My Absence

I agree about the stores and frigid temperatures, Abe. I guess that means we're both cranky.

Going in oand out of extremes temps cam give you pneumonia! My daughter came down with it in Az. when she was not quite two. Doc said it was from playingoutside and coming in to the cold a/c air (The day care center evidently didn't know this could happen).

Abe on the AC front, I remember griping at work about it and being told that the temps were set and not going to be moved because to adjust them it cost $300 everytime they brought in a technician, and then he charged $100 an hour. We hung deflectors as shields, wore sweaters and plugged in portable heaters (which blew the breakers--ha!).
My sister works in a vet clinic that has the opposite problem...heated floors so that the animals in surgery are comfortable. The surgery is lovely, but the receiption area so hot that they prop a window or door open all the time...even in dead winter. Same excuse...too expensive to keep bringing folks in to get it adjusted properly. Instead, they'll put up with staff griping and feeling sick because it's so hot.
And you think you guys get cranky...you should see a bunch of menopausal women who work in an overheated vet clinic...

Burning fuel for months/years is cheaper than a one off payment to reduce the fuel bill?

Shelagh wrote:

Burning fuel for months/years is cheaper than a one off payment to reduce the fuel bill?

My thought exactly, Shelagh. Evidently no one did the math. I would like to see the electric bill!! What ever happened to thermostats?

I don't know except to say that some folks really are dumber than sticks...or oak knots for that matter!

Talking of dumb folks, I used to work in a theme park and the number of people to ask if you got wet on the log flume was unbelievable. Then there were those asking if you went upside down on other rides they'd stood watching for half an hour and could see for themselves that they did. Of course I always said no hehehe

Don't ask me how Billy, but somehow I knew there was a rebel in you.

Hi Sue,
The best way to explain it might be that the knot is a (usually darker) area in the trunk where a limb or branch was joined to the wood, and because the wood fibers in those areas have to be really close together in order to hold the branch to the tree, the joints (knots) are super tough. Things like oak and maple are hard to cut at the best of times, and so by the time that wood is dry enough to burn for fuel, it's like a chunk of cement. A carpenter who planes his own wood will cast aside chunks with large knots because they are impossible to remove without messing up the rest of the wood (leading to a box of cast off oak or maple knots around here). You'll also find big knots in the wood lots because they can get caught in the log splitters so the bigger of nastier versions are cast aside.

Cool pic of a knotty oak tree here
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Cool pic of an oak knot here [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

That helpful?

You're welcome Sue!

Dumber than a box of rocks is how my NC uncle would put it.

And while we're on wood formations, how about "I've seen shaplier knees in a cyprus swamp"?

(See, that weeds out the Yankees, because calling cyprus knobs "knees" is pretty regional.)

My dad always used to say that us kids had "knobbly knees". No wonder I grew up feeling like an awkward duck!

Knobby knees takes me back to high school. It was the 60's, and all the girls wanted to wear mini skirts. Most parents wouldn't let a daughter leave the house in one of those shamefully short pieces of attire, so all the girls could be found in the girl's room before class, rolling their skirts up at the waistband.

The rule of the day was that if you knelt on a chair and your skirt did not touch the seat, you were sent home.

One teacher in particular was death on the short skirts, and having been a WAC Drill Sergeant, she made it well known, and loudly.

In her class, the worst thing a student could hear was "Hey you, with the knobby knees! Go get a coat to cover yourself; I don't want to look at your knobby knees!"

This of course would result in several girls running to their lockers to grab their coats, and others standing to unroll their waist bands!

I had forgotten all about that until I read this thread.

Pam, those are great photos you linked us to. The one of the oak in winter looks just like some of the trees around here.

Zada, I'll bet the boys hated that teacher more than the girls.

A well-remembered verse to Sound Off:
Roses are red, violets are blue,
the shorter the dress, the better the view.