(click to enlarge)

Curiosity is a human trait.

The number of people who are actually ON the cutting edge of a profession, a sales position, a social studies job, or whatever are very few.

I asked in an open forum a few months ago "Why should I train my competition?" That being a question which can be applied to almost any business or profession. Though I felt it was a rhetorical question, I was a little curious about what was going on in people's minds when they wanted to come to me and "be my apprentice". (It happens every week...to every single person on that blacksmithing forum.)

The answers were quite illuminating, and I am glad I asked it. Generally speaking, the blacksmiths were united in their answers which were a variation on "I'll do it if I get paid/praised/laid." The students however seemed to be of three camps....

1) So that the skills don't get lost to perpetuity forever,

2) so that they could massage an arts and crafts bump to do a hobby, and

3) to learn enough that that they could do this as a living instead of working at the fast food franchise.

Answer 2 and 3 were expected and are totally praiseworthy of course, but I was a little surprised at the large number who answered with number one.Its kind of funny that none of the professional blacksmiths actually said "I want to teach this because otherwise the information will be lost forever." I don't think any blacksmith, metal worker, or pretty much any professional is actually on the "cutting edge" of even re-discovered information. Perhaps people on the outside of the trade feel that that continually developing a new skill set is analagous to being on the "cutting edge", that if there are no new discoveries in the world, there are at least new discoveries in their own life.

It is really not too hard to imagine a black smith or a metalworker who does such stunning work that it stands out like Paul Anka writing and singing "My Way" . We all want to experience that flash of genius. I fear most of us will simply have to accept the metalworking equivalent of singing in the shower. The important thing, of course, is just roll up your sleeves and get out there and DO IT. Even a shower song is better than no song at all.

Spring Ride 09

Mila and me on a spring bike ride.

My bike looks soooooo dusty!

Briggs and freakin' Stratton

Honestly, I mean, how many mechanics will do more with a spark plug than to gap it, and to check that there is spark going to it! Yup, judging by the jolt through my fingers, there was plenty of spark, so the magneto, points and everything electrical is working. Maybe its air. Clean the air cleaner. Okay, so all I did was blow it out...and maybe order a replacement on line, hopefully this will do for now. But it was working last week, so I can't think that the air cleaner would have packed up suddenly! Its not something air cleaners DO! Maybe its gas. Well, its all new gas, and judging by how nicely it is blowing through and creating a nice petrochemical fog in the air there is nothing gummed up or sticking in the carb. Maybe its getting too much fuel! A sunken float comes to mind. And it might still be a problem. But the excess fuel doesn't seem to be there all the time...or else the carb would be swimming in it, the float in a carb does the same thing as the float in a toilet. if it fills up and stops "floating", the toilet runs. And in a carburated engine, the fuel just keeps on running in. Sunken carb floats...possible but unlikely.
The delicate balance of the counter loaded springs of the governor. Hey, that could be it! Oh wait, that broken spring...its a red herring...its only there to keep the linkages nice and tight. They don't have them on ALL Briggs and Stratton engines, and nobody seemed to know why it was there. Well, I re-attached it on and it made no difference. Of course, it took me an hour to track down "where" to re-attach it, and to find out what the blessed thing is actually there for!
Changed the oil AGAIN, all that fuel collects on the walls of the cylinders, and trickles down into the oil pan. Dangerous at worst, annoying at best, always a source of excessive and needless wear.
So, we have air, spark, and fuel. How about timing? Oh wait, the only thing that will throw a B and S engine's timing off is to get a flywheel to shear the key on its shaft. And this has not happened. Took me an hour to discover that little tid bit of info!
Well, after a full day of tweaking, checking on line, perusing forums with amazing amounts of non-applicable information, perhaps just go back to the beginning.
Spark plugs. Gapped and clean. disengage the thing from the wrench where it was sitting happily. No cracks in the ceramic, lets see what the spark looks like. Ow Ow Ow Ow Ow (repeat as necessary as the voltage jolts through my hand in quarter second intervals) and observe that there is "something funny" about that spark. Turns out, the spark is there, but is being shorted backwards through some defect in the spark plug.
Replace spark plug with spare from the snow blower. Works fine.

funny, I don't feel fulfilled.....

wotta week!

