I store my firewood naked. Uncovered, that is. Contrary to popular belief, covering firewood with a tarp or storing it in a shed keeps it damp, not dry. Split firewood acts like a sponge; it soaks up the rain and draws in humidty from the air. It will draw in this dampness no matter how carefully covered. Covering the wood impedes the evaporation process and yields damp and moldy wood.

I learned this fact during my college winters when I helped harvest, split, store and deliver about 2500 face cord of firewood to homes in and around Rochester NY. It was difficult to convince customers they didn’t need to cover their wood. It’s still a difficult concept to get across to people.

For stone dry wood that will bounce like a baseball bat on your garage floor, and burn clean and hot, store it right outside in the rain and snow, out from under trees and eaves, preferably where the sun will hit it for a good part of the day.

In my college days, we dumped our newly cut, green firewood by the truckload in an open field where the snow and rain washed it and the sun baked it. It remained showroom clean and dry for a year. After a year bugs start to find their way under the bark so it’s good to use it up every year.

Cutting or scavenging already-cut wood right now, in July, will yield firewood ready to burn by late October/early November.

I operate a resume writing service. I interview new people every day. In twenty years, I’ve found that everyone has a unique story to tell. That’s my own take on it; fact is, most folks don’t realize there is anything especially unique about themselves.

Here’s someone from recently:

She sells software and technical training packages to engineering firms. She’s just two years out of college and doing quite well at this. In fact she’s the youngest account representative in the firm, and she’s currently generating more than double her sales quota. 

She finds leads, calls them, tells them a little about herself and her firm, finds out about them and their software need, sets up appointments, and goes out to meet them - usually executive-level decision-makers - at their offices. Next, she brings in her technical representative to actually explain the nuts and bolts of the software to the prospect. If all goes well, a deal is struck. She then confers with the client’s finance department to coordinate payment, and she visits the client after the sale to ensure everything was delivered, and the client’s staff were properly trained.

Now, this isn’t the first person I’ve written a resume for who is a busines-to-business sales rep. But this is the first rep I’ve interviewed who doesn’t have a car. She’s based in Manhattan and covers New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania - all by using public transportation and taxis.

Washington is big country. Big land, water, mountains and sky. Almost as big as Alaska. As an easterner, when I think of water, I picture a river I can throw a stone across, or a lake small enough I can tell the colors of the cottages on the far shore. Space-wise, Washington is kind of a halfway point between my New York backyard and infinity.

You cannot throw a stone across the Puget Sound. The first time I stood on the beach - as wide as a football field is long, and squinted to make out a freighter a couple miles off shore, with its ”cabin” the size of a five-story apartment building and carrying hundreds of tractor-trailer-size containers, with eagles soaring behind me and pelicans perched on the pier in front of me - I was humbled.

Within shouting distance down the beach were two men. They appeared, as I approached them, to be homeless. But I was intrigued by what they were doing. They halted as I came nearer, to let me pass so they could resume their exercise.

“Is that a sling?” I asked the man who seemed to be teaching the other, a teenager.

“Yep, it is,” replied the unshaven man, tossing long hair away from his face. He was missing several teeth.

“Mind if I watch?”

He nodded to the teenager who propped up a heavy wooden pallet with a driftwood log. The man selected an igneous stone the size of a bar of soap and placed it in the leather pouch of the sling. I’ve pictured David slaying Goliath, twirling the sling around and around and then releasing it. False. No twirling. The man used the two-foot long sling cord as an extension of his arm. Imagine a pitcher lobbing a ball into home plate with a four-foot, instead of two-foot arm. The man held the sling so that the stone hung next to his knee. He eyed the pallet, made some kind of silent calculation, and with one quick animal-like movement, lurched forward, while thrusting his arm and swinging the sling. He hit the pallet squarely, shattering a three-quarter-inch pine board and knocking the pallet to the ground. What I saw was a weapon accurate and powerful enough to hit and shatter a ten-pin all the way down a bowling alley.

He picked up another stone. He faced the open water now, paused, calculated and let it rip. I heard the stone pierce the water some two hundred feet from us, not with the splash or ker-plunk of a stone, but with the “zip” of a bullet.

I said, “I haven’t seen anything like this back east where I come from.”

He just smiled. I think his earlier, “Yep, it is” had him all talked out.

Boy Scouts of America, Handbook for Boys, Price 40 cents

HEALTH AND ENDURANCE

BATHS: Besides exercises a boy should have simple, workable rules for living. A boy ought to take a good soap bath at least twice a week and always after he has played a hard game or performed work of a nature that has caused him to perspire freely. Each morning a quick sponge bath should be the first order of the day, in water as cool as he can stand it, followed by a good rub with a coarse towel.

