Lobster Tales, Life Lessons, and Laughter

By Dennis M. Dupuis

If youre looking for a book thatll entertain you (no matter how close you are to exceeding the limits of your medication), this is it. Its fun, and funny, and filled with crazy adventures.

Its about a guy and his boat having way too much fun off the seacoast of New Hampshire and Maine. The guys name is Dennis. The boats name is Aislyn, and she is the place upon which magic becomes possible.

The characters in these stories are real people who are really characters. Join Dennis and his family & friends as they do their worst to do their best. If you think that mistakes and bad decisions make for great stories, then youre in luck. Lobster Tales, Life Lessons, and Laughter is chunkin full of them!

You will

? learn pantloads about lobsters and lobstering.

? pick up some skinny on boat navigation, saltwater fishing, and nautical knot tying.

? gain a few choice recipes for the next time you decide to eat a few bugs. (lobsters)

? build an armory of snappy comebacks, New England style.

? enjoy more than a couple of interesting insights into human nature.

? acquire the scoop on some prime eateries, retailers, and services providers that the locals love to visit.

? have a ball looking at the pictures and using the QRC codes and web-links to visit most of the businesses & attractions mentioned, as well as nautical charts of the waters they played in.

And thats only part of the fun. Scope out the Table of Contents and youll see what were talking about.

Go on, do yourself a favor. Read this book. After all, it comes with the authors personal guarantee:

If you dont laugh out loud at least five times while reading this book,

Ill be go to hell.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Abbott Press
• Release date: Aug 20, 2014
• ISBN: 9781458216748

Dennis M. Dupuis

Dennis M. (Pap) Dupuis is president of the New England chapter of Wing-Nuts Anonymous. When he’s not playing on the Atlantic, he’s working at The University of New Hampshire, where’s he’s been since retiring from the US Army in 1998. He lives in Barrington, New Hampshire with Sandi/The Boss, his wonderful wife. (She told him to say that.)

Book preview

Contents

Illustrations

Dedication & Bestowal

Introduction

A Boat & A Dream

Prepping for the Summer

A New Language

Lobster Trap Components

Key Parts of a Lobster

A Link to Charts of the Waters We Played In

Cleaning Up After Pulling Out & Other Unappealing Acts

Striper Summer (Select Fables and Synopses from Summer #2)

Lobster Laws, Misconceptions & Facts

The BLT? (The Better Lobster Trap?)

Knots That Come in Handy

Lobster, The Other, Other White Meat

Insights and Reflections

Choices? I’m Comin’ Around! (A Poem?)

Delicious Purveyors of Local Dining Delights

Trusted Providers of Gear, Tackle, Supplies and Services

Illustrations

1)   Sunrise over Kittery Point

2)   Aislyn before we owned her

3)   Aislyn sitting in the yard before being repowered

4)   Aislyn packed & ready to hit the road

5)   The basic components of a lobster trap

6)   Parts of a lobster

7)   Our first catch

8)   Jason & Pepe’ with supper in hand

9)   Hauling one in

10)   Captain Apt with a car full of bugs

11)   The Portsmouth tug boats

12)   The 2KR Buoy

13)   Shane banding and Beka keeping the log

14)   Crystal, Shane & Pap with a keeper

15)   Shane, Tim & Pap with a handful of lobsters

16)   Shane with a dangler

17)   Beka chillin’ out at the Isles

18)   Tim’s Cod

19)   Crystal & Shane hamming it up

20)   Dad with a sabiki full of mackerel

21)   Captain Dad

22)   The sun burning thru the fog

23)   Dad & Wayne snackin’