What a crazy week! It started with a trip to Potsdam NY to participate in a demo involving armour making. Then the news that my licence to make armour based on that made by a famous artist came through, and I'll have to develop new and interesting pieces to justify his faith in me. The lawn tractor needed its blades sharpened, and that means flipping it on its back to get at them. The result of THAT exercise goes much more smoothly if you drain the fuel, oil, and remove the battery. None of these jobs went well...the oil drain plug was jammed, the battery cable needed to be cut off with clippers because there was no shifting the bolts! Which means of course I had to fabricate new cables AND new eyeletted ends out of scrap brass. And the fuel lines are all dried and cracked. Tires were flat. ARRRRGGGH.
Got some time in the shop...not as much as I would have liked...and made a pretty piece of armour. Hope it is what the customer wants. Its kind of neat and I never made anything quite like it before. Got one (count em, ONE) measely ride on the bike in.
A few school demonstrations will help to cover the mortgage, and we are getting ready for the big show this summer....the Upper Canada Renaissance Festival. Shayne Adams and his jousters will be there, (Yes Jennifer, they are the ones you know from the Ohio show) and this show will be kind of weird because there are two major components to it...the first two days will be all about putting little kids into armour and giving sword demonstrations, and the second two days will be all about selling swords like crazy.
The weekend was full of visitors. I had seven visitors on Saturday, and I was training some of them in the rain. Andrea came back to the forge after class Sunday, and did some fantastic work, much needed labour intensive stuff like grinding spun tops and cleaning the demo armour. We found a couple of broken straps which will need to be repaired before I can put it back into service, but nothing I can't handle.
Today was pleasant...we saw the new Star Trek movie on IMAX. Went to the early show, and I am glad I did....there was quite a line up to get into the later shows. Don't these kids have to go to school? A lunch at Wild Wings, and another convert to the joys of fancy chicken wings. An hour at that warehouse for guys "Princess Auto", made my day off worth while.
So tomorrow, I'll clean out the gunk which is causing my lawn tractor to sputter, and finally get those dandelions under control. Maybe go for a bike ride. Lay out a nice helmet, and get started on that sexy armour.
Ahh...life is unfolding as it should.

Where is my Flocki?

click on image to enlarge.

Its spring, and...

a young man's fancy turns to.....


Cars, actually.
I rather like the horse and carriage above. Very nice sculpture. Unlike the chia pet below.

I said this car was fly, and sure enough....

Cheese cake in the cupcakes. About a hundred comments come to mind, none of them printable but all sidesplittinglly funny.

I know how long it takes to cut out all those scales. My hat is off to the fella who probably spent a year of lonely weekends to fabricate his dream car.

Tweenbots

Tweenbots. Yes.

Thanks for the link Bill

http://www.tweenbots.com/

Cool rides

A ladder made from one piefce of plywood.

Oh right...that'll settle disputes!

This might actually work. But even if it doesn't, its still pretty neat.

A tea timer. A penguin tea timer. Well....its not something you see every day!

Just one of many ideas I wonder why I never thought of first.

Auto Rim Art

Made entirely out of wheel rims, hubcaps and bits and pieces from the wrecking yard.
The treatment of the legs of the wasp up above is amazing.

Man's best friend.

Man's worst friend.

Who. Who.

Just dragon my steel into town...

Cell phones

Girl, 13, runs up $5K cellphone bill
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

CHEYENNE, Wyo. - A cellphone used by a 13-year-old Wyoming girl to run up a nearly $5,000 phone bill will text no more - thanks to her angry father and his hammer.
Dena Christoffersen of Cheyenne sent or received about 20,000 text messages over about a month, and her parents' phone plan didn't cover texting.
Her father, Gregg Christoffersen, says he thought texting had been disabled on her phone.
It's disabled now - he smashed the phone to pieces, hours after getting a bill for more than $4,750.
The family says the phone company Verizon has been willing to knock the bill down to a reasonable level.
Dena has been grounded until the end of school.
She says she feels bad and has learned her lesson.


