Trying

It’s been hard to find the motivation to write about mushing lately, because mushing itself has been less than perfect this season. It’s January and we should be (consistently) on sleds here in the north country. Instead, there’s been frequent warmups, unfrozen ground, and partially-frozen ponds across our trails. We can only go so far on our home trail with the dryland cart, so we’ve been repeating loops to try and gain miles. This is boring for the dogs and for the musher. 

Right now, we’re focusing on the Tug Hill Challenge in February as our final race goal for this season. As much as I wanted to try mid-distance, I know it’s not within reach for us yet. Instead, I rather make sure to end Knox and Denali’s racing careers on a high note. While I’m sure they’ll continue running to some degree next season, I expect their younger teammates to handle the bulk of our big goals.

Tug Hill will be a poetic bookend in a lot of ways. I attended this race a decade ago, before I even had my first husky. It’s what brought me to the north country. It’s where I saw friends and mentors race their teams, back when I just had Dexter and a dream. I’ve wanted to run six dogs since the very beginning. It took some time, but here I am. I’ll have Denali, my first husky, lead us through Winona Forest in our first snow race. Knox, my second husky and a rescue dog, will be right behind her.

If all goes well, this will give the younger dogs more race experience and it’ll be a thank you to my older dogs, for seeing this whole adventure through.

Okay, enough sappiness for now. Aside from races, I’ll be pushing to reach 500 miles for the season. The fact that we somehow managed 400 miles on the rocky, miserable trails in SoCal is weighing on me. Of course, it’s about quality and not quantity, and the dogs and I are much happier here. It’ll take work to get another 300 miles before spring, but I’m hopeful we can do it. Just keep on trying.

Goals

Somehow, it’s already late November. We’ve had lows in the single digits and a little bit of snow. It’s cliche to say, but I feel like just yesterday I was swimming in Lake Ontario and kayaking in the Salmon River reservoir. Around this time last year, we were recovering from our second major snowfall in the North Country. After that storm, things were relatively calm until the new year. Temperatures right now have been hovering just above freezing, with warm days ahead.

The team is doing well, but I’m apprehensive about sending in a Can-Am Crown 30 entry. Our goal for this season is a mid-distance race. We need to put on more miles and pick up our pace a bit. My home trail is full of sections that aren’t safe for fast speeds on the rig, due to rocks, roots, and tight corners around trees. Once there’s a nice base layer of snow, we’ll be able to cut loose with the sled.

In the mean time, we have plenty of other things to work on. We finally did some passing training with other mushers this past weekend. Roy Smith ran a few teams of his sporty stag hounds and Jordan Rode joined us with his solo husky for some bikejoring. It’s been so long since my dogs have had time out with other teams, I really didn’t know what to expect. I figured most of them would be fine, but Hubble has been my wildcard, Knox can be rude, and Denali has a habit of turning around to watch other teams approaching.

The main trail we started on was a sheet of ice, so brakes weren’t really an option unless we kept the teams all the way on the shoulder. Once we made it onto side trails, things shaped up and we did some leap-frog style passing. I kept a Baskerville muzzle on Hubble just in case he was snappy, but he showed very little interest in interacting with the other teams—ideal! Knox, on the other hand, shoved himself towards Roy’s dogs a couple times and barked. Luckily, he didn’t make contact or start any fights. Denali turned around to watch the teams when they were coming up behind us, but only for the first few minutes. After awhile, she got over it, and seemed eager to stay in the lead. It’s funny how the younger dogs (Laika, Hubble, Blitz, and Willow) were all perfect. I didn’t have to worry or correct them at all. It’s a good sign for the future of my team. I just have to hope that when Sagan and Hopper take over for Denali and Knox, they continue the good-behavior trend.

All in all, we did a handful of passes with Roy’s 6-dog teams and his ATV, as well as one pass with Jordan on his bike. Exposure to other teams also means other training tools—carts, ATVs, bikes, etc.—so I’m happy to see my dogs weren’t spooked by the ATV’s noise. Roy and I also stopped our teams side by side for a few seconds, and the dogs were mostly good. We avoided a potential squabble and kept moving, and the dogs ran very close together without a problem.

