How Many Puzzles?

During the coldest winter months, Desiree and I typically work on jigsaw puzzles as a way to pass the time. Our preference is for 1,000-piece puzzles. We work sporadically and usually finish a puzzle about two weeks after starting. However, there is an added twist to the process this year. A couple of weeks ago, we installed a wood-burning stove in the corner of the dining room, not far from the table where we assemble our puzzles.

I expect we will be drawn to the heat (and the puzzle by default) on cold winter nights. Our puzzle-building time may be reduced to less than two weeks.

While at the cabin yesterday, I cut and chopped a load of wood to load into my truck. After Desiree took a picture of me and the wood, I asked, “So how many puzzles do you think we can put together while burning this load?”

“Three or four puzzles,” she said after some deliberation.

“I’m thinking four or five,” I said.

All of this is pure guesswork, of course, and I’m not diligent enough to actually track this particular load of wood. Only one thing is certain: I’m going to recognize some of the hard-to-split, knotted chunks when I finally get to feed them to the stove.

The New Wood Stove

Truckload of Wood

—Mitchell Hegman