Did a little branch trimming and cut two small trees at the house site. Now, once Bob LaPorte removes a couple of rocks and the stumps, will be able to drive from the leach field site to the shed site via the house site. Took inventory of the firewood stacked up alongside the driveway and elsewhere... well over 8 cords is drying nicely. Late morning Larry came and took away the Kubota. On a hunch, went across the road to Dave and Ceil Todd's house to see if they knew how to get hold of the Leicester Fire Warden, whose phone had been called at least 50 times (no exaggeration) this summer, but to no avail. In all those calls I never talked to the Fire Warden once -- no voicemail!!!! and the phone was only ever answered twice... by a young child who obviously didn't do so good in relaying a call-back message. All those calls were to find out what kind of permission was needed before burning stumps and/or brush piles. Ceil Todd knew instantly who to call - the Fire Warden's father (OF COURSE!!!!) That august person said, sure, go ahead and burn... and he would let his son know what was going on. Returning back across the road, matches in hand, the weather turned downright ugly -- gusty winds and threatening rain. Not the time to light a large bonfire! But an hour later, rain squall gone (the only daytime rain, by the way, in the last two weeks) ole One-Match Doug, fire-boy-in-charge, tried to light the stump pile... five times. On the sixth try (being a fast learner) I actually built a fire with real firewood upwind of the stump pile, whereupon the blaze started with gusto. Unfortunately, no longer having a loader / backhoe, there was no way to move the stumps around the edge into the fire, so after 8 hours of burning (halfway through which a quick plunge in the lake just felt sooooo gooooood), only about 2/3 of the pile was consumed and the fire was down to a very, very large pile of embers. Dinner was, (what else?) hot dogs roasted on a green stick over the burning pile... along with a bottle of cheap wine... Does life even get any better?
