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Zip Line

Up in the woods where we were at, you are not allowed to cut any trees down but anything already lying on the ground is fair game. Fred and I use his quad to drag down a couple of trees that have been blown down by the winter winds. We slab out flat cuts on opposite sides of the trunks and then make sloping cuts on either end, so that one can drive up onto the trunks after they are placed across the washed out area of the bridge. Before I get to work with the saw, I don some protective gear. There is some small amount of ridicule tossed up toward me from the creek area concerning the protective gear and the possibility of me being a noob with a saw. It doesn't take all that long to cut down the trunks, pull out a Lewis Winch, pull the logs into place, toss a couple of spikes into them to hold them in place, and even notch in a couple of braces down below. At first, while the keystone cops try to recover the submersible quad from the depths, there isn't a whole lot of interest in our bridge building efforts. Soon though, interest reaches a fever pitch. Old Fred has some reservations about driving his truck across the new bridge span which is only around 15 feet or so. "Don't worry, it's Jim Built" I smile to Fred. A couple of hours has passed by now and the group down below is cold, wet, and tired. They have managed to drag the machine up right and to this side of the creek. Jaws drop as I quickly fire up my rig and pretty unceremoniously drive right across the bridge to the other side while old Fred watches the wheels to keep them centered on the logs. Old Fred follows. He gets out on the other side and walks back to where I'm standing with my hands on my hips, looking down at the creek. "Do you make this stuff up as you go along or do you actually plan it this way"? asks Fred. "You doubted my engineering prowess, I'm upset" I say to Fred. "Not any more" says Fred. "Any moment now" I say back to Fred and point my left thumb toward the creek. "How bout you blankers gettin down here and helpin us get this blankin blanker blanker out of the water". "Ah, there it is" I say to Fred. "Well, you'll have to ask nicer than that" I say toward the creek. "Would you blanken blanker blankers blanken please get your blanken blanks down here and" "You're mother know that you talk like that"? I interupt. "Let us grab our insulated waders from the camper and we'll be right down" I smile. The cold wet tired group looks at each other with a stupid look. We come back, don the waders and nail a red dixie cup to the bridge. the cup has "pay toll here" writtin on it with a sharpie pen. "That's a nice touch don't you agree"? I ask Fred. "You might be pushing it" he smiles back.
 
Old Fred nudges past the group which looks pale and bluish and hooks the end of the winch cable to the rack on the front of the quad. "Yeah buddy" yells Fred, "This water is cold". I hook a chain around a nearby tree and then to the winch. I fire up the winch, release the brake and pull the quad right up the steep bank faster than you could say 'busted the heck outa my brand new truck's grill, and lower valence panel, and bumper, and then got froze and all scuffed up trying to rescue my fancy quad, all the while, some guy just built a bridge and pulled said quad right up to safety like it was nothing'. Feeling rather smug with myself, and still completely dry, I might add, I offered up the usual little epitaph, "May I offer a suggestion?". I continued on with my 'Rocky Balboa' voice impression, "If youse fellas drain all a da vital fluids real quick like, pull da plugs, flush some diesel through de engine, dry out duh tank and carb and stuff, she might just fire up you know". "You sure are lucky that this is fresh water and not salt", I added. Mr fancy's eyes were all red and peevish as they narrowed onto me. "Look" I say to Fred, "I'm not even wet". I detect some bad words under the breath from the others about. "Let's drive up and I'll show you around the camp" says Fred. I shoot a sultry look and wink at mr fancy and remark " Don't stay out too long Honey, grab a quart of milk from the corner store on your way home, and we'll leave the porch light on for you". I can feel eyeballs burning little holes on my back as I walk briskly to the truck and drive off after Fred up the trail. I offer up a wave out of the drivers side window as I leave. I see one guy offer up a kind of wave back.
 