The only downside of the day came from an angry hunter. When we set out, there was a truck parked directly at the opening of the side trail we were planning to return on. We assessed and figured we could make our way around it without any issue, so we mushed on. When we made it back, another truck was parked perpendicular to it. We had enough room to pass on the right, but when we did, one of the hunters asked me something. I couldn’t quite hear and with Roy’s team coming up behind me, I tried to slow down enough to hear her without stopping, and the team pulled the rig up against one of their trucks. We didn’t crash into it or scrape it, but we did push against the bottom plastic part of the bumper. I kept moving and the truck’s owner came out in a huff.

Once I got the dogs settled at my own truck, I went back over to apologize for the chaos and made sure I didn’t do any damage (I knew I hadn't). It was abundantly clear that this particular hunter was pissed off at us for being there and not for touching his truck. I get it—it is hunting season. This is why I generally avoid running in the state lands this time of year, and especially on weekends. We very intentionally planned our run for late morning, knowing most hunters are out around dawn and dusk. My own neighbor politely asked that I run midday on our land so he can hunt, which I’m happy to oblige. What I don’t like is the implication that I shouldn’t be in the forest at all. I should note that the other hunters I spoke to were kind and actually interested in seeing the Tug Hill Challenge in February.

Despite this one bad interaction, the people of the North Country have taken me in as one of their own. Roy and his friend, Tom, came by and helped get my snowmobile running. My Twitter friends, Amanda and Jennifer, are planning a weekend in Saranac Lake this winter and I can’t wait. Niki, my fellow North Country newbie, has extended her ever-growing friend circle to me, and now I have plans for Thanksgiving. There’s a lot to be grateful for in this weird and wild place.

Mud Mush

This weekend marked the first ever NY State Dryland Challenge—a winding, 2.2 mile sprint race held by the Pennsylvania Sled Dog Club in musher Steven Davis’s backyard. While I’m trying to move away from sprint races, I still need to give the dogs race experience and exposure if we’re going to be attending longer races in the future. This event was less than two hours from me, so I figured I better give it a shot.

Photo by Niki English

I debated running Hubble right up to the night before the race. ISDRA rules state that dogs cannot wear muzzles, so that option was out for him. My start time was towards the middle of the class, with speedier teams both in front and directly behind me. There was a good chance I’d get passed, and it would be the first time Hubble would be in that scenario. Since he’s been defensive around dogs he doesn’t know, I figured this wasn’t the best way to introduce him to races. The game day decision was to leave him in the van and run five (Denali, Willow, Knox, Laika, and Blitz) in the 6-dog class.

Photo by Niki English

Photo by Niki English

Day one of the race was pretty smooth-sailing for my little team. We had a solid run, although by our start time (around 11:30 AM), it was sunny and nearing 50°F. Knox was definitely feeling it, so I didn’t push them too hard. Thankfully (?) there was plenty of mud and water on the trail, so that helped cool them off. No one passed us on day one, but there were some sections of trail where you could see a team on another part of the course, which definitely peaked my gang’s interest.

Photo by Donna Quante

The second day was a bit colder, but I think the mud got… muddier? A day of bikes, rigs, scooters, and ATVs definitely didn’t help the situation. Our start time was a bit later, but we still had a speedy team positioned behind us out the chute. The run itself was mostly fine, though Knox did take a brief second to poop. We got passed a few minutes into running, and the dogs were pretty shocked to see another team suddenly appear. Knox did a scary bark and nobody listened when I called to “gee-over” (move to the right of the trail), but the team got by us without a tangle or altercation, so I’m mostly relieved. I knew we needed passing training for Hubble, but the entire team could use a refresher.

Photo by Niki English

Photo by Niki English

We finished in 10 minutes, 48 seconds on day one and 10 minutes, 27 seconds on day two. That works out to roughly 12 mph, which is awesome, since we’ve been training to run at a sustained 10 mph pace. Our combined time put us at 9th place out of 11 teams, which isn’t very impressive, but that’s just fine with me. This race was all about gaining positive experiences. Besides, I don’t really expect to place when competing in sprint against speedy hound teams.

Photo by Niki English

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Photo by Niki English

Speaking of positive experiences—my favorite part of the weekend was hanging out with other dog-loving humans. Along with fellow mushers, several central NY friends I’ve made through Bumble BFF and Twitter came to spectate each day, which was a delightful surprise. I’ve grown so used to pursuing this hobby alone. It’s comforting to find a sense of community here, especially if I plan on staying in the North Country for the long haul. (Which I do!)