Information from: KUSA-TV, http://www.9news.com

I rather enjoy reading the news from south of the Border, even though technically, Colorado is not really south of me, but rather more west by north west. Their news is always so interesting...like the story about a Navy Seal who chased after a pair of dog killers. Very very interesting. Seems a couple of good ole boys decided to kill the wrong guy's dog. Worth linking to the news site.

Easter Eggs Are Satan's Testicals!

(important information found on the website. http://www.landoverbaptist.org/

Are Your Children Playing With Lucifer's Testicles?The Truth About Easter Eggs

(Recommended for Parents of Christian Children ages 4-22)
-by Dr. Daniel Cameroon


List Price: $18.95Our Price: $27.99
You Save: Nothing. (Only Jesus Saves!)
Availability: Usually ships within 24 hours (if Jesus wants it to) from Landover Baptist Church in Freehold, Iowa:

Summary:
Are Your Children Playing With Lucifer's Testicles? is a Bible based book for Christian parents who by lack of faith can't afford to send their children to a decent Christian school. Their precious youngsters are infected by the secular filth and lies being taught by unsaved teachers in America's public school system. The book teaches parents how to easily explain to their children that Easter (as it is celebrated by the Unsaved) has absolutely nothing to do with Jesus Christ but is actually a holiday celebrating lewd and sexually explicit pagan ritual.

Are Your Children Playing With Lucifer's Testicles? (The Truth About Easter Eggs) is a wonderfully informative and well-researched Christian book which consolidates a 2-month Adult Remedial Sunday School series into two-hundred exciting and easy to read pages along with memorable illustrations. Are Your Children Playing With Lucifer's Testicles? or "PWLT" as the book is now referred to in the Southern Baptist Sunday School Teachers catalogue takes the reader on an unforgettable journey that traces the pagan (Satanic) origins of secular (Satanic) Easter, with a specific focus on the origin of "Easter Eggs."


Hardcover 1st Edition (April 2009)
Remedial Christian Parenting Series - Picture Learning Book;
ISBN: 6624AM7-B6227;
Dimensions (in inches): 0.7 x 11.03 x 11.02 landoverbaptizon.com - ZONDERVAN PUBLISHERS CHRISTIAN BOOK OF THE MONTH!

- Sales Rank: 1 Avg.
Customer Rating: Number of Reviews: 152,287 s of fertility.

"It's not that difficult to understand," says Author/Creation Scientist, Dr. Daniel Cameroon. "In the old days, deluded pagans would gather round and hump like bunnies on Easter Sunday because they thought it would make their tomatoes grow faster." Dr. Cameroon explains that it doesn't matter what god or idol the Pagans were humping under on Easter Sunday, because any god other than "Jesus" is "Satan." Dr. Cameroon dedicates four chapters in the book to Easter Eggs. "Easter Eggs are one of the wiliest tools of the Devil," he says. "Pagan kids didn't have anything to do on Easter Sunday because their mommies and daddies were stuck in a false temple all day, naked and writhing around with their neighbors in Satanic orgies of the flesh. You see, parents had to come up with a way to occupy their children while they were away from home, praying and fornicating under the altar of Satan. And since they didn't have babysitters back then, they gave their kids eggs to play with and sometimes paint," he says. "But the reason they chose eggs had nothing to do with any sort of fertility or fertilizers (as some misguided Christian historians would have you believe). Nope, it was because of Lucifer's testicles! Glory to God! And I won't say a word more about it! I don't want to ruin the book for you!"

God Fearing Fundamentalist Baptist Customers who bought this book also bought:

Daddy? Why Did Jesus Kill Grandma? by Pastor Deacon Fred.

The Little Jew: "Levi, The Dancing Cockroach" by Gloria Steinhunt

Donkeys Can Talk, People Can Fly, and a Man Named Jesus Lives Up in the Sky! by Pastor Deacon Fred

What if??????