24)   The #3 Green can buoy

25)   The roll-top desk

26)   The cat & the comorant

27)   Gull on a statue

28)   Sunrise at the Whaleback Lighthouse

29)   An Egger chunkin’ full of eggs

30)   A sunrise filled with wings

31)   My Keeper

32)   Louie & the big one that didn’t get away

33)   Shane’s Monstah

34)   Rebeka & Na-Na with Bek’s Monstah

35)   Shane & his 19" striper

36)   Uncle Jason’s winning catch of the day

37)   The grandkids & their cool hats

38)   Rebeka & her squid

39)   Pepe’ & Shane

40)   Eddie painting buoys

41)   Louie sending smoke signals

42)   Trap morphing back to nature

43)   The Ninja Lobster

44)   A two-parlor trap

45)   A traditional trap with a Knight’s Hoop gate

46)   Net head BLT with a Hoop Gate

47)   The BLT with a metal head

48-50) The Cleat Hitch knot

51-53) The Clove Hitch knot

54-57) The Grinner knot

58-63) The Monkey Fist knot

64) Beka doing nothing/everything

Dedication

To my family & friends who spent time on the water with me, thank you for your smiles, insights, and joy, they will be remembered and treasured the rest of my life. To Rick Apt who started this whole endeavor and without whom I would not have such a fine boat on which to play. Thanks Rick. To Louie Hardy for the many hours spent working on Aislyn with me laughing & cursing together while getting it done. Thanks Lou.

And beyond all measure, to my life-long friend and partner, Sandi, who is and always has been the compass in my life, and whose patience with me is worthy of sainthood. Thanks Kit. I love you, always & all ways.

D’

Bestowal

To Rebeka Barker, Shane Barker, Theodore Dupuis, and Abigail Dupuis, I bestow these stories to each of you. You four are the reason that I kept banging away at this book when I really wanted to go out and play. The sayings and phrases you read on these pages are ones that our relatives & my friends use while having fun with each other and I wanted to make sure that you have them as you go forward with your lives. I hope they come in handy at some point, help you to keep your perspective when things get heavy, and make you smile when someone around you does something numb and you get to use one first-hand. Have fun with them & know that Na-Na & I love you.

Pap

P.S. DON’T use any foul language you might find in this book. We curse for effect, not as a matter-of-course, nor from a lack of discipline or appropriate words as some people do. As I’ve told you before and will tell you again, "Any idiot can curse. It doesn’t require any education or special knowledge. In fact, it takes more brains and control not to curse. Be smart and practice not cursing, you’ll be glad you did and so will the people around you." Love you.

Papster

P.P.S. I said I bestow these stories to you Shane, not the royalties from them. That goes for you other three too. You can split the proceeds the next time I play cribbage with Nannie!

Pappy

Blessings Noted

This book would not be the wonderful product that you are holding in your hands if not for the love of my father and mother: Joseph (GI Joe/Pepe’) and Elaine (Nannie) Dupuis. Dad received a present my Mom sent him from heaven that she mailed eleven years ago. He, and in so doing, she, backed me in bringing this book to publication with this gift. Thanks Dad, and the Spirit of Mom. You keep me believing.

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Sunrise over Kittery Point

Many men go fishing all of their lives

without knowing that it is not fish they are after.

Henry David Thoreau

Introduction

Just so’s you know… Some folks call me Dennis, some of my favorite folks call me Pap, and the list of other labels and expletives that have been used to get my attention or describe me to others is probably endless. The chronicles captured on these pages began as entries in a boating log book that were recorded so I could learn about lobster fishing. I’d never fished for lobster before and figured I’d give it a go, not as a living, just as something fun to do with my family & friends. To get started, I searched for a How-To book on lobster fishing and couldn’t find one. Are you shipping me? How could there not be a book on how to do this? I could find & watch some videos of other people doing it, but for the life of me I couldn’t find a book, nor could my co-captain, Rick Apt, a learned and well-versed navigator of all places and he’s an experienced traveler of the world wide web. The contents of this book began with my jotting down basic data about our lobstering endeavors, was gradually expanded to include some lessons learned while doing so, and ultimately led to the addition of some anecdotal entries about the trips. As my first summer came to a close and I was reading the log book entries I began laughing out loud and decided to try to capture the fun times as a series of short stories (anecdotes) that all connect with each other through me, and then give them to those who shared the fun with me on the water. I’m not a writer. I’ve never written a book, nor have I studied how to do so. I am, however, a story teller and an avid observer of life and people, so I decided to stick with the horse I rode in on and apply these skills to writing this book. I’ve tried to mimic the style I use when telling a story around a campfire, focusing on relating the story so the listeners are brought into the adventure and experience the events with me on some level. So, pull up a log, I’ve got a few stories to share with you.

