Kimler Adventure Pages (http://randsco.com)

Burning Down the House ... NOT!

Hutton House - Spring has finally arrived in Yellow Point. Today! (It seems like).

Spring has been very slow in coming this year. We keep having to steal from the woodpile, each evening, as temperatures stay WAY too low. The hummingbirds have returned, the robins are plucking worms from the ground, once again, but most mornings, there's still frost on the windshield. It just hasn't warmed up much and there's been a pot full of rain (mixed with hail and snow).

Randsco Forcast: A nice sunny, warm day today, after a week of rain and what looks like ANOTHER week of rain to follow. The only good "yard day" for two weeks! _{Randsco Newswire}

Today, Scott was scheduled to attend a "live fire" burn, at a delapidated old house, as part of a volunteer fire practice. He was looking forward to going, but after a quick look at the weather forecast on Randsco, noted that today is going to be the warmest and nicest day in two weeks.

With the lagging Spring weather, Scott has many outdoor projects that have been put on hold, in various stages of completion.

"Great," said Scott, "The first NICE day in forever, it seems and I'm supposed to be dressed in turnout gear, playing the role of a marshmellow at a weekend weenie roast!"

He had already considered playing hookey, while making an egg breakfast, with Alex (Mom was sleeping in, preparing for her first of two, 12-hour night shifts at the hospital). As the Oop and Dad were eating, he was mulling over his options.

"Please, Dad," said the Oop, "Don't go to the fire hall. Stay here and play with me!"

"Well Oop," he said, "If I stayed home, I'd want to work. Maybe you could be my little helper."

"OKAY Daddy!" the Oop immediately replied, "I'll get my wagon and then I can work outside with you."

Well, that pretty much settled the day for Scott, who was now of the mind to give the house burn a miss ... until Carey called from the fire hall.

"Are you coming? There's only 5 guys here and we need some pallets, do you have any?"

"Yeah, I have 5, but my little girl just made a very strong case for my staying." Then Scott explained the weather/Oop scenario.

Growing Woodpile: The baker dude looks on from his stump location, onto Scott's growing woodpile. When the clearning was made, the timber was milled and the slash stacked in a pile. After mowing down the pile last year, Scott's been chopping up the usable slash into fireplace-sized pieces, to fuel our wood stove. It's slow going! _{Randsco Newswire}

After the call, Rachel got up (who can sleep in when the smell of frying bacon and the sound of telephones ringing are in the air?).

"You should go," she said, "I was going to take the Oop out anyway, to do some shopping."

So, Scott grabbed the 5 pallets and headed off to the hall. Once there, we drove over to Boat Harbor, where nearby, was the old log cabin that we were going to burn down.

At the end of a little dirt road, we parked the Chief's pickup (loaded with pallets), Tender 6 (water tanker, as there are no fire hydrants in this area), Engine 7 and Mini (Forest Fire truck). As we began to set up the scenario, an angry neighbor approached, complaining about the impending fire. He wanted the cabin hauled out, not burned and was afraid that flying embers might damage his newly painted steel roof, and the smoke would bother his wife and (a bunch of other things). In the face of angering residents, we canceled the burn and went back to the fire hall. There, we practiced some draft pumping from our portable tank and participated in a hydrant hook-up training session, so the morning wouldn't be a complete waste.

Lunch was catered, so we all ate on the patio, then went back home.

Scott passed Rachel and the Oop on the road, they headed out to go shopping and Scott heading back to get some of those "spring chores" done, which he wanted to do anyway.

In the end, it wasn't a "hookey" day. Though he didn't get to do the live burn, Scott did manage to get in some good training and still have a sunny afternoon, working in the pasture, whittling down the slash pile!

The only bit he missed, was Oop being his playmate and helper.