What if Hitler cheered for the Edmonton Oilers?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ss1JTK7JUts

Note, turn it down if you are at work.....

Auctions of arms and armour

It looks as though "Imperial Auctions" is going to make its big sword auction a regular event. The prices were just as you expect from an auction, almost embarassingly low. A Javanese Kris in its sheath went for under 12 dollars for instance...heck the silver in the scabbard is worth more than that! A basket hilted "Scottish" (actually English) broadsword went for $292.00.
A sword identical to the lady's blade from the movie "Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon), 19th century, folded steel WITH sheath went for a measely two grand.

Check out item 121. Wow. A bladesmith named "Yusuf" but his name on a cossack sword! Kuuul. And I didn't bid on it! Drat.

Anyway, the next auction will be during March Break of next year. That gives you lots of time to quit smoking and put the money towards that dream sword. (Thats what I did.)

The auction house is here....
http://www.auctionsimperial.com/

and you click on the "prices realized" here....
http://www.auctionflex.com/showlots.ap?co=30162&weventid=7526&weventitemid=2675592&wmaingroupid=0&wcatmastid=0&inventorytype=&minyear=2009&minmonth=2&minday=17&maxyear=2010&maxmonth=2&maxday=17&keyword=&lotsortorder=lotnumasc&pagenum=1&action=&lang=En

Busy week...

The last couple of weeks in the shop were really odd...I finally finished those swords for the Guard...some were really bad. Other were not too bad, but I had to do my own plating this year since I could not find anybody who could nickel them to my satisfaction. Check one on my professional development. I also did some experimental heat colouring of steel. The scrap breastplate below was the result of that experiment. Check two on my professional development. This helm which had been mocking me for almost two months suddenly figured out how to be fixed. Hey, I'm not proud...I'll accept the accolade. But two months...should have been less. But I was preoccupied.

A sword which should not have broken, broke. I am not thinking of welding it back together since although it is very nice, it may have other problems with it. I hate returns.

Jason and Austin seem to be enjoying themselves in our last advanced class at the Plant Rec Centre. Austin and I decoded one of Talhoffer's moves, so score three on my professional development.

I am not quite sure what to make of that smiley shield of Jason's.

Though he does seem to be using it with a certain amount of aplomph.

Most of these activities are detailed in depth on my other blog...the "armouring blog".

Skippy's list of things he may no longer do.

Skippy’s List: The 213 things Skippy is no longer allowed to do in the U.S. Army


A quick note from Skippy:
I don’t mind if you want to quote a few items from my list of your site. But please do not copy the list in it’s entirety.

Explanations of these events:
a) I did myself, and either got in trouble or commended. (I had a Major shake my hand for the piss bottle thing, for instance.)
b) I witnessed another soldier do it. (Like the Sergeant we had, that basically went insane, and crucified some dead mice.)
c) Was spontaneously informed I was not allowed to do. (Like start a porn studio.)
d) Was the result of a clarification of the above. (“What about especially patriotic porn?”)
e) I was just minding my own business, when something happened. (“Schwarz…what is *that*?” said the Sgt, as he pointed to the back of my car? “Um….a rubber sheep…I can explain why that’s there….”)

To explain how I’ve stayed out of jail/alive/not beaten up too badly….. I’m funny, so they let me live.

So there you go....drop into http://skippyslist.com/list/ and see the rest of them.....this is only a brief sample. Hope you don't wet yourself laughing....




28. Don’t take the batteries out of the other soldiers alarm clocks (Even if they do hit snooze about forty times).

29. The Irish MPs are not after “Me frosted lucky charms”.

30. Not allowed to wake an Non-Commissioned Officer by repeatedly banging on the head with a bag of trash.

31. Not allowed to let sock puppets take responsibility for any of my actions.

32. Not allowed to let sock puppets take command of my post.

33. Not allowed to chew gum at formation, unless I brought enough for everybody.

34. (Next day) Not allowed to chew gum at formation even if I *did* bring enough for everybody.