Before we get started, I need to bring you around the fire with me so you can hear me speaking. I don’t have any experience doing this on paper, but I’m going to give it a shot. Janet Harris is a wonderful woman who works with me at UNH and the amazing editor of this book. Thank you Janet, you are the punctuation guru and I am not worthy. (I’m bowing as I type this) However; because I might have missed a punctuation error or two that she found and I didn’t correct, I’m going to tell you the same thing I told her (listen up, this is where I attempt to bring you round the fire, it’s important) When you come upon a punctuation mark in this book that is either a comma, semi-colon; period. question mark? exclamation point! or a colon: pause. Seriously, just pause. If you do this, you will be reading in the rhythm that it was spoken aloud or in my head as I wrote it. No matter what the punctuation, pause. Everything else will fall into place. Simple right? Have fun.

The photos I’ve shared on these pages are often less than the best in quality. Please understand that I had no intention of writing this book as the adventures you’ll read about were unfolding. The pictures were taken with whatever camera was available at the time, which was often a component of a cell phone of less than stellar quality. Mostly we just wanted a picture to send to family & friends as part of a text message. Had I known, I’d of kept a really good camera handy, but I didn’t, so they are as they are. The resolution may suck, but the smiles and fun captured are genuine & clear.

Disclaimer: I ventured out aboard Aislyn 43 times during the first summer I lobstered. Most times I was accompanied by friends or family, all of whom seemed normal when I first met them. Throughout my life as an educator and active participant in many adventures, I’ve come to understand that there are basically three types of people in this world: Those who learn by reading; Those who learn by watching; and Those who have to stick their tongue on the frozen metal pole and find out for themselves. As you’ll soon see, I spent the two summers in this book with each of these types of people, and freely admit that I am, and will continue to be, all three depending on mood and circumstances. It keeps my life more interesting. What’s your excuse? The folks that you’ll meet are my family and friends and they have a knack for saying the damnedest things at the perfect moments. The names of these people, for the most part, have not been changed to protect the innocent, because there weren’t any. The recounting of these days is based on my recollections and experiences, from my point of view, and with my insights and sense of humor. Everything in this book is true. Others’ memories of these days may be different than mine, but surely you understand that I can’t be held accountable for their memory lapses, inattentiveness to the details, lack of perception, or skewed remembrance of events. In all fairness, I must also share with you one of my favorite fishing quotes passed down by my good friend Fred (Big Fella) Apt to his son Rick who has tossed it my way more than once, "All fisherman are liars, except you and me, and I’m not so sure about you." You’ll do well to remember this if you intend to read any further. That, and the fact that everyone mentioned in this book as having joined me aboard Aislyn is a fisherman or woman with the exception of Capt. Apt’s bride, Louise.

Serious Disclaimer: Throughout this book you will encounter a plethora (yes, plethora) of sayings, phrases, similes & metaphors. Many of them are my creations, but most of them are one’s my friends and family use in their day-to-day dealings with other human beings and the world at large. I don’t know who originally said many of them, I only know that we use them often enough in our communications to have them become familiar and feel like ours. I mean no disrespect to the originators of these pearls, nor is it my intention to infringe on any ownership claims. I’ve cited the authors of those I could find, and it is my sincere hope that those who I’m not privy to will view my/our use of their creations as the sincerest form of flattery: we’re using their words still today and spreading them for future generations to enjoy, and employ.

Not-So-Serious Disclaimer: Just to be on the safe-side and cover ALL of the bases:

Once upon a time…

A Boat & A Dream

Life is too short to own an ugly boat…

A couple of winters ago, one of my best friends, Rick Apt, and I bought the shell of a lobster boat together. God bless us if it wasn’t one that Rick had found on Craig’s List that was being sold by a lobsterman who fit the fisherman profile provided under Disclaimer. The boat is female, you can tell this by the wonderful lines and shape of her body. Her front end (bow) is a pleasure to look at and she has a wide bottom that makes her hold on to the surface of the water like a true lover. She’s a 21 foot Pointer born in Yarmouth, Maine around 1985. We first set eyes on her as she sat in this lobsterman’s yard, knee deep in snow, and it truly was love at first sight. After a bit of haggling, we pulled her home and shared one of the two happiest days in a boat owners’ life: the day he buys a new boat! (the second being the day he sells said boat.) During this first trip we discovered that our new boat’s trailer was less than one step away from the scrap metal pile and needed to be replaced, immediately. It took all of the money we received from the sale of our last boat, motor and trailer, plus an additional $300, just to cover the price of a new trailer worthy of carrying her. Technically, my Dad (Joe/Pepe’) is also a co-owner in this venture since he owned a third of the previous boat along with Rick & I. So, as we like to kid him on occasion, Dad owns about a third of the trailer that now carries the boat twice a year between her winter and summer homes. Because of this, he, too, is called Captain with all the high honors and respect that accompany the position, assuming he’s at the helm, otherwise, he’s fair game just like the rest of us.

