Sherry, your post about using wood for heat, made me think. Sometimes there are no good choices for keeping oneself warm. Gas, oil or wood - all have drawbacks. My hope is that some day we'll be able to afford solar panels, and an electric car that gets charged by the solar panels, which would also keep us warm. We can think this way because sunny CA (rainy today) has a benign climate with not a lot of freezing in my neighborhood. Because we live on forested land, with lots of cyclic change and harvestable downed wood, we've depended on our trusty Vermont Castings stove for 33 years, Never has let us down!! Of course, if my husband wasn't in the picture, I'd be more dependent on our electric space heaters. The wood must be cut, split, stacked, carried in to feed the stove, and the ashes cleaned out once or twice a week.