Photo by Niki English

We don’t have any races planned until the Tug Hill Challenge in February, but there’s a ton of work to be done between now and then. Hopefully starting soon, we’ll be working on passing training with Roy Smith’s team of hounds. I’ll be visiting New Jersey for Christmas and New Years, and plan to do the New Year’s Day training meetup in the Pine Barrens, my old stomping grounds. Along with gaining experience with other teams on the trail, I want to boost our runs to 20 miles or so by January. Fingers crossed for steady but manageable snow storms, patient dogs, and a season unlike anything we’ve done before.

First Race

It’s been two years since my dogs were in a race. I’ve written before about how sprint races aren’t really my thing—I much rather just run my dogs casually, without the speed and competition. That said, I do want to try some longer races, in the 20 to 30 mile range. In order to prepare for such events, my dogs don’t just need to increase their endurance and learn to pace their speeds. They also need to learn about getting to the starting line, passing other teams, and resting when other dogs are nearby. These are all skills that I can’t teach them alone. The older dogs have raced before and they’re very good with the rigmarole a race entails. They’ve also trained with other dogs in the Pine Barrens, back before the move to CA and NY. The younger dogs, especially Hubble and Laika, are new to everything.

Earlier this month, I attended the Northern New England Sled Dog Trade Fair. My goal was to get the dogs back into an environment with lots of distractions (both human and canine). We parked and set up camp at a far corner of the camping field, just close enough to see other teams without being right on top of them. There’s a fun, 0.8 mile race the final morning of the fair, and I debated whether we’d run it. Hubble and Blitz’s paws were healed from their recent great escape, but I’ve been apprehensive about Hubble’s behavior with unknown dogs. He definitely needs work, but that also requires exposure to get him there. Laika has never been in a race environment before, and with her fear of new people, I wasn’t sure how she’d do. But, again, exposure is the only way to get through it.

I thought about running a team of four (Denali, Willow, Knox, and Blitz) like I did two years prior, but I decided to enter the 6-dog class—my first time running six in a race! I brought Hubble’s Baskerville muzzle with us, which allows him to pant and drink but not snap at a passing team, so I felt fairly certain we’d be OK. I also made sure we were last out the chute, so no one would be passing us. As it turns out, the teams all completed the trail so quickly, there was barely any passing at all.

The toughest part of the race was just getting the team to the starting line and waiting while the four other teams went out ahead of us. Thankfully I had help while we waited, and the dogs behaved themselves. Laika was very brave around all the excitement. The joy she has for mushing seems to override her fear of strangers. Hubble made a few angry grunts at leashed dogs walking by us, but he seemed more concerned with his pulling duties.

The race itself was smooth and flawless. There were a few tricky spots along the trail where I could see teams veered the wrong direction, but my gang listened to my commands. They came through the finish and we made our way back to the van without any problems. In the end, we placed third out of five, which I was not expecting at all. (The competition in sprint races is fierce!)

Of course, the other reason I attended the trade fair was to scoop up Sagan, our first Alaskan Husky team member. I’ll have to write another blog post, later, to talk about the differences between raising purebred Siberians versus Alaskans, but for now I’ll say she’s incredibly sweet, capable of being VERY loud, 50% legs and 50% ears. Although the thought of Denali and Knox retiring breaks my heart, I’m very excited to see what my team will look like in the coming years.

Ready

Lately, I’ve written a lot about leaning into the mushing lifestyle. About really pursuing this hobby that I’ve been juggling with a “regular” life for almost a decade. That’s what brought me to rural central New York, right in the lake effect snow belt. It pulled me away from the comfort of past relationships, friends, and family. It didn’t always feel like the best decision, but now that the dust has settled, it feels right. I’ve got a house that feels like home, an expanding circle of friends, and some very good dogs.

The funny thing is, I started writing this post from a hotel suite in Santa Monica. It was 75°F and sunny, but all I could think about were trees changing color and mornings where you could see your breath. I’m still juggling a double life, while I can. Traveling for work is a blessing and a curse. It’s fun and exhausting, stressful and a relief in its own way.

Los Angeles might be the exact opposite of where I live. It’s consistently warm, always noisy, and full of traffic. The strangest part about travel is all the time I have (outside of work) that I’d normally spend tending to the dogs. It’s weird to have no living things rely on me, except maybe a drunk coworker.