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Aislyn before we owned her.

We named her Aislyn. Rick came up with this name after doing a little research, something he is extremely good at. He’d learned that the name Aislyn meant Dream or Vision and that it was associated with the water. How perfect is that? She was the culmination of our dreams: to own a boat to fish from and enjoy on the ocean. The decision to name her Aislyn was unanimous and well received by all who asked about the unique name I’d painted on her stern. That is, until my lovely bride of 37 years (Mrs. Dupuis/Sandi/Na-Na/The Boss) sat staring out of our living room window at Aislyn’s painted stern one evening, obviously deep in thought after having received this explanation, and asked, "If Aislyn means a dream, and she’s associated with water, does that make her a wet dream?" It’s one of the reasons I am still with the woman, she keeps me on my toes, and humble. Being a guy, I liked the idea that Aislyn was a wet dream, so did Rick, and so she is to this day. Shane & Theo, ask your fathers why this might be funny, they’ll explain it all to you.

2AislynStern.jpg

Aislyn sitting in the yard before being repowered.

Aislyn’s summer digs. Early during our ownership of Aislyn we came to know that even with the very best trailer made, we were not going to haul this boat to & from the water each time we wanted to go out. We’d done this with our previous boat, a cute little thing that was all of 16 feet long, including the motor, and whose weight wasn’t even a nuisance when it came to trailering and un-trailering. Aislyn was not such a boat. She was much longer than our trucks, wider than our trucks, and heavier than anything else we’d ever pulled with our trucks. The bottom line was, this girl required a summer home, as some women do. This temporary home needed to be a place close to her playground, where those who loved her could board her with impunity, care for her with due diligence, and enjoy her company without much ado. There’s that, plus it needed to fit into our budget; no easy task. Fortunately, I am retired from the military and, as such, have the privilege of being able to rent a slip at the Portsmouth Naval Ship Yard for about half the cost of one anywhere else in the immediate seacoast. And so we did. We’d keep her in the Sound Basin Marina, Pier A, slip #25, sheltered from the brunt of most weather that she might be subjected to and about a 50 minute ride from the house. How sweet is that? There are a few distinct advantages to slipping the boat at the Navy Yard: First, the security is far beyond any expectations you’d have anywhere else. (Can you say video monitored & automatic weapons enforced?) Second, location, location, location. Two hundred yards from the dock you either break left and are at the mouth of the Piscataqua River in 5 minutes, entering the ocean by Fort Constitution, or break right and head up the Piscataqua River all the way to Great Bay & beyond. One of the advantages of renting a slip, any slip, anywhere, was being able to step aboard, fire up the motor, & head out for fun. Equally advantageous and much appreciated in Aislyn’s case was only having to carry her to & over the threshold of land & water twice each year: once to the boat ramp on the Navy Yard in the spring, and once from it in the fall. Personally, doing this makes me about as nervous as a tom cat in a room full of rocking chairs, so this arrangement was, and has continued to be, a blessing to all parties involved.

