How to Set an Outhouse on Fire

In attempt, with the new owner of Spotted Bear Ranch, to clean up the grounds out here we have been taking everything that is not going to be used here and has just been sitting in various cabins for the past 3, 5, 10 years and either creating giant burn piles or making trips to the dump. Included in these burn piles are the outhouses that 1) do not get used anymore and 2) are leaning so badly that if you did use it you actually do run the risk of falling in (one of my greatest fears as a child when we would go camping and have nothing to use but outhouses).

Of course, being that we are out in the woods with not much in the way of entertainment (save the fishing and hiking and all that nature crap) we had to find a clever way of creating some sort of exciting explosion in order to burn down the outhouse.

Attempt #1:

We stood the outhouse on top of one of the smaller burn piles, placed fire starter paste around the rims of the toilet seats (it was a double crapper), hung a glass jar full of gasoline from the ceiling, lit said starter paste, then (somehow) broke the gasoline filled jar. Jar exploded sending the gasoline spewing everywhere inside, the shitter up in flames in a glorious orange fireball, cheers from the eight of us who were watching the pyrotechnics show........and then, slowly, the fire petered out.

Hmm.......

Attempt #2:

After much deliberation on how to, once again, set the outhouse on fire (send in a flaming arrow? already been done, plus no bow and arrow. Toss a gas filled bottle with a flaming rag into the air, shoot it with a shot gun and have it rain down fire onto the structure? Nope. a) can’t shoot a shot gun on the premises and b) last time some one attempted that a tree was almost set on fire) Finally it was decided that we would just douse the outhouse in gasoline (careful that it wouldn’t blow up from the first attempt), and then create a fire trail. So gas was trailed from the gas sodden building and lit on fire. The fire raced towards the outhouse, and, for the second time, up in flames it went. However, the damp, green grass deemed more flammable than the old dried out building, because, like the last time, the fire lasted only long enough to burn off the gas before going out, though the grass continued to smolder.

Now it was starting to get annoying. I mean, how hard can it be to burn down a building? People’s homes catch on fire all the time, so it shouldn’t be that hard for seven wilderness men and one girl to do it to a little old, crooked shitter, right?

Attempt #3:

In the end it was filling the outhouse with logs and newspaper that we finally able to reach our goal of burning the thing down. Nothing fancy. No explosion. No ball of fire. Just the slow lick of flames creeping up from the newspaper to the kindling to the logs to, finally, the building.
The conclusion:

Newspaper is the number one contributing factor to buildings catching on fire. Accidental fires in homes occur because people have too many old newspapers lying around, so in order to protect your home from fire you should probably stop reading the newspaper.

Also: none of us would be very proficient arsonists.