So up the 'road' (about fifteen thousand feet or so) we round a bend and here is this little lake. There is a nice clearing with all of these tents, the ever present blue tarp, some rather fashionable camo tarps, and some screw together structures. Old Fred parks me next to his spot. There are little Christmas lights adorned to the tents and buildings and trucks and stuff. There is a big screen tv suspended between two pine trees with some rows of logs laid out in front of it like a primative theater (big on the primate here). Several of the tents are in the 12x24 size, by the looks of them. There is a pop up canopy with a wood fired hot tub in it. There is a shower tent complete with hot water. A ways out into the woods, the soft hum of generators can be heard. It's quite the little spot. I roll out the the awnings on my camper, throw down some astro turf, unfold a chair (with drinkholders), fire up the central heat and water heater. By this time the gang has found their way across the bridge and it sounds like an armoured division advancing through a bamboo forest as they pull in to their respective spots. They unload fp's quad from his truck and start working on it. I strap on my old six shooter, low down (might be real bears about). I walk over to supervise the drying out phase. "What the blank is that"? asks mr fp snottily. He looks around at the group with a sneer. "It's a gun" I say. "Think you can hit anything with it"? he sneers. I pull a business card from my wallet and hand it to him. "Here, walk down there by that big stump, hold this up right between your eyes, and I'll show ya" I say. I smile. Mr fp takes a step towards the stump but stops and stiffens up a bit. He turns around, tears up my business card and flicks it onto the ground. He turns his back without a word and begins work on his waterlogged machine. I shrug my shoulders. "Well Fredward" I say, "Let us produce some firewood. I don't want to be cold this evening". We take his quads and cruize out into the woods and return with logs dragging behind. We have a pretty nice sized cold deck by lunch time.
 
Cold deck is a term for the stack of logs like waiting for transport. In this case we cut them into lengths for firewood. I brought up an enclosed trailer with a hydraulic wood splitter in it. After we haul in some nice logs and stack them into a pile, Frederick and I cut them into lengths and then split them up with the splitter. I brought up some of my personal saws, among them is the fabled 'Fear no Tree' saw. We get into 'the zone' while Fred and I are cutting and splitting. The big bore saw throws out a rooster tail of long shavings and eats wood, slicing through it like butter. Freds 045 Sthil (really an 056 in sheeps clothing) holds it's own while cutting. Before long, mr fp staggers over with his Husky saw and gets ready to saw some wood from our pile. Fred and I hold up for a break as we are both sweating from the exertion. True to his nature and possibly multiplied by a beer or two, mr fp announces rather loudly and obnoxiously that he is going to show all present how to cut some wood. Mr fp comments that all of the safety equipment that I have on is for people who don't know what they are doing and old men. I might mention right here that I don't particularly care for mr fancy pants and haven't for sometime now. In point of fact, I have been weighing the possibility of having a medium sized scrap with him and have had more than one impulse to insert a sized 12 boot sideways in his posterior area. My impulses grow in direct proportion to the amount of alcohol that he intakes as the more he drinks, the more belligerent and loud he becomes. Mrs Jim doesn't like it when I wrestle around and generally dissapproves of that kind of behaviour so I generally stay away from it but Mrs Jim is not along on this trip.
 
"I hope you cut wood better than you read directions" I needle fp, seeing a chance to build a fire. "What"? says fp. "Actually, if you can saw wood as fast as you blew the grill out of your truck , old Fredrick here may have some competition" I state. The others in camp are taking notice. "If you can drop logs like you dropped yourself into the creek, you might even be able to beat old Fred" I add. There is some definite snickering going on. "I wonder what you're insurance agent is going to say about all of that"? I say as I point at his truck. "Don't worry about it blank" says fp to me. "I sure hope you don't have a big deductible on your policy" I add. fp now tells me what I might do to several different things in several different ways. "I'll have to ask you to refrain from talking that way" I say to fp. "I'll talk anyway I want" says fp to me. "What you gonna do about it"? "You gonna keep running off at the mouth or are you going to show us some cutting"? I ask. "I've heard that these Huk-a varnah saws are kind of high revving" I say, "kind of like their owners" I say almost under my breath. fp drops his saw and clenches his fists. "It's about time somebody put you in your place, old man" fp growls. I step forward. "Well, your right about one thing" I say. "I've got 30 years on you, maybe more". "I've had my back broke once, both arms a couple of different times, numerous fingers, my nose, and one leg". " I been shot once, stabbed twice, and been stitched up more times than your granny's quilt". "But I'll tell you something right here and right now". "On my worst day, I'd beat, the blank, out of you". The temperature has now dropped about 15 degrees in the immediate vicinity.
 