35. Not allowed to sing “High Speed Dirt” by Megadeth during airborne operations. (“See the earth below/Soon to make a crater/Blue sky, black death, I’m off to meet my maker”)

36. Can’t have flashbacks to wars I was not in. (The Spanish-American War isn’t over).

37. Our medic is called “Sgt Larwasa”, not “Dr. Feelgood”.

38. Our supply Sgt is “Sgt Watkins” not “Sugar Daddy”.

39. Not allowed to ask for the day off due to religious purposes, on the basis that the world is going to end, more than once.



As I said, drop into skippy's web site for the rest.....

http://skippyslist.com/list/

Tee shirt sayings.

BEST T-SHIRT SAYINGS

"Filthy Stinking Rich... Well, Two Out of Three Ain’t Bad"

"I Used Up All My Sick Days... So I Called In Dead"

"Happiness Is Seeing Your Mother-in-Law on a Milk Carton"

"Just Give Me Chocolate and Nobody Gets Hurt"

"Learn from Your Parents’ Mistakes... Use Birth Control"

"If God Had Wanted Me to Touch My Toes, He Would Have Put Them on My Knees"

"If You Can Read This...Kiss A Teecher"

"Wrinkled Was Not One of the Things I Wanted to Be When I Grew Up"

"If You Remember the ’60s, You Weren’t Really There"

"Procrastinate Now"

"Rehab Is for Quitters"

(Across a drawing of a skeleton) "Waiting for the Perfect Man"

"My Husband and I Married for Better or Worse...
.... He Couldn’t do Better and I Couldn’t Do Worse"

"The More I Learn About Women, the More I Love My Harley"

"I married Mr. Right. But did his first name HAVE to be "Always"?

Skeptics....

They tell me that there is a US state which is called "The Show Me" state, and they even put that on their licence plates. I wonder...when did sceptisim go out of fashion?
Of course, as anybody that knows me has noticed, I have a remarkable level of sceptisism in my day to day life. I mean, we all know that the kid at MacDonalds really doesn't care if you "have a nice day", and that perhaps Ford really doesn't HAVE a better idea. And that guy on TV, the spokesman for the auto company who is saying "everybody talks about quality cars". As if "quality" has any meaning....a true sceptic fills in the missing words..."everybody talks about the HIGH quality of their cars (does anybody have a LOW quality car? I thought not.) And the luxury, best in its class. (there are classes?...you mean surfeit of luxury don't you? Or did you mean to say LACK of luxury? Neither "quality" or "luxury" have any existance without qualifiers.)
Make no doubt about it...if they had a greater quality than the other guy, or a a softer, cozier, better luxury than the other guy, they would have said it.

Now we have the great global warming debate. Is it a debate still? Well, anything which the world's government has spent (get this) 50 Billion dollars on had better be a topic for debate. The debate is not, of course whether global warming is happening. Of course it is happening. The money is all being spent on how to stop, alter, or live with it. Good work if you can get it. There is a "green" movement which is attracting a lot of money.

So shortly after our eyes glazed over from the Bob Dole movie and shortly before the economic meltdown, we came up with a way to develop carbon credits. This happened in something called the "Kyoto Accord", a conference which has pretty much been ignored, possibly unfairly. I usually say when people ask me about it that "Tell ya what, you bring out your scientists and I'll bring out MY scientists and see if we can agree on anything.

Turns out we all agree on global warming. What we don't agree about is what is causing it? And we REALLY don't agree how to reverse it.

Dr. David Evans wrote this article in the Australian. He is the scientist I am trotting out in favor of the idea that it is all a big shell game and a money grab by special interest groups.... Dr David Evans was a consultant to the Australian Greenhouse Office from 1999 to 2005. http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,24036736-7583,00.html
So, I kind of like Dr. Evans...he would clearly be a great candidate for a "show me state." He states categorically and in writing, and I quote... " There is no evidence to support the idea that carbon emissions cause significant global warming. None. There is plenty of evidence that global warming has occurred, and theory suggests that carbon emissions should raise temperatures (though by how much is hotly disputed) but there are no observations by anyone that implicate carbon emissions as a significant cause of the recent global warming." unquote

I suppose I could, in the interest of balance, bring an article by David Suzuki, but then, Dr. Evans doesn't have a TV show like Dr. Suzuki so maybe it will all balance out.
I am finding that I am applying my "grumpy old man" outlook to more and more things these days.

