Noodling.

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Been there, done that. Bucket tear in my right knee. Hurts like hell.
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So, now there is yet another victim. I did that last Tuesday after having worked for a week collecting next year's logs for splitting. Funny thing, it wasn't a quick pop or fast pain. It came on later and caught me by surprise. I could hardly drive the truck home. MRI revealed the miniscus tear out and I've been in pain for over a week.

Doc says it may never heal all the way back. It all depends on the severity of the tear out. Prescription pain killers don't work. They block you up (stools and urine). Aleve pills are as good as anything internal. Simple therapy is best for now along with a few prayers. And, keep your chin up. Walk down the stairs backwards with the bad leg first. Walk up with the good leg first. Hold onto the railing tight while you do either. Don't become a couch potato.
 

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In addition to making pieces small enough to lift, I really prefer to noodle the uglies and crotches. Some don’t even mess with the real ugly pieces but they seem to have the most BTUs. Sure you can push them through a splitter but you end up spending a bunch of time to make pieces that don’t stack worth a crap. About the same amount of time with a chainsaw and you have nice easy to stack pieces.
 
I noodled some Beech into 4" slabs to split with the SuperSplit. Hit a large, quick curving grain when splitting, like where the tree flares at the base, the last few inches of the piece. It summersaulted off the wedge in a blink, catching the pad of my thumb as I tried to get away from it. I thought one of the hard noodled edges broke my hand, but just bruised it badly. Lucky it contacted where it did, in the soft muscle, and not any of the other hundred boney spots in the hand or wrist.
 
I noodled some Beech into 4" slabs to split with the SuperSplit. Hit a large, quick curving grain when splitting, like where the tree flares at the base, the last few inches of the piece. It summersaulted off the wedge in a blink, catching the pad of my thumb as I tried to get away from it. I thought one of the hard noodled edges broke my hand, but just bruised it badly. Lucky it contacted where it did, in the soft muscle, and not any of the other hundred boney spots in the hand or wrist.
You walked away from a small miracle. God was with you. I don't think many people understand just how dangerous that firewood processing really is.
 
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