Congrats on the new job. I hope you enjoy it!
Maybe you can talk them into adding a woodgas system. 
Mr.Tom,
I think the other day when we discussed the English language you never mentioned how many meanings a single word can have 
I knew of only one meaning for PUP (baby dog) so I googled it and found:
- a younger man/boy that an older woman is involved with sexually.
- Short for “pickups” in guitar lingo
- someone whose an idle douche bag, who sits around talking horseshit the whole day
- A pup is a gay adolescent or young man
- The definition for beers
- adj. Origin “puppy” another word of saying someone is cute
- Another term commonly used on the eastside of Detroit to refer to a woman’s Tittie’s
- Someone who is constantly following you around.
…and many others.
Sometime it’s better to take a guess. Is it a small (pup) trailer or a two axle “trailer” with steering on the front axel?
Max width is 100 inches here too. Max length is 24m (80 ft), which most trucks+“pup” are. The one in the video was shorter, maybe Norwegian, where max is 18m (60 ft) because they have nothing but serpentine roads. We don’t use many regular trailers here, even though roads are full of forign ones (much cheaper labour down south).
Milling. As soon as it dries up a bit down at my milling site I’ll set up the sawmill. I have couple of orders. I’d be happy to send you a load of 2X2s. I bet Swedish birch would make your Chev burn some rubber 
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JO: My apology for the use of the word “pup”. I did not use the word correctly. Your assumption was exactly correct and a perfect description of what I meant.
Any chance, I could pick the 2x2’s up at your mill? I would love to have a reason to come see your country. I so enjoy the videos of your woodgas drives.TomC
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Not only meanings JO but also pronunciations !
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You’re welcome to visit. That goes for everyone.
No wonder there are misunderstandings around the globe
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Yup no body said English was a simple language just a common one. It amazes me to think a language which comes from a small island nation is the major language around the world. I am impressed with anyone who learns it as a second language because languages are about the hardest thing I have ever tried to learn and I have only ever managed the odd word or two of other languages.
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I took 2 years of Latin in high school and I was surprised how much I learned about language structure and how much Latin helped me with English language structure. Sadly not many high schools teach Latin anymore. It’s a dead language and no one speaks it anymore doesn’t mean it isn’t a valuable learning tool. Even sadder imo, they opt for French. Sorry, mon ami.
Ami is french for friend, how amazing amicus is friend in Latin. Amo is I love in Latin. Which came first? Latin, of course.
French is a Romance language meaning that it is descended primarily from Vulgar Latin. Ergo, learning Latin helps with learning the romance languages as well. America is 26th in the world in education. I’ll bet most Americans would say we’re first. Hmmm?
Pepe
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Hi Jan,
l noticed in the video the roads are rusty red colour. What is that?
Porphyritic rock which is very common in this area.
Are roads made out of it or is this just sand mixed with salt used in winter?
Made out of it. Some roads are red, some black and some granite white. I guess it depends on what rock is avaliable when constructing. The road you saw was black but later patched up with red porphyritic material.
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Kristijan; Did you notice most of the buildings are painted with a red color also?? TomC
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Indeed, but that one JO cleare a while ago.
Its so nice to see different cultures do interasting thigs, so inspirationa!
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Excellent post. It’s disturbing how easily we overlook the talents and potential of the third world, when often we should be the ones humbled by their talents and efforts. Any fool can buy a toaster, or car if money is easy. Making one from raw materials is another dimension. I have seen people in Nicaragua making mufflers, and similar feats elsewhere in Mesoamerica. Truth is the third world has more skill, and more guts than us living inside the corporate propaganda bubble.
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Garry, my intro to people with skills like this was in Nam. These particular 2 guys were furniture makers. To get planks they had a 8’ high kind of bed that supported a log. One guy stood on top and one guy was underneath. They started a 5’ long saw at one end of the log, the one guy walking on top and the other underneath walking the saw down the log to cut off boards. It was amazing to watch and their displayed furniture fitted together top notch. Not a power tool (or power at all for that matter). I started paying attention to the resourcefulness of the villagers around us. My whole take on people and life changed in those 11 months. I’m thankful I was only a surveyor. Whenever I hear someone complain what this or that gadget they don’t have, I shake my head and think, " you have no idea how fortunate you are".
Pepe
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I think about the old timers doing everything by hand every time I work in my barn from the mid 1700s it is amazing how they built things back then. I can almost see the timbers being built on the ground and fitted together. The old axes are around here or where when I was a kid I think they where stolen about 20 years ago but I tried to use them a few times it is alot harder then it looks. I haven’t seen somone saw boards by hand but I have seen the boards and it blows my mind to look at them in the barn with the saw marks on them. You are right that we don’t understand how much we have.
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Railway sleeper making was the main sorce of income in our county after the war. People made them with axes and handsaws described above out of oak and beech, and my father in laws family was the only ones with horses and went house to house collecting them, 2 times per day, then transporting them to nearest railway station 10 miles away.
My hat is off for them. We still have the saw (one man on top, 3 on the bottom), its one of many handpowered tools we have as memorabilia, and older people like to say they are apple cider powered instead of man powered. You had to be a bit intoxicated to eaven start to saw the hard oak
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The old pit saw system. Before the invention of the circular saw mill in the mid 1800’s, all lumber was sawed that way, or in colonial times people aimed to split siding out of high grade timber, it was so much faster. Less refined work was accomplished with hewing axe and splitting, then possibly planing or shaving. It makes timber framing make sense, as that represented far less work with simpler tools. (And in a time when nails and spikes were very expensive hand made and scarce commodities. ) Causes me to respect the amount of physical work our ancestors put into building our world.
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On this episode of “Fix it with Zip Ties”, the car door handle linkage has come apart, and the plastic clips that hold it together are all broken. This means you can’t open the driver’s door from the outside… kind of an important function. Since the parts store has all the wrong size clips, and the dealership is closed until next week (if they even sell it, it would be a $10-15 part), I decided to just zip-tie it. Seems to work as good as the original clip. Check back in a month…
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