At this point, in Baseball parlance, Big Jim has stepped up to the plate and announced to the stadium that they are going to see a home run to the left field bleachers. I affix a cold hard eye upon mr fp and await the pitch. He stares right back, teeth clenched, his mouth down at each corner in a frown. I smile now, give fp a wink with my left eye and think to myself 'That should just about do the trick'. "There's no fighting here" interupts the ex state trooper member of the camp. he steps in between fp and myself with his back to fp. He is a big man. "Have you read the camp rules"? he asks me, hands on his hips. He just exudes an air of self confidence. "Why no I haven't seen any posted rules or regulations" I say. I shoot a glance at Fred. He is pale and somewhat withdrawn. I furrow my brow at him. He was supposed to step forward and recommend that we settle our feud with a wood cutting contest. The ensuing chill in the air probably froze him in his tracks as it were. That's what he later claimed anyway. The trooper closely watches me look at Fredward. I detect an unmistakable twinkle in troopers eye for an instant as he glances me down and up. "The rules are posted on the outhouse" he points toward the woods. "I would like a chance to read these rules" I speak up. "If I have possibly bent one of these regulations, I should like to offer an apology to all present, all but one" I add. I tilt my head to look around the troopers right shoulder at fp. I can detect heat waves radiating off of fp. Mr trooper steps just to his right so as to block my view. He smiles at me. "You two 'gentlemen', and I use the term loosely here" says the trooper, looking first at me and then over his shoulder to fp, "are going to have to get along or leave". "Let's step back, take a breath of two, shake hands, and put this thing to rest" says trooper. I thrust my hand forward, malice aforethought. A lifetime of arduous work has given me what some might identify as a firm handshake. "What da ya say, pal"? I ask fp. All eyes fall on fp. "Take the mans hand" says trooper to fp.
 