I always come back to how grateful I am to have my family to watch the dogs while I’m flying all over the place. Realistically, though, it’s a burden I can't put on them forever. I need to embrace these brief travel opportunities. I’ll be leaving the eastern timezone one last time next month, for my friend’s wedding in Seattle. After that, I’m staying as put as possible until work pries me away again.

Looking ahead, I see temperatures dipping into the 30’s in the extended forecast. I’ve got wood stacked in the garage and the fall furnace checks completed. The propane tanks have been filled. My home trails have been (mostly) cleared. I’ve got my sights set on pups to add to the team (yes, plural—more on that later), new trails to train on, and races to enter. I’ve got the snowmobile ready to pack snow and keep the team moving.

I’ve got big plans. I’m ready.

Descending into Autumn

July is behind us, along with the peak of the summer’s heat. We’re on the descent now, trending downward into the cooler days of autumn. I feel it, the dogs feel it, and the energy build up is palpable. The dogs have been less satisfied to sunbath and lounge. The dog-den couch has suffered several de-stuffings and re-stuffings as a result.

Last weekend, I managed to coordinate a mini-getaway with friends. I’m grateful to be back on the east coast, where I can drive my dogs down to Jersey if I need to travel, but spending just a night away is harder to plan. I don’t have anyone local I trust to watch the dogs. Thankfully, my parents like visiting (and escaping the NJ 90°F heat) and agreed to dog-sit up here for me. I was able to venture east for the first overnight camping trip I’ve had in a long awhile.

Before heading out to camp, I was feeling particularly guilty. I’d be missing the first 50°F morning of the season. (The general rule for mushing is “below 50°F and the temperature plus humidity should not exceed 100”) As I was preparing for my parents’ arrival, a cold front swept through, bringing with it a chilly wind and cold drizzle. It was still too warm for our typical fall training, but a quick 1/2 mile jaunt around the trails I’ve been mowing wouldn’t hurt.

The dogs were ecstatic, as they tend to be when they see the harnesses come out. They were so happy to lope around the property, winding through the wildflowers and grass three times their height. The mowed trails are slightly different from what we ran last season and you could see the excitement in their body language. By the end of the run, the older dogs were satisfied. The younger dogs would’ve happily kept going, but I wouldn’t risk them overheating. More soon, babes.

As summer inches into fall, there will be more travel—a bachelorette in Texas, a wedding in Washington, and visits to New Jersey to see old friends. In the meantime, I’ve prepped my mountain bike for bikejoring runs in the mornings and evenings. I plan to take each dog out, solo and in pairs, to help reinforce commands and get them ready for the season ahead. Laika is nearly 7-months-old, and I’ll start her off with some easy canicross runs in the adjustable puppy x-back harness before trying her out on a small team.

Late summer feels like being a kid on Christmas Eve. Mushing season is Christmas morning.

Traditions

I’ve always loved traditions. I stayed in central New Jersey for most of my life, not because I loved the area, but I loved the people and the gatherings we created. I especially loved hosting—whether it’s just one friend spending the night or 70 people stuffed in my basement apartment exchanging gag gifts around a skinny Christmas tree.

When I moved to California and, eventually, to NY state, my thought was that I’d go back “home” to keep my traditions going. I could stay at my parent’s for Labor Day and for Christmas Eve Eve and continue hosting the parties I’ve been having for decades. The first Labor Day back east was easy enough, since I was living in my parents’ garage while house-hunting. (I did have to temporarily deflate my bed so we could have the party.) Christmas Eve Eve (a party I’ve had since 2004) was more difficult. I was moved in upstate and had to rely on the kindness of my sister and her then-boyfriend (now fiancé!) to let me use their space, where I used to live and host. It worked out in the end, but it added logistical pressure to the holiday season, which I just wanted to enjoy.

This year, I have a bachelorette trip to Austin on Labor Day weekend. For the first time in maybe my entire life, there won’t be a party at my childhood home. Well, there might be, but not to its usual scale. I don’t expect to hold my Christmas Eve Eve party, either. It stings to skip or end these traditions, but it’s time to close that chapter and begin a new one.