PAIN: One thing that should be regarded seriously is pain in any form in any part of the body. If there is a dull headache frequently, find out what causes it. Pain in the knee, the arch of the foot, or at any point, should be taken seriously. Pain means something is wrong. It may be brave to bear it, but it is not wise. Remember that pain felt in one part of the body may be the result of something wrong in another part. See a wise doctor about it.

GAMES

KNIGHT ERRANTRY: Scouts go out singly, or in pairs or as a patrol. If in a town, to find women or children in want of help, and to return and report, on their honor, what they have done. If in the country, call at any farms or cottages and ask to do odd jobs - for nothing.

How much teamwork is there in professional sports? Consider the following ten traits manifested by a hypothetical athlete. Do you think they depict an individual athlete, like a golfer, tennis player, swimmer, auto racer, or long distance runner? Or do they depict the behavior of a team athlete (as in “All for one, one for all”)?

1 Demand and receive a guaranteed annual salary regardless of their future success.

2 Get busted for DWI, assault, rape, torturing dogs, or beating up their woman.

3 Use unethical or illegal peformance enhancement substances.

4 Randomly cop a punk-ass attitude.

5 Fail to show up for, or out-and-out boycott practices.

6 Demand up-negotiation of an as yet unfulfilled contract.

7 Jump over a car that’s going 60 miles an hour.

8 Punch out a member of the opposition.

9 Accidentally shoot their bodyguard.

10 File for bankruptcy in spite of being paid millions.

Do you think a pole vaulter or a football player is more likely to display the above behavior?

I find the use of the terms “team” and “teamwork” ironic. Unless, of course, the ”game” is Antisocial Behavior, and the position one is playing is God.

Spanish explorers once made it up the west coast all the way to Canada. And left their mark. The Strait of Juan de Fuca, for example, is the name of the hundred-mile-long body of salt water that separates the state of Washington from British Columbia. It looks to be ten or twelve miles wide; you can see the Canadian shoreline from Washington.

The shoreline on the Washington side is mostly remote and fairly wild. Driving along Route 112 I think I see an eagle on the beach. I stop and back up carefully on the narrow shoulder. We get out and creep carefully around tall grass and there, not fifty paces away, stand not one, but two magnificent bald eagles. They immediately depart upon spotting us. After all the evidence of really bad logging practices I’ve seen driving through this state, seeing two eagles makes my day.

Back in the car I spot two more - in a tree, and two more - on a rock protruding from the surf - and two more… I stop counting after six pairs. They are more common than red-tailed hawks back east here sitting in trees along the New York Thruway; a little less common than gulls circling a landfill. We saw probably four eagles for every mile of coastline for about twenty miles along one particular stretch near Port Angeles and they were almost all in pairs.

I didn’t take pictures. To do so would be to reduce this spiritually uplifting experience, this knowledge that such a high member of the food chain is thriving here, to a mere photograph.

I am not a shopper. I avoid stores; malls expecially. Maybe it’s because of a guilt complex I carry from having been involved - as a college student/summer laborer - in building one of the biggest malls in the northeast. That mall not only displaced woodlands and farm fields, but it has continued to spawn more and more peripheral stores over the years, turning into nearly half-a-square mile of consumer wasteland.

So when my wonderful daughter gave me a gift card to the Gap for Father’s Day, I realized I would have to go to the mall. I put it off for a week.

Finally, carrying my guilt (along with a heads up that Gap employees can be so obnoxious that Saturday Night Live even did a skit on them), I scanned the mall directory for the location of the Gap. Oh, there is was, right across from the mall directory.

A very nice woman waited on me, giving me as much unhurried time as I needed, as if I were the only customer in the store and there was nothing she’d rather be doing. When it came time to pay she rang up the sale and said, “Ah, you’ve got $2.55 in change, enough to buy yourself a nice cup of coffee!”

I left thinking, “Gee, that was pretty painless.”

When I got home I discovered the T-shirts were too small. I never tried them on. I didn’t take them back until about a week later when I was in the mall neighborhood. Another equally pleasant woman waited on me. I got my three replacement shirts and when she was ringing them up she noticed they’d been reduced 40%. So I got two more shirts and, ta da, another two-something in change.

I thought about walking over and checking out the pants I’d bought to see if they too had been reduced, and I could multiply them and parlay that into some more coffee money, but I’d already worn and washed my pants.

Most home improvement stores in Seattle have a feature not found in my east coast city of Rochester. When you pull into a Loews you’ll likely find a small group of Mexican men standing off to the side. They’re looking for day work. If you come out of the store with lumber they’ll come running over, offer to help you load your vehicle, and ask if they can come to your house and help with the project. Generally, this system works. The Mexicans do okay work and don’t charge too much or try to rob you.

This particular day we pull into Loews and there are eight Mexicans standing under some trees at the edge of the parking lot scanning the American asphalt for opportunity. Inside Loews we wrestle several 80-pound bags of ready-mix concrete into a shopping cart with three-and-a-half wheels. We manage to tear a small hole in each bag and the cart is so loaded that the bad wheel won’t even wobble; it just shuts down.

