One of my favorite presidents has always been Abraham Lincoln. Before I was 9, I knew his entire life story from reading every biography in the school library. Even today, odd facts about him occur to me now and then, almost like remembering something about someone I really knew. Just last week, the path from the movie theater to our dinner reservation took us up 10th St, past Ford's Theater and the house where Lincoln died. "I wonder what the street was like in 1865," I said, looking across the 4 lanes of traffic from the box office to the steps of number 516. "Was it this wide? Were there hitching posts? Did this house have a yard?"
One of my favorite purchases in the last year or so is a cylindrical cast-iron doodad a little smaller than a breadbox. Forged in America, it has an open ring at the top connected to a sturdy base by two solid columns. Welded in the center is a fan-shaped wedge, and the idea is to put a log through the hoop on top, balance it on the wedge, and knock it straight down to the ground and split it in two.
Oh, it makes a lot of racket, and yes, you have to swing that mini-sledge like you mean it, but the effort it takes to split wood is really minimal.
But?
The satisfaction of cracking those logs in half with a single blow (or two)?
Is not.
One of my favorite purchases in the last year or so is a cylindrical cast-iron doodad a little smaller than a breadbox. Forged in America, it has an open ring at the top connected to a sturdy base by two solid columns. Welded in the center is a fan-shaped wedge, and the idea is to put a log through the hoop on top, balance it on the wedge, and knock it straight down to the ground and split it in two.
Oh, it makes a lot of racket, and yes, you have to swing that mini-sledge like you mean it, but the effort it takes to split wood is really minimal.
But?
The satisfaction of cracking those logs in half with a single blow (or two)?
Is not.
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