The seasons here are amplified. Winter is about moving snow, stoking fires, and mushing. This leaves little time or energy to plan parties. It also makes it a lot harder for friends to get here safely. Spring is wet, wet, and more wet. The snow melts, the ground thaws, and the rain doesn’t stop. Black flies appear in swarms. I’ve learned that it’s hardly a time I want to be here, let alone have guests suffer through it.

That leaves summer and fall, the seasons far less brutal and soggy. For the most part, summer has been sunny and mild. The black flies disappeared as suddenly as they arrived. Daytime hits between 70°F and 80°F, and the nights sink back to 60°F, keeping the house cool without air conditioning. I hosted my “local” friends to ring in the solstice. None of them actually live that close, but they’re not 300 miles away, and that’s important. It felt like a very real victory to sit around a fire with people I didn’t know a year ago, in a place I didn’t own a year ago.

The Fourth of July fell on a Thursday this year, and a few friends (old and new) managed to take an extra-long weekend to visit. This holiday has never been one of my traditions, but given the opportunity, it might become one. As luck should have it, the mild temperatures skipped town and we had our first 90°F day. We managed to get by with cold drinks, dips in Lake Ontario, and a garden hose. We even caught some fireworks down in Syracuse.

Another set of traditions has emerged out of almost all my friends’ visits here: diner breakfast at Artie's, followed by flea markets, and ending with hikes at Salmon River Falls. I first visited the falls before my walkthrough of this house, and it may have sealed the deal more than the walkthrough. The falls and the area surrounding them are like an illustration for what each season brings to the north country. When I first saw them in late summer, hints of autumn were already creeping in. In winter, the face of the falls was nearly frozen solid with long tusks of ice shooting down the sides of the gorge. The ground was under a layer of snow and the moisture from the falls made the trails crunchy and slippery. By spring, everything was surging with the thaw and excess rain water. And now, as summer unfolds, lush green has taken over and the hum of bugs echoes the falling water.

So it goes, these cycles, the passing of time. Traditions end and new ones replace them. Relationships fade and appear, almost overnight, like wildflowers. You find a new tribe to combine with the old; the ones who stick around and matter most. It makes a foreign, lonely place finally feel like home.

Wide Open Spaces

The off-season may be a time for the dogs to relax, but the work of a musher is never done. I had a very successful “staycation” last week, which gave me time to work on house and kennel projects. I’m pleased to announce the Blue Eyes and Spitfire play yard is open for zoomies. The dogs haven’t had this much enclosed space to run since our days visiting the Pawling house. 

I’ve spent the past few weeks collecting materials and tools: fencing, posts, stabilizer mix, a post hole digger and driver, a pneumatic staple gun, an air compressor, and so on. My mom and dad came up for a long weekend to help with the initial construction. After mowing down some of the overgrown spots, we got to work digging holes, securing posts, and raising the fence. The project itself was simple enough, but springtime in the north country provides its own challenges. The ground has been fully saturated by all the rain, so a few holes lead to water. And plenty of rocks.

It’s also black fly season. These little black clouds terrorize anything breathing; biting and flying into any exposed orifice. We also had the warmest day of the year (thus far), complete with three thunder storms rolling through. Somehow, we still managed to get everything (mostly) done. 

I had to wait on some more ground stakes before I felt comfortable releasing the dogs into their new space. The fencing is 7 and 1/2 feet tall, but I folded around a foot at the bottom into a 90° angle and drove stakes down to create a dig guard. Just as I was finishing the final few stakes, a deer plowed through a corner of the yard, ripping the fence off the tree it had been stapled to. It flailed around a bit before bouncing out the other side, pulling down a bit more fence as it made its escape. Such is life living in the woods. 

Thankfully, it’s an easy fix to re-staple and tie the fence back to its posts. I also hung plastic newspaper baggies to add visibility for wildlife (750 feet of flags are on their way, for slightly more attractive-looking visibility). I let Dexter and Knox out into the yard first, since they’re (usually) a bit more reserved and easy to wrangle, should they get loose. Once things were going well, I let Denali and Willow out too. 

Something got Knox excited and he went off like a furry torpedo towards the opposite side of the play yard. He has a history of crashing into fencing, and despite the bag, he didn’t have time to slow down and leapt straight into the fence. The fence came down a bit and a post bent (I used two types of posts, and this was the less solid variety), but the collision was so startling, he immediately booked it back into the play yard. I was able to fix the fence within a minute, unbending the post and re-zipping the fencing to the chain link dog yard fence.

