Book Acquisition Disorder

Biblioproximity

 

One of the notable absences from the studio ever since I started working there pretty much full time almost ten years ago was the physical distance from my books.  Almost all of them were located up on the library balcony on the other side of the barn.  Not far, but not close enough for the psychic comfort of 1) being part of the decor of the studio, and 2) being close enough that I could just grab one to browse or look something up whenever I was waiting for the glue to dry or something similar.

Yes, my gunsmithing books were already down in the studio on a shelf over that workbench, but even I do not browse gunsmithing books.  They are ther for instructional/informational purposes.

In the studio, I need books for inspiration and peace of mind.  It’s one of my many quirks.  So, I relocated a goodly number into my immediate work space, and once I get finished with the tool cabinet and empty the plane shelves, will probably fill them with books too.

I feel better already.

Stinky Book Update

My perfume-infused book has been in the deodorizing chamber for a month, but my on-board stench-o-meter is not calibrated to detect any change in the level of noxiousness.  That change will occur given enough time, as the offending molecules are adsorbed into the charcoal medium.

The effectiveness of the protocol has been demonstrated for me numerous times, most recently inside the cab of my new-to-me pickup truck.  On the long drive home from the DC-area dealer I noticed the faint but definite residual odor of tobacco smoke in the truck, which had I noticed it earlier it would have been a deal breaker for me.  Anyway, as soon as I got home I bought four bags of lump barbecue charcoal and set them in the back seat of the truck for the past four months.  Slowly but surely the charcoal gently removed the stench from the space.  Last week Mrs. Barn and I journeyed over the mountain with nary a whiff of the detestable odor.  So, I have every confidence that the book will emerge relatively un-pungent at some point.  What I do not know is exactly when “at some point” will occur.

 

But back to the book itself.  While the book has been inside its deodorizing chamber I was noodling another copy of it on-line.  Much to my astonishment a copy of the book in nearly pristine condition for a mere fraction of the expected price.  It was an important lesson for me, namely that sometimes a hard-to-find book turns up on ebay.com for sale by someone who does not really have a working knowledge of the value.  $17.50, shipping included (it is a ten-pound book).

The outcome is a near perfect circumstance; I get to enjoy the book while undertaking an odor-scrubbing exercise in real time.

This Book Stinks

A while ago in my quest to gather pertinent books regarding the artistry of the World of Roubo, and in fact the larger portrait of the culture surrounding him (in part due to my desire to replicate the work, in part due to my ongoing efforts to write a novel for which one thread involves Parisian cabinetmaking c.1770), I went on a sustained book-buying spree.  For the most part that spree has ended with only one or two exceptions, and my absence from abebooks.com has led them to send me a “Get Well Soon” card.  Just kidding about that, but it had been a very long while before a recent purchase or two.

One of my last purchases perhaps three or four years ago was, at that time, a somewhat hard-to-find book that was equally hard-to-afford.  While browsing my barn library a couple weeks ago a faint familiar stench prompted the memory of this book.  When it first arrived and I opened the package I knew immediately why I could afford it.  Yes, it was in poor physical condition, but I knew that already.  What I did not know at the time was the someone had doused the volume with perfume, and I mean doused.  It was probably to disguise up the odor of mildew or rodent urine/feces or who knows what.  When I first opened it the perfume actually burned my eyes it was so strong.

 

I bagged it back up and set it aside to deal with it “another day.”  Since coming across it again, and desiring to actually read it without wearing a gas mask, I splayed it out on a bench way away from my work space.  I checked it gain and it is still odoriferous.   I think I will have to put it inside a sealed rubber tub with a lot of activated charcoal and probably swap out the charcoal a time or four to extract the stench enough for me to hold it at reading distance.

Peeeyuwww!

I’ll let you know how that goes.

Smacks to the Forehead and A Lump in the Throat

Yes, I am “all Studley exhibit, all the time” for the next month, but that tedium (?) was punctuated by a banner week at