Anyway, I believe we can all agree on a few things...like perhaps life without smoke in the air would be better, (though the alternative might mean freezing to death) so maybe we may have to agree to a trade off.

I was going to add a paragraph about this latest censorship by the city of Ottawa transit system in which they refused to allow a billboard stating "There is probably no God, so just get on with your life". but I have a hockey game to get to. So TTFN. Stay sceptical....grin!

(I may move this to my "rant blog". But this is not quite as wild a rant as usual...the censorship one will DEFINITELY need to go there though!)

Alien Abduction or something more sinister?

SCOTTSBLUFF, Neb.

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

- There's no wheeling or dealing at a car dealership in western Nebraska.
Three top executives are missing and so are about 80 cars. Police in Scottsbluff are investigating the removal of the cars from the Legacy Auto Sales dealership and the disappearance of the owner and two managers.

Dealership employee Miranda Cervantes told the Scottsbluff Star-Herald newspaper that she returned to work Tuesday after a day off and found the lot was virtually empty.
Cervantes said 25 to 30 Fords were loaded on trucks and removed Saturday, and about 50 Toyotas were apparently taken away Monday night.

She said the desks of the owner and the two managers had been cleaned out.

Police Capt. Kevin Spencer said the dealership has had financial difficulties

Bergen Op Zoom

This is a little exercise in reconciling old pictures with new ones. Trouble is, often my holiday snaps are rarely taken from the same perspectives as the old ones. Case in point, the pic below. Above are the Canadians who visited in October of 1944. Very pretty little town square. The Canadians had been mauled pretty badly on the trip to get here, this was pretty much all that was left of our armour. Needless to say, we had to hold off a bit, and lick our wounds, we took well over 70% casualties within the last month and had nothing to speak of in the way of serviceable armour. The British called it a "side show".
But the side show opened up the port of Antwerp, allowing everybody to re-arm and get ready to march north through Holland to Nimegan. We were not the only ones to take a lickin' though....the German 7th army, the Adolf Hitler Paratroops, and the German LXXXVIII army (thats the famous 88th army) Corps managed to withdraw in fairly good order, and the Hermann Goring Ersatz regiment proved to not be so ersatz at all. They hung onto Holland through the "Winter of Hunger" (as the Dutch call it) Just to put it all into order, this all was going on while the "Bridge Too Far" was tripping over its long feet, and in a month or two, the Germans will pull a lot of the troops out of Holland and hit the Americans some sixty miles to the South in Bastogne, the famous "Battle of the Bulge". But for now, here, everything is peaceful, mostly because nobody has enough energy to stand up, let alone fight.

The top picture was taken from the bell tower, and here is what the bell tower looked like in June of 2007. Those old stones must have seen the ebb and flow of army after army...they date back almost 900 years. In 1944, they saw the 4th, 6th and 10th infantry brigades from Canada, the 49th and 104 divisions from the US, and the 1st Polish Armed Division drop in for a beer.

The Palais de Justice. The statue is of blind justice with a sword and scales.

This coat of arms even LOOKS old. I have no idea how old.

And I believe you can see the same building in the 1944 print above.

Looks pretty in the sun though.

Vanity of Vanities, all is Vanity

Playing with the filters. Here is a picture which to my eye looks like Henri Matis was playing with it. When you click to enlarge it, the beard hairs really look good.

This one enhances edges. It gives a real three dimentional effect. The green background looks almost textured.

And this was the original. Brenda took it of me to memorialize the dirty face of a working man. Well, I didn't really HAVE a portrait of me for this year.

I thought it would be kind of fun to try out different "artistic" effects.