I had a stroke 11 days ago, I am fine, mostly back to normal, but it does make me pause and look at the activities I do that require a lot of physical effort. I am new to strokes, never had one, I only knew one person who had one, so maybe in three months time I will have a different perspective on things.

I am thinking of drastically downsizing my sugar operation, just tapping the trees on my own property, selling my divided pan and float box and base stack and replacing the cinder block evaporator with a barrel evaporator. Besides reducing the workload, I still cannot get out of my mind, how low key my neighbour’s operation was and what their finite goals were.

I would just make syrup for my home use, and my kids and grandkids can enjoy it while they visit.

I will give it a few more weeks before I decide, but I am definitely on the page of just making it a small hobby.

My other major physical activity is all of the cutting down, hauling, splitting and stacking of firewood for home heating purposes. I am considering buying a heat pump, good to -30°C, that should reduce my home wood requirements by 80%.