This is turning out to be a Four-H day: Hot, Humid, Hungover, and, by the time I get to the cashier, I can feel my old Hernia operation. I wonder how little I can offer one of those Mexicans to hoist these bags into the trunk of our car. I’m willing to go five bucks.

Outside again, my eyes adjust to the bright sun and I search the shadows under the trees for the Mexicans. There are none to be seen. In their place are two young Caucasian men with the physiques of college lifeguards. Their tanned and toned arms are folded seriously across their chests, their sleeves rolled up tight. They wear Nike running shoes and have semi-automatic pistols and handcuffs strapped to their waists. They sport sunglasses and blue baseball caps with white lettering, two words of which I can just make out: ”Immigration Control.”

I found this list neatly printed in blue ball point pen on lined notebook paper, on the floor in the lobby of my office building. There is a construction project underway on another floor and there are tradespeople and suppliers coming in and out on a regular basis.

ITEMS TO BE ADDRESSED

NO RIDING ON TOWMOTORS W/ DRIVER

POT HOLES

PEOPLE NOT KNOWING WHAT

YARD CONDITIONS

PALLET NOT LEANING

NOT ENOUGH PEOPLE

HEAVY MATERIALS HOW TO HANDLE

PERSONAL SAFETY WEATHER CONDITIONS

IQ TEST INSTEAD OF PISS

BOOTING ALLOWANCE

BACKING UP

COMMON SENSE

ALWAYS JAC

Rainier is a major artery in Seattle. Interestingly, it’s a road designed by Frederick Olmstead, who created public spaces back east here in Rochester. The name comes from the fact that on clear days, like today, Mt. Rainier is “out,” as they say in Seattle, looming loud and clear at the end of the road looking north, although the mountain is actually 60 miles away. These are the business and their signs I passed walking a one-mile stretch of Rainier, from Loews, in what is referred to as the Rainier Valley:

·         Wells Fargo – More than free checking

·         Firestone

·         Starbucks

·         Chief Seattle Council Boy Scouts of America

·         Me Cay Da Restaurant

·         Columbia Physical Therapy

·         El Mexicano Seattle Video

·         Rainier Hair Salon

·         Van Loi Lo Bun Banh Hoi Banh Beo Restaurant

·         Saigon Printing (with second sign in Vietnamese characters)

·         Waste Management truck stops dead pulling out of a driveway fifteen paces ahead of me; motions me to go; he will not pull ahead; pedestrians have the right of way here – its enforced

·         Mai Tinh Thu Gift Shop

·         Samoli Community Services of Seattle

·         Saigon Moi Restaurant

·         Chubby & Tubby’s Discount Store – serving Seattle since 1947

·         Really messed up homeless man across street trying to pull himself up from the sidewalk groping at empty air

·         Mekong Seattle – Oriental Groceries and Gifts (with signs in Vietnamese, Chinese and Farsi)

·         Berean Church of God in Christ

·         Phoi Auto Co. – Used Car Sales

·         Old school bus painted white with awning extending from it: “Open” neon sign in window; sign hand-painted on bus: Tacos el Asedaro

·         Homeless man now vertical with aid of shopping cart

·         Seattle Metropolitan Credit Union

·         Thuy’s Vietnamese Bridal and Tailor Shop

·         West Coast Auto Body

·         Homeless man horizontal again

·         All City Auto Sales – Get Approved Here! (100 used cars; 50 still have license plates: “Washington – Evergreen State”)

·         Fine Line Window Tinting, Car Stereo and Alarm

·         Taco Bell

·         Starbucks

·         Game Craze

·         Radio Shack

·         Safeway (supermarket)

·         Hollywood Video

·         Northbend Nails – Walk-ins Welcome

·         Nguyen Xuan Thanh Law Offices

·         Ta Luu Anh Dung, CPA, CMA

·         Cac Djch Vu Ve Thue, Di Tru Income Tax

·         Quan Phuoc Le, MD Medical Office, Physician & Surgeon

·         Sweet Pot Body Oils & Incense

·         QT Nails

·         Sign tied to tree: Stop Foreclosure – Call 1-800-444-4444

·         Hollywood Nails

·         Ky Van Tran, MD, Primary Care Clinic

·         Ethio Grocery and Smoke Shop

·         Gambia International Gift Store

·         Northwest Community Service Food Bank

·         da Pino Italian Café & Roganao Sausage

·         Global Furniture – Italian Design

·         Top Spot Chinese Restaurant

·         Jumbo Chinese Restaurant

·         Johnnie’s Nails

·         Walgreens

·         Tully’s Coffe

A perfect Seattle day. The magnificent Rainier is “out,” as is the cultural landscape, I’ve got my Tully’s coffee and the screws I need to fix the kitchen faucet.