Loggers are Tough guys

[Peter Drouin]

I have a friend that logs for a living, I buy a lot of wood from him . I called him to see if he was on the new track yet, 200 a , has not been logged in the last 100 + years. There's a lot of hemlock on it I need. It; s 1 mile away from me, 8)

So he said no he cut himself with the saw 
So what happen I ask, well the chaps he has worn out, and did not run out to get new ones.
So when he cut himself he had to stop the blood and did that with a snot rag tied around his leg walk out of the woods got in his truck went home.
So I ask didn't you go to the hospital , why he said I can fix it myself, beside there just going to rob me . He said, he clean the cut out good [got the wood and oil out] with peroxide and supper glue it together.
took  two  days off and went and saw his honeys. I think he has 2 or 3 on a string  :D
Going to work tomorrow clean up the landing and move to the new job and buy some new chaps .

[Woodhauler]

When i was 20 or so, i cut my leg above my knee with a chainsaw while cutting pine! Guy driving skidder had a weak stomach! Told him to take me to were our boss was. He was at his mothers house, a lady that in her 80 odd years had seen it all! She told me to drop my pants and then she cleaned it out and took off lose skin and Get this, she stiched it up! Seemed to heal ok! ;D

[Peter Drouin]

She had done that before I bet.
But that is the new England way, do it your self  :D :D :D giddy up

[cutter88]

tough lad.... I had to think about what he said about he hospital robbing him... I forgot u guys have to pay when u go to the hospital are health care is paid for...

[beenthere]

Peter
Not sure the subject line is accurate, as "tough guys" could be changed to something else given the facts... i.e. no chaps and no Dr.
But sure hope he does alright with both new chaps and with no infection. ;)

[Peter Drouin]

beenthere, I think he'll be all right, he's not dumb. And I think he use a brillow pad too :D :D :D

[Kodiakmac]

tough lad.... I had to think about what he said about he hospital robbing him... I forgot u guys have to pay when u go to the hospital are health care is paid for...

You'll want to clarify that.  Paid for by us.  Provincial and federal Income taxes, Harmonized Sales Tax, hidden 'green' taxes, etc., etc. 

Can't figure out why some folks think it's "free".  :-\

[Texas Ranger]

Used to have a cow hand work for me when he wasn't other wise employed.  Ran a pack of dogs for deer and hogs, kept a suture kit with him most of the time to sew up the dogs.  Cleaning a hog and cut his hand.  Wahed it out with drinking water, dumped some medicinal alcohol on it (just happened to have in his truck) and sewed it up.  I convinced him to go get a tetnus and antibiotic shot, which he did with mutch complaining.  Back to work the next day.  No problem, probably the toughest 150 pound fella I ever knew.

[Woodcarver]

A friend of mine tells me a similar story, Texas Ranger. He was hunting with a guide in a remote area in one of the western states.  The guide cut himself while skinning an elk.  He got out a sewing kit, cleaned the cut, disinfected it with a couple of fingrs of whiskey and sutured it.  Told my buddy he hated to waste good whiskey that way  :D.

[cutter88]

tough lad.... I had to think about what he said about he hospital robbing him... I forgot u guys have to pay when u go to the hospital are health care is paid for...

You'll want to clarify that.  Paid for by us.  Provincial and federal Income taxes, Harmonized Sales Tax, hidden 'green' taxes, etc., etc. 

Can't figure out why some folks think it's "free".  :-\


still I would not want it to be like it Is in the US were if u don't have the money ur SOL way may pay in the long run here but at least when we have to go for medical care theres no big bill

[rfm7fxfox]

still I would not want it to be like it Is in the US were if u don't have the money ur SOL way may pay in the long run here but at least when we have to go for medical care theres no big bill

In the US a hospital can not deny you medical care even if you don't have insurance or a penny to your name. They just bill you and you do what you want from there! I don't know what's gonna happen now with this wonderful Obama care crap.