Prepping for the Summer

We’d already accomplished much work during our first two summers with Aislyn. I’d replaced every wire on the boat and added a few blue deck lights under the gunwales (pronounced gunnels) from bow to stern, modified and fiber-glassed the deck, repaired the hull exterior, added a 35 gallon fuel tank underneath the center console, wired & installed all of the necessary electronics, and mounted a T-Top. Rick assisted and spent hours patching the 186 holes in the center console where stuff had been moved, removed, and replaced by lobstermen drilling another hole & adding another screw when something worked loose or needed replacing. 186! Must’ve been busy men cuz repair time was obviously as scarce as mascara at an Amish convention. The 125hp Mercury Force motor (circa 1985) that had carried us thru our first summer of sea trials had left us tied to the dock during the second. She was old and it was just her time to go. We’d gladly sold it for $34 to the scrap metal dealer last year and cut our losses. After much researching, planning, talking to dealers, and saving, we were finally at a point where the wet part of our dreams could be realized. (sorry) So the following fall we stripped everything but the center console from the deck of the boat in preparation for the repowering of Aislyn with the motor of our dreams; an Evinrude® 75hp E-TEC™ Saltwater motor. Dover Marine mounted our new motor, connected it to a nicely matched, state-of-the-art hydraulic steering rig from BayStar™, (yeah baby), plus a BRP™ Binnacle Mount Remote Control and the 35 gallon beast of a gas tank under the center console. This motor mixes its own oil into the gas inside the engine, trim-tilts at either the throttle handle or on the motor, and winterizes itself from the center console. Now that is the definition of sweet. To compliment this ensemble, we purchased a propeller from Dover Marine that was built for power, not speed, since our desired outcome was strength in the currents of the Piscataqua, which this prop was tailored to deliver. You might be wondering why we waited so long to purchase this wonder of modern marine propulsion, questioning as to whether we might be numb-er than a couple of pounded thumbs? Well, it’s quite simple, really; the mother of all motors cost more than we had paid for this boat, the Force motor, and the useless trailer combined. For the record, it was worth every penny, and more.

The winter before, I’d come into a bunch of very used traps. I was told I could have them, provided that I removed them from the property before the trash disposal company hauled them off to the dump the following morning. Mrs. Dupuis & I went and pulled them out of 2 feet of snow that evening. Five at a time and 5 trips later we had them stacked behind the garage. (Is this woman a keeper, or what?) Most of them were in really bad shape and rusted to the point of being dangerous. So I spent the better part of that winter learning about the makings of a lobster trap as I cannibalized and reassembled the 25 traps into 9 useable ones. It was the perfect way to learn my way around a trap, gave me the opportunity to personalize them a bit with a Monkey’s Fist knot or two, and bring them down to a size that was manageable for me to haul up & into the boat by hand. The original traps were 4 footers with two parlors and 5 cement bricks to weigh them down, sarcastically referred to as chiropractic specials by New England lobstermen who pull their traps by hand. I took this to be a warning and heeded it by cutting these 4 footers down to 3 footers consisting of a kitchen with one parlor and decreasing the number of bricks to 3 total. (mo’ betta for my back) *Have a peek at the illustration titled Lobster Trap Components for relevant visuals. Bait rods in the kitchens were removed and replaced with cleats made for tying-in bait bags. Bait rods are sharp spikes placed in the kitchen of a trap. Whole fish/fish carcasses are impaled on the spike to prevent lobsters from turning the bait into a take-out dining experience. My removing the rods insured that no sharp spikes awaited my arms when I reached into the traps, and more importantly, none awaited the hands and arms of those who would be learning and enjoying the experience with me. Runners were trimmed to fit, heads were replaced or repaired, and any bare metal was painted with Liquid Tape purchased at Lowe’s, a type of rubber paint that seals & protects. Each buoy was painted with my registered colors & pattern, assembled, (there are four components to a buoy, who knew?) and tied to a trap using 60-68 feet of line known as Trap Warp. Lastly, I carved my name into one of the runners on each of the traps and into each of the buoys in order to comply with the laws of the state of NH.

Hours and hours of prep work were invested in getting Aislyn ready to splash come June the following summer. To begin with, her entire hull below water level was sanded and painted with copper-based anti-fouling paint I’d picked up from Dover Marine to prevent sea algae, barnacles, mussels, and other ocean life from attaching itself to Aislyn’s hull. This paint is a true experience to apply as it has the consistency of maple syrup and is sticky enough to bond frogs to lily pads. This makes clean-up a nightmare and removing it from your hair involves extra strength paint thinner and much colorful language. I discovered this the day I was rolling a coat onto Aislyn’s bottom, lying on my back underneath her, wearing a brand new Lowe’s hat belonging to Mrs. Dupuis that she’d proudly worn home the day before. I’ve painted enough to know that a hat is always a good idea when painting above your head. Halfway thru the job the hat slipped off during a particularly long roll. I reached back, felt the hat brim on the ground behind my head, and pulled it back into place. It didn’t take long for the cool sensation on the back of my head to register in my brain and result in the rapid removal of the hat. A hand to the back of my head confirmed that the cool sensation was the result of an application of anti-fouling paint courtesy of my hat, ’er, The Boss’ hat. Apparently it had fallen directly into the paint tray above me as I shimmied beneath the boat while painting. For a full 30 seconds it was like a shouting match in a sauna below Aislyn; plenty of noise, heat and steam. The result wasn’t pretty, the clean-up was about on par with removing pine pitch from your forearm, and the hat, to this day, hangs from a rafter in the garage as a reminder to keep the damn paint tray in sight at all times while painting. That was the last hat of Mrs. Dupuis’ that I’ve borrowed, having witnessed The Boss perform the largest eye-roll I have ever seen anyone do when she saw the hat & the back of my head. Honestly, I thought she was going to go over backwards with that sucker.