A period of time passes. My hand is extended. I smile like Slick Beasly, the car salesman, looking at a pile of 'c' notes. Well, OK, maybe like the Grinch. Fp finally extends out his hand after Mr Trooper directs him to take my hand or pack up his stuff. I set the hydraulic pressure in my right hand to the pleasantly uncomfortable mode and clamp down. I pull fp closer by a couple of inches. He is somewhat stiff and his boots slide toward me along with the rest of him. He is surprised. I reset the pressure to 'Really'? for a moment and then down to "Holy Blank". Fp now tries to turn up his pressure gauge. Trooper looks from me to fp and back and forth again several times. Fp pulls back now. My smile must be beginning to turn down on each side as I strain the pressure to "You're hurting me, please let me go" mode. I look at Fred and raise my eyebrows and cock my head. His eyes seem to deblur a shade and he finally speaks up. "I have an idea", he says, "let us have a little woodcrafting competition" "Woodcutting competition" I correct Fred as I let go of fp's hand. fp nearly falls backward. Right about here is when I see a little movement in the brush on the side of camp. I am quite surprised to see a really nice buck munching on some flora. I am more surprised to notice that I seem to be the only one that has detected the deer. "Sooo you guys are up here for deer, right"? I ask. They look at me kind of blankly. "Anybody got a deer tag on em"? I ask. They look at me now quizzically blank. "Anybody got a gun" I ask and stick out my left arm, palm up, toward the munching buck. I figure the deer is either blind and deaf or figures that any group that makes so much noise couldn't possibly be hunting. "You shouldn't have any trouble hitting that bad boy from here" I say. I place my hands in my pockets. Fp creeps (big on the 'creep' here) silently over to his tent and comes out with a rifle that looks like it shoots cannon balls with a scope that just might have been pilfered from the local observatory. He jacks a shell into the chamber and brings the rifle up to his shoulder. "Shhh" he says with confidence. "May I make a ..." I begin. "Shut up" whispers fp. He shoots a glance around the group and sights back on the buck. I can tell that he has already got it hung on his den wall, in his mind, and is standing there, pipe in hand, regaling those present with the story of how he bagged it with one clean shot. From my angle, the shot isn't as 'clean' as someone might think it is, but I have been shooshed up by mr fp. I might mention right here that fp's fancy lifted black Dodge truck is sitting in between fp and the deer. Clearly fp has never ever heard to not fire a gun anywhere near, over, under, or around your own vehicle. I look at Fred and move my mouth all the way to the left side of my face and the roll my eyes. I take my hands from my pockets, show my index fingers to Fred and place them into my ears. BAH Whoom goes the rifle. A hole appears simultaneously in the tippy top of the hood of the truck. The deer looks over at us with a disdainful look on his face. True to his nature, fp lights off another round from the shiney polished autoloading wonder. Simultaneously, another hole appears just above the previous one but rips open the sheet metal at the very top of the hood. "Your insurance agent just aint gonna believe this" I say. The second shot plowed into the ground by the big buck and he kind of dematerializes into thin air in about half a micro second. "Dang, missed the shot too" I add. "Oh, wait just a tick" I say, "You missed the buck, but got a Ram instead" "You can mount the hood on the trophy wall at home" I add. Mr fp walks over and surveys the damage. He doesn't look well.
 
:rof::rof:

OK this is ridiculous, unbelievable, you're making this up.

I used to work for a guy, who was such a poor boss, that when I told family and friends what he did that day, they called BS.

I always responded that I was not imaginative enough to make the story up and every word was true. It was also a good thing that I had witnesses to the stupidity that confirmed my stories or no one would ever believe anything I said.

But Jim, mister fp is too unbelievable, if his other friends have any common sense they would run away as fast as they can for self preservation reasons.
 
Kars, it was one of the best meltdowns I have had the luck and pleasure of watching for free. The guy absolutely exists. His friends think he is the greatest thing in the world. They voted and asked me to leave after my trophy ram comments and I was merely warming up (can you imagine). I didn't even get to show him up at wood cutting. I was happy to vacate the area after he shot his truck, twice, it was scary. He is an idiot. They are clearly not my kind of group and suspect that they are going to be on the national news one of these days. Old Fred was pretty bummed out too. So what did your boss do? You know I love a good story. I'm hurt that you think I may have stretched the facts a little, but I'll be OK, it may take some time though. Did you notice how I left his name in lower case letters? So to make a long story short, I packed up quick, said my farewells, but paused at the end of the bridge to pull the timbers out though (heh heh). 86 me from camp, will ya!!! I'm thinkin about going back up there with the 'Bigfoot' suit.
 
Ah, Anotherrunner, you are a man after my own heart. The logs that spanned the washed out part, I unchained and drug down the road a fair piece since I was chapped at being asked to leave. I found a neat spot where the road dropped off quite a ways and rolled the logs off down into the ravine (smile). I should have taken the zip line too, but I figured old Fred might need it to get back across. I am somewhat disappointed that Fred stayed there and didn't even see me off at the bridge. It is my understanding that they all got caught by the forest ranger crossing the creek in their trucks. I can just imagine who's idea that was (he he he haw haw). I suspect a small monetary fee may be associated with this type of infraction. The group might just be a little unhappy with me, I heard rumblings in that direction. I don't think I'm going to be invited back.
 
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