As far as loggers being tough, I've seen my father use super glue and or duct tape for just about every injury he's ever had. I remember when I was younger (I don't remember all the details) he was bucking a tree in the woods (cutting for a forwarder) the tree snapped back hitting his leg, it broke the bone in his lower leg right in half and ripping everything apart causing his leg to just flop around. He dragged himself to the ATV he used to get into the woods, climbed on it and rode out to his pick up ( he was about 5 miles deep in the woods) he got out to his pickup and got in it and started to drive himself to the hospital, the guy he was cutting for saw his leg flop sideways when he got into his pickup and ran over to stop him from driving himself and instead brought my father to the hospital. He now has pins and rods and all kinds of fancy metal in his leg. Only a very short time after this happened he was back in the woods running the forwarder until he was strong enough to chop again. It takes a rare breed to work in the woods and I'd you're not tough you won't make it. Anything can happen and you have to be ready. If he decided to just lay there and wait for someone to come along and see him the outcome could of been a lot worse then some metal in his leg.

Everyone stay safe in the woods!

[Mark K]

 i cut my toes off about 12 years ago on my left foot. Waited for my dad to come back for a hitch and he brought me out. Insisted I take my boot off. He untied it and pulled it off, wasnt pretty. Everything was hanging by tendons and mangled skin. No choice but to go to the hospital. Bill was over 14k. Thank god for insurance

[Onthesauk]

Logger in our neighborhood took off on a one week deer trip by himself, packing in by horse.  First day out got thrown crossing a creek and broke his wrist.  Hunted all week that way, didn't want to waste the hunting time.

[lynde37avery]

I stubbed my toe a couple of days ago and it hurt real bad, and I was all ready milking my pinched finger from a few days before. rough time but I toughed thru with work anyways. it wernt easy but I managed. just hope I don't get a cold anytime soon in this cold weather season, that might be really tough to get thru a whole day of nose blowing.

[Peter Drouin]

I hope you feel better.

[barbender]

I stubbed my toe a couple of days ago and it hurt real bad, and I was all ready milking my pinched finger from a few days before. rough time but I toughed thru with work anyways. it wernt easy but I managed. just hope I don't get a cold anytime soon in this cold weather season, that might be really tough to get thru a whole day of nose blowing.

???

[Kodiakmac]

still I would not want it to be like it Is in the US were if u don't have the money ur SOL way may pay in the long run here but at least when we have to go for medical care theres no big bill

Well, rfm7fxfox stole my thunder with his reply.  The majority of Canadians have this idea planted in their heads that millions of un-insured Yanks are dying in the streets because they lack health insurance.  That's simply propaganda that is spun by our politicians and spread by our gormless media to cover up the increasingly serious problems in our own provincial systems.

Now, I've got a little story to tell that amounts to my take on "Loggers are tough guys".  I look at it a bit differently.  I think it goes more like this: "Logging makes guys tough.  I'll tell you why.

On the 19th of August I crashed my motorcycle (it landed on me) and I ended up in the ICU with a punctured and collapsed lung, 9 broken ribs (4 compound), compound fractures of the clavicle, compound fractures of my scapula, and a traumatic pneumothorax.  Besides all the drains and chest-tubes, etc., I had two surgeries: a 7 inch titanium rod with screws on my clavicle, and a T-shaped titanium plate screwed onto my scapula.

Except for the surgeries, I never lost consciousness. I walked out of the hospital under my own steam 11 days later - and I was back on my old 440 setting chokers as of last week.  I'm not doing it very quickly, and I still don't have much strength in my left arm to haul on the mainline, but I am "back at 'er".

I joke about the fact that it was all those kicks on the butt I got when I was a kid that pulled me through. But I know, and so do my doctors, that I owe my recovery (and possibly survival) to one thing: logging toughened me up (although I didn't feel very tough when that m/c came down on top of me). 