After picking up where I’d left off with the hull, hat & head painting, I turned to sanding the entire deck surface and painting it with some non-skid deck paint I’d purchased from Dover Marine that contains sand. This paint is much more user-friendly and being able to look down at the paint tray and surface being painted was much more to my liking. These projects were followed by the refitting of all the lines (ropes on a boat are called lines, a fact that Captain Apt will call you on tirelessly if you should show such disregard for appropriate nautical terminology in his presence) with a new knot that I’d discovered: the Grinner. This knot rapidly became a favorite and was applied to all the fenders, trap warps, buoys, tie downs, and anything else I could use it on. (I said it was my favorite, didn’t I?) I’ve included it in the chapter titled Knots that come in handy later in this book. Painting & knot tying were followed by a complete rewiring of the entire electrical panel and mounting of a couple of spot lights onto the front of the T-top support poles for night navigation. A new live-well pump and fuel dipstick/gauge (technically referred to as a sending unit) were installed, along with some extra lights inside the center console and seat storage compartments. Lastly, our newly purchased davit and snatch-block pulley were mounted on the starboard gunwale in preparation for pulling my lobster traps from the depths of the icy Atlantic. (Danged if I ain’t feeling salty just writing about it.)

By mid-May this had all been accomplished. Other essentials had also been checked off of what seemed to be a never-ending To-Do list. I’d sent in my license application to the state of New Hampshire and the order form to receive my trap tags to the company that makes them. The cost of a NH resident Recreational Lobster and Crab license was $35 which entitled me to fish up to 5 traps from the day in January that I felt I could stand being in a boat on the Atlantic ocean pulling wet line and seaweed onto me from its depths, until the day in December that I had had enough of doing the same. Many new toys, er, necessary tools were acquired in order to be appropriately outfitted for this new endeavor. Rubber bands called Claw Bands in the color of blue were purchased to secure claws (called banding) along with claw-band pliers to apply the bands. A measuring device to differentiate between lobsters whose carapace is legally long enough to be brought home, called keepers, from those whose carapace is not, called shorts, joined the tool box along with a few pairs of rubber-faced cotton knit gloves to handle the warp, traps, and lobsters safely. Of course, also included were the purchase of new sabiki rigs from Kittery Trading Post to catch mackerel for bait, tackle for flounder, striper & blue fishing, and a new tackle box to stow it all in. (Yes, every piece was an essential purchase, my love.) To all of this was added a new VHF handheld radio for marine communications in case of emergency and 20 gallons of gas to get started. A limited set of tools were assembled and stowed aboard that included some of the basics, plus Duct Tape and WD40. As all men know, if it doesn’t move and it’s supposed to, use the WD40. If it does move and it’s not supposed to, use the Duct Tape. Lastly, my favorite son Jason & his wife Karin had bought me a pair of Grunden rubber coveralls from New England Marine, bright orange and tough as woodpecker lips, to protect me from all the sea stuff that comes over the gunwales with the buoy, warp & trap. You see, Jason had some experience at this business from his days spent afloat on the waters of Maine with his best friend Seth, along with a few years under his belt as an employee of Kittery Trading Post. Little did I fully appreciate this gift and foresight until my summer began to unfold. Yep, tell your friends if you’d like, I wear rubber pants and am damn proud of it! Thanks J’, again & again.

We made plans to splash Aislyn on Saturday, June 9th, so on Friday, June 8th, I found myself in the backyard with a pile of 10, sixteen inch chunks of freezer-burned salmon, a stack of 9 inch long nylon-mesh bait bags, and the need to fit the former into the latter. I tried cutting the frosted fish with a hacksaw. Not happening. I tried using a wood saw. Nope. Maybe my reciprocating saw? Better, but I was in danger of losing the fillings in my teeth from all the vibration. Plus, trying to hold on to