligence.
When it's all said and done if I can split the wood, recognize problems in my animals when I see them, dig myself out of the snow and keep the manure cleaned up, I am going to feel like a pretty well rounded person. A person who can talk firewood. A person who can talk chickens. Won't ace any tests, nor lay claim to any high faluttin scores, but pass as useful just the same. Does this apply to you too? Then I wood like to compliment you on that. Well done!
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