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Monday, July 11, 2005

The wood's last laugh

Author's Note: For the many people who do not regularly follow the meanderings of my blog, let me recap briefly the saga of the wood. In Sept. 2004, I hired an evil tree service to "remove" two fir trees from my backyard and paid them $750 to do so. They cut down the two trees and left their battered tree bodies strewn in 18-inch rounds around my backyard for me to use as firewood. Jokes on me: both of my fireplaces are gas. The logs lounged around my backyard throughout the winter. This spring I began calling various firms to try and get the wood removed from my backyard. I was basically told that, since the wood wasn't split into manageable pieces, it would cost me more than it cost to cut the trees down to have it hauled away. So, the wood sat there like an unwanted relative, reluctant to ever leave even though my hospitality was running out. Finally, maul and wedge in hand, I split the wood and stacked it neatly behind my shed. Then I tempted people via Craig's List to come take the wood away and pay me $50 for the pleasure. Someone nibbled at my bait and hauled the wood up into the mountains to burn in a cabin. The saga would seem to have ended there.
After smuggily ridding myself of the unwanted wood, it dawned on me that I should have someone from the gas company come inspect my gas fireplaces before I placed my now wood-free home on the real estate market. We called. A repairman came out and quickly began berating me for the sorry state of my gas fireplaces. He informed me that one was actually a woodburning fireplace that had been converted to gas in the many years prior to my having purchased my home. And he informed me that said "woodburning" fireplace converted to gas was not legal. For a mere $100, he could cap the gas line running to it and return it to it's legal job of...you guessed it...burning wood.

You can see where I'm going here. I now have a fireplace that burns wood, but no wood because I sold all of the wood I'd split to a woman for $50. And I had to use the $50 I got for the wood to convert my gas fireplace back to a woodburning fireplace. This would be a fitting new stanza for Alanis Morrisette's song, "Isn't it ironic."

Damn you wood.

I'd cry if I wasn't still laughing.


6 comments:

Anonymous said...

And then, sometimes, an author will put out a surprise installment of a supposedly retired series.
Nice ending to the saga.
As to Alanis' song, isn't it ironic that almost nothing referenced in the song is actually ironic?

Anonymous said...

Tim, I think I'd still be crying or have a bruised shin from repeatedly kicking myself. Ivan and I used to sell wood professionally. Of course, we weren't a tree service either.

Naughti Biscotti said...

haaahaaa!!! :)
You knew something like this was going to happen. You already recognized the irony in someone buying the wood for a cabin in the WOODS.
It's good to laugh at oneself. It's even better to laugh at someone else's expense. HAAAAHAAA!!!!

Time said...

Lights,

Don't you think?

Anon,

A writer friend of mine used to turn to me after a particularily hard day at a place we both worked and said,"I'm just gathering data." He would file away the experience to use in his writing. The same goes for the wood.

Shandi,

Yes, I knew it was inevitable that the wood would burn me yet again. :)

Anonymous said...

Translating pain into gain - now that's a marketable skill :)

Anonymous said...

Translating pain into gain - now that's a marketable skill :)