Mark is inventing a log splitter.
This is because he is getting old, and splitting up enough wood to keep our house warm all the time is a lot of very hard work. It is a lot of work even when you are twenty five, which he is not. He is getting elderly and complains about his knees.
We do not have any other heating. There is only the fire. Now that it is truly winter it cannot be allowed to go out again. We will have to keep nursing it carefully all the time until around about March, and maybe even later.
There is only one fire, but it keeps the house very warm indeed. The house is tall and thin, and works a bit like a chimney. When we light the fire in the stove the heat fills all the radiators, but also rises up through the house and keeps the bedrooms warm. We have stuffed every tiny crevice in the house full of insulation, so that we do not lose lots of heat to icy draughts, and it works beautifully.
He has invented a log splitter to go on his digger. Please do not expect explanations. I do not in the least understand how it works.
It is massive, and has been keeping him very busy in his new shed. He spent ages out there last night when he came in from work, bashing and welding and cutting with his gas axe.
I went out to have a look at it when dinner was ready. I did not stay very long, because it was terribly cold. Mark had his boiler suit and woolly hat on, and said that he was fine, but I was in my apron, and the chill air was sinking into my bones.
It turned out to be a long lump of steel with some pointed bits. I have attached a picture of part of it. You can see the pointed bits and another, enormously heavy bit.
I do not know what it all does. I just took the photograph.
The whole thing looked very heavy indeed. Mark agreed that this was likely to be a problem, and added that he was not quite sure how he was going to get it from the shed to the car and then out again at the farm. Out again at the farm is not really a problem, because he can always fasten it to his digger and lift it with that. It is the first bit, getting it out of the shed, that will be exciting.
I can see this is likely to be a challenge. Certainly it is not an object you would wish to drop on your toe, even if you were wearing prison boots. The bit on the photograph is a mere tiny bit of what looks like a colossal steel gatepost. Fortunately it is not my problem, and Mark is perfectly good at thinking of solutions for things. He once moved a Rayburn up a steep hill by himself just with two bits of scaffolding tube, using them as rollers. I expect his ancestors were the people who built Stonehenge.
He explained it all to me, pointing at bits to help me understand. I admired it very much, but then was forced to admit that I had not got the first idea what he was talking about. It is hydraulic, and will mean that he can just split up firewood quickly and easily. It will be so easy that even Oliver will be able to split firewood, using the digger. This will be brilliant. It will be handy to have an apprentice.
I have not invented anything. I am still doing Christmas things. I was painting pictures today. Doing this is one of my favourite things, almost as much as writing. I was so completely occupied that I did not realise I had been dipping my paintbrush in my cup of tea instead of the paint water, until the snow I was painting started to look as though somebody had been walking their dogs on it.
This kept me busy all day, and then when Mark came home we thought we would not go to work again. This is because the alarm goes off for rural broadband at half past six, and we feel grumpy and miserable if we have been working until midnight.
It felt gloriously idle to have a second night off. I cooked some lamb in pastry that we bought from the butcher near Oliver’s school, and we would have loafed about all evening if we had any comfortable chairs.
Perhaps fortunately, we have not, so we have got to carry on and do things with our lives. I came upstairs to write to you, and Mark went outside to bash his log splitter about. We are going to go to bed just as soon as I have finished, we have set a goal of nine o’ clock. I am driving to York to collect Lucy tomorrow morning, and then we have got to work all night afterwards, so we thought we would try and bank some sleep in advance, like putting money in a coffee jar for when the tax bill comes in January.
I am off to make a start.
