Up here, as winter approaches, any serious outdoor work had better be done before the first big winter storm, or it may not be done until May.

We had two challenges this week. One of our two wood stoves wasn’t drawing air; every time we lit it, the house would fill with smoke. Several repair people came, and none of them could figure it out.

We also need to get fresh gravel into the barn before the ground freezes. The fresh gravel is softer for the animals to sit on, absorb urine, stay dry, and keep the barn wood from eroding.

We found Josh Harrington, who has been working with wood stoves all of his life, and he came rushing over in his big white truck, climbed up on the roof and saw that the cap on top of the chimney was almost totally clogged, none of the previous wood stove people had bothered to check.

Josh knew about a big storm coming and came over four days ahead of schedule. “I don’t want to leave anybody without a stove in this kind of weather,” he said, “I just couldn’t bear it.”

So we’ve got a new and very good wood stove person.  He asked me if I wanted to come up on the roof and see the clogged cap for myself, but I said no thanks; I trusted him to tell me about it.

Then Vince Vecchione, a proud Jersey guy, came over with his giant truck and dumped a couple of tons of gravel in front of the barn, as he does every autumn.

When he looked at the weather forecast –  the big storm coming tonight, wind, snow up to 18 inches here, he came rushing back with his tractor and spread all the gravel. “I knew if I didn’t get her before the snow, it might be Spring before I could move it.”

I love people like Josh and Vince; they make our lives possible up here. And you never have to prod them to do the right thing.

Our wood stoves are warming up the house – there’s a good chance of power outages, and the stoves will make all the difference if we have no oil heat in a storm – and our barn will be dry, soft, and warm for the animals this winter.

Nothing feels better on a farm than to be ready for winter, and this one is starting with a vengeance. I got my cardiology appointment moved to virtual yesterday and don’t have to drive out in the storm tomorrow morning.

A good day for us. We bought sand, a new shovel, moved the garbage cans closer to the road,  took in anything that might blow – lots of wind coming – and got milk and some food. I’m all set for surgery Monday (more on that later.)