Reminds me of the time I helped a mate cut down a huge gum tree in their backyard. Actually, the first set of tree loppers left after the boss broke his leg. The second set of loppers actually felled it. We were left to cut it up into managable sizes...
We tried to burn it, which was a bit silly at over 100ft long. Then we realised we needed a permit to burn off legally, so we threw some spuds into his wife's cake tins so we could officially call it a "BBQ" rather than a "burn off". His wife wasn't happy when we melted the cake tins....
Long story short, later that winter we put a 2ft cube of gum tree into the fireplace (which was about 2 1/2 ft cube), the grout on the hearth started smoking and the stone hearth became way too hot to even go near. Had to quickly check under the house to check that the wooden structure of the house (under the hearth) wasn't burning... In the end we had to vacate the lounge room where the fireplace was.