I'm absolutely convinced that all the raps, slaps, bruises, scratches and cuts help us develop a tolerance to pain that serves us pretty well, and we put our muscles and connective tissues to daily tests that most fellows can't imagine. And I think that just being outdoors, making our own decisions and dealing with frustrating set-backs helps us enormously when a positive attitude is needed most.

So, if we are indeed 'tough guys', we can probably thank our chosen trade for that.

[Peter Drouin]

I agree with you 100% Kodiakmac.
My job is moving logs and lumber all day. It will keep a man in shape too. Good luck to all of you and be safe. Now get off your backside and get some wood out  :D :D :D :D :D :D ;D 8)

[furltech]

I usually don't like to brag about it but one time i got my leg chewed off by a rabid crocodile and had to crawl 17 miles through a mosquito infested swamp and sew it back on myself with dental floss .Still walk with a little limp but not bad . :

[barbender]

Was that one of those ornery Canadian Boreal Crocs? KodaikMac, arguing the other side, how much would that accident and time in the hospital have cost you with no government health care?

[Kodiakmac]

Was that one of those ornery Canadian Boreal Crocs? KodaikMac, arguing the other side, how much would that accident and time in the hospital have cost you with no government health care?

Nope. Not a boreal croc.  The moral of my story is: don't pick a fight with an 850 lb. Jap!

I guess my time in hospital would have cost me the same thing if I had no government health care, or, no private health insurance.  But I wouldn't doubt for a minute that the bill would be in excess of $100,000. 

Currently in Ontario, the gov't spends $8481 annually on health care for every man, woman and child in the province.  And that comes from 2 places: (a) private sector pockets, or, (b) borrowing.

I have no complaints about the quality and efficiency of the doctors and nurses, they were fantastic - but when I was in ICU I could see the system falling apart.  A 79 year-old fellow in another bed had suffered a heart attack and waited for over a week for an angiogram.  My second surgery was delayed for days because of "staffing issues" in the OR.  I talked to the surgeon later.  He said that was just Greek for not enough surgeons.

The physio-therapy that I'm taking twice weekly is no longer covered by  OHIP (Ont. Gov. Health coverage), and returns to the ER to have staples removed or for follow-up x-rays result in 5-6 hour wait times.  Only yesterday I heard on the news that several other surgical procedures are no longer going to be covered by our gov't health plan - cataract surgery is one of them,

And it's getting worse and worse in this area of the province. Our ER waiting rooms are filling up with Quebecers, who cross the border into Ontario because wait times in their home province average 17 - 20 hours.  The Canada Health Act says that out-of-province patients can't be treated any differently than residents.

The issue has been polarized (for pure political purposes) on both sides of the US-Canada border into two factions: the evils of privately funded care vs. the evils of public systems.  And that's too bad.  There are pros and cons in both.  Just get a g-d system that works.

A lad on this forum was wondering what the US system was going to be like under Obamacare.  I don't pretend to know the answer.  But I can tell you one thing, you chaps got off to a hell of a handi-capped start.  Your governments hired a Canadian Firm, CGI, to handle all the database and 'puterized stuff.  This is the same company that was hired to build the 'puter systems for our recently-departed gun registry.  A total cock-up with security breaches so wide you could steel info by the barrel full.   That cost us hundreds and hundreds of millions of cost over-runs and extra billing for a system that was an absolute joke.  Then the same company effed up the Ontario E-health 'puter system and scooted off with millions upon millions.

Too bad someone among the thousands and thousands of geniuses in D.C. didn't think about doing a simple Google check on CGI before they were hired.   

[luvmexfood]

I consider myself fairly tough and only take meds or go to the doctor when absolutely no other choice. Got covered in poison ivy and called doc to get some meds called in to pharmacy. Wimped on that one. Can take pain but the torrential itching was to much.

Remember cutting a vine out of the way to get into a tree to limb and buck. Must have slung poison all over me. Sweating at the time and the sweat must have spread the poison over a large part of my body. Eyelids, face and even my business has broken out. Guess while draining some coffee out must have had the poison juice on my hands. Either that or when I came in I took a bath instead of a shower. Just call me scratchy.

