Wood Stove

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I rebuilt a wood stove I had in storage. The only textual items on the stove is "Made in West Germany". After puzzling about how to repair the broken leg (everything from welding with tungston rod to fabricating a splice), I found a similar replacement foot. It was similar, so I ended up buying two in order to make it look and set right. It was a fun "little" project. It cost me about $150 in materials and probably took me about 8 hours. I am looking forward to getting it fired up at some point. Since it is going back into storage I am wrapping it up with as much rust inhibitor as I can. I bought some VCI paper for the effort.
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Here is a poem, sent to me, worthy of repeating.

"Designed to Fly"

by Ellen Waterston


After ten hours of trying

the instructor undid

my fingers, peeled

them one by one

off the joystick.

"You don't need

to hold the plane

in the air," he advised.

"It's designed to fly.

vA hint of aileron,

a touch of rudder,

is all that is required."


I looked at him

like I'd seen God.

Those props and struts

he mentioned, they too,

I realized, all contrived.

I grew dizzy

from the elevation

from looking so far

down at the surmise:

the airspeed of faith

underlies everything.

Lives are designed

to fly.

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