So I recently went on a camping trip with my family. I brought a small hatchet because we usually collect small dead-fall branches for kindling but usually end up buying firewood. When we arrived however, the campground had recently been clearing some of the overgrowth and we had some pretty good sized logs in our camp ground. Most of them were just to big to even think of tackling with my hatchet but there was one log that was probably eight or ten inches in diameter and about two and a half feet long that I thought I might be able to handle. Little did I know that my musings would be the start of an epic battle...
That's the log I had my eye on and that is
the hatchet I used in my first failed attempt.
I first tried with my hatchet and despite the tremendous force I am capable of mustering with my chicken arms it just sank in and didn't even think about splitting. I gave it up but it kept nagging at me and wouldn't give me peace. The next day we were in town to buy some bug spray and I came across a bigger kind of hatchet/axe hybrid, basically a hatchet with a longer handle. Now, I have a full size axe at home and I didn't really need the dumb thing but I wanted to lay into that log again. So I bought it. The rest of the day at the lake and in town was just wasted for me cause I wanted to get back to camp and kill the log that had defied me.
The second round went to the log as well. Same mighty swing, same solid thunk, and same unsatisfying lack of destruction. I let the log be for another day or so but it never really set right with me, giving up to a chunk of wood and I would occasionally go over and take another swing at it to no avail.
So the last day rolls up on us and the log remains unconquered. I decided to put my massive brain to good use and out think the log. I figgered the problem was that the log was to long and that a shorter log of the same diameter would give it up to me. I thought to myself that I should chop it in half and then try and split it. I wasn't sure if it was cheating or not but since this was a contest that was taking place entirely inside of my own head, there was not likely be a referee flagging me for an illegal chop.
So I turned my worthy opponent on its side and began to whale away with my mini axe/oversized hatchet until it looked like a pack of beavers on crank had invaded our campsite. Silvia commented that it was the last night and we had plenty of wood for breakfast (girls never understand stuff like this). I finally got the log in half and after I had recovered from the micro stroke I had given myself, looked to finally split it.
I was pretty sure that I could get it now and a wasted no time in tyring again. I was greeted by the same thunk and no split. To say I was frustrated was putting it mildly. I sat there looking at my axe buried in the log thinking of what I could do (shooting it, running it over, throwing it off a cliff...you know your basic Wile E. Coyote solutions) I got to thinking that now that the log didn't weigh seventy lbs I could lift it while still in the axe and whack the back of the axe against another log like you do when you hit a knot in a regular piece of fire wood.
By this time I had gotten Silvia's attention (she always seems to know when I am thinking about shooting something and I think she was hovering in order to keep my enthusiasm in check). Well when I picked the axe up with the log still attached she looked kind of quizzical. When I swung it around and gave it a whack on another log it seemed to make sense to her. When the log split in two and I let out a primal scream of triumph it seemed to kind of startle her (girls don't get primal screams of triumph as a rule either)
Well I split the other half in the same fashion and was beginning to quarter the halves when Silvia says she wants to try the backward axe whacking trick. So she sticks a quarter and then swings around and splits it. She looks very satisfied with herself and I suggest she try a primal scream. To my surprise, she lets rip a respectfully loud whoop and I whoop back at her and we grin at each other like a couple of goofs.
Well on a whim and in a fit of unjustified optimism I throw the axe at a stump across the fire pit. To my great surprise it sticks just perfectly! Well this really got my testosterone pumping and I whoop again and pump my fists and Silvia whoops again and then we hug each other real rough like almost a guy-like World Series home run hug. Well, the day before we had both gotten pretty good sunburns and we both kind of go owwee and whimper at the same time and this moment was so un-caveman like and contrasted from the last minute so much, that we both immediately bust up laughing uncontrollably.
Sweet axe throw, huh?
We (mostly me) called him "Monkey Ear" for obvious reasons. At first he was like, "I'm not a monkey ear, Mom tell him to stop saying Monkey ear!" After a while though, you could hear him from the back of the car saying, "Mom, Brian is touching my Monkey ear."