[exSW]

Was that one of those ornery Canadian Boreal Crocs? KodaikMac, arguing the other side, how much would that accident and time in the hospital have cost you with no government health care?

Nope. Not a boreal croc.  The moral of my story is: don't pick a fight with an 850 lb. Jap!

I guess my time in hospital would have cost me the same thing if I had no government health care, or, no private health insurance.  But I wouldn't doubt for a minute that the bill would be in excess of $100,000. 

Currently in Ontario, the gov't spends $8481 annually on health care for every man, woman and child in the province.  And that comes from 2 places: (a) private sector pockets, or, (b) borrowing.

I have no complaints about the quality and efficiency of the doctors and nurses, they were fantastic - but when I was in ICU I could see the system falling apart.  A 79 year-old fellow in another bed had suffered a heart attack and waited for over a week for an angiogram.  My second surgery was delayed for days because of "staffing issues" in the OR.  I talked to the surgeon later.  He said that was just Greek for not enough surgeons.

The physio-therapy that I'm taking twice weekly is no longer covered by  OHIP (Ont. Gov. Health coverage), and returns to the ER to have staples removed or for follow-up x-rays result in 5-6 hour wait times.  Only yesterday I heard on the news that several other surgical procedures are no longer going to be covered by our gov't health plan - cataract surgery is one of them,

And it's getting worse and worse in this area of the province. Our ER waiting rooms are filling up with Quebecers, who cross the border into Ontario because wait times in their home province average 17 - 20 hours.  The Canada Health Act says that out-of-province patients can't be treated any differently than residents.

The issue has been polarized (for pure political purposes) on both sides of the US-Canada border into two factions: the evils of privately funded care vs. the evils of public systems.  And that's too bad.  There are pros and cons in both.  Just get a g-d system that works.

A lad on this forum was wondering what the US system was going to be like under Obamacare.  I don't pretend to know the answer.  But I can tell you one thing, you chaps got off to a hell of a handi-capped start.  Your governments hired a Canadian Firm, CGI, to handle all the database and 'puterized stuff.  This is the same company that was hired to build the 'puter systems for our recently-departed gun registry.  A total cock-up with security breaches so wide you could steel info by the barrel full.   That cost us hundreds and hundreds of millions of cost over-runs and extra billing for a system that was an absolute joke.  Then the same company effed up the Ontario E-health 'puter system and scooted off with millions upon millions.

Too bad someone among the thousands and thousands of geniuses in D.C. didn't think about doing a simple Google check on CGI before they were hired.

My old job assignment required I lay over in Cleveland OH,a LOT.The hotel was always full of wealthy Canadiens from right across Lake Erie seeking health care.

[Howdy]

Beings as my wife works for a doctor I hear all kinds of horror stories.  However few come close to the time I got a new pocket knife and saw an opportunity to do some whittling.  I should have known better because I still have the knife I got years ago for my 34 birthday.  It still has blood on it.  Well anyway I got to working on making a block of wood with a loose ball trapped inside, or maybe it was making a chain with several links.  I was having a great time just a stabbing and hacking away when the blade folded across my finger.  A nice sharp blade. One that was long and pointy.  After getting THREE whole stitches I gave up my carving career until the next time.  I didn't even cry too much.  Really, I was tough and manly, a real outdoorsy fella.  I gots a scar and everything. Anyone want some almost new pocketknives?

[loggah]

I never got cut !!!! knock on wood, but i been bent,and twisted a few times, like getting my arm caught up in my Franklin winch driveshaft, and arm wrestling the torque convertor for a hour and 40 minutes ,before a neighbor showed up and shut down my machine. I'm real lucky it had a convertor and wasn't direct drive or i would have no arm or be dead!!!! still got a lot of nerve damage in my left hand and forearm along with frostbite  from my arm being jammed against the skidder frame in 0 degree weather. Don