Since those two minor mishaps, the fence has been doing its job keeping the dogs inside during supervised playtimes. I’ll continue adding stakes and staples as needed, as I’m sure maintenance on it will be an ongoing process. I’ve got almost a full roll of fencing leftover, so I’ll be able to make repairs, too.

Aside from the play yard project, I’ve made plenty of progress on my off-season To Do list. The dog box has been sanded and repainted, and I now have a set of pool steps to help with training the team to load and unload. My snowmobile has been moved to the barn, ready for next winter, as is my snowblower—with freshly changed oil. I found a local mechanic to swap out the busted wheel on my Arctis Cart; he seems like a great go-to for repairs (which I need… often) and welding. I stacked five more van loads of wood in the garage for next winter. I started a fresh pile of wood for the winter after next. I purchased a weed whacker and got the ride-on mower running. The side garden has been weeded and vegetable seeds have been planted. 

The land has come back to life. It takes work to keep it maintained, but it’s a good, fulfilling kind of work.

Better Here

I turned 32-years-old last week. I had to think about it, for a moment I thought I was 31. I don’t really like birthdays. After 21, the passage of time doesn’t really seem worth celebrating.

Yet here I am, a week later, feeling pretty proud of what I’ve done in these 32 years. Navigating adulthood hasn’t always been easy and I’ve made plenty of mistakes to get here. I took an enormous leap when I moved to California. And another when I gave up and moved back east. Buying this house, hundreds of miles from anyone I knew, was the biggest leap of all.

For the first time in my life, I’ve been making my own decisions. I’m not compromising on the things I’ve wanted to do for so long. I’m not waiting on someone else to do them with me—or worse, for me. I’m not curating my personality, my desires, or my dreams to fit someone else’s narrative. I’m not bending over backwards to accommodate a lifestyle I don’t want. I’m not changing who I am to appear more desirable, to a man or anyone. (My dating record can attest to this and that’s fine with me.)

You might be thinking, “Jess, you moved out on your own seven months ago—why the sudden revelation?”

I feel like I’ve finally reached a turning point since settling in here. There were some really dark days along the way. I questioned if moving out here was the right choice, if I had thrown away something irreplaceable, if I could even do this on my own. But here I am, figuring shit out.

Maybe I needed to survive my first winter. Or maybe I needed time with friends around the new BBQ grill (which I assembled myself).

Or maybe it was just realizing I’m better here. This was where I needed to be.

The Tree Event

I was out in the barn when it happened—BOOM. I peaked outside the door and could see a giant tree had fallen across my driveway. “Shit.” I was preparing to head south for a weekend in New Jersey. In twenty minutes, I would have had the dogs packed into the van and we’d be on our way. Well, that was the plan.

Living alone in the north country often means nothing goes as planned.

Instead of heading south, I checked the damage. The power line was wedged beneath the tree, pulled off one of the poles. The Spectrum line was also down. I went inside and sure enough, the internet and cable were out. Surprisingly, the power was still on, which meant I had a live wire to deal with. OK, so now what?

I called National Grid and they had a maintenance worker out within an hour. He informed me that the tree had fallen “beyond the box”. This meant that it was technically my problem. Genuinely unsure of what to do, I asked if it was at least safe for me to begin working on the tree with my chainsaw. After inquiring about the whereabouts of my husband—hah—he realized my predicament, and offered to help free the wire (the least he could do). Working together, we cut a gap in the tree trunk and passed the wire through so that it was in the air again. He also helped me clear the middle of the tree that was blocking my driveway. A kind gesture despite the mild sexism, exposed butt crack, and accidental flatulence.

I spent another three hours cutting down the remainder of the tree and moving it into a pile. I managed to get the saw blade pinched only once, which required me to then hack through a limb with my axe to relieve the tension on the blade. I almost phoned in help, but unleashed my spinster rage to do the job. The battery on my saw died before I could finish the entire tree, but I did enough to feel accomplished.

Later that night, a Spectrum technician came out to fix the cable wire and get my internet up and running. I was able to get up early the next morning and continue on with my original plans to visit family, despite the brief setback. I’ve since cut the remainder of the tree. Now I just need to rehang the power line, split the wood, and stack it for seasoning.

I guess I can check “cut down tree for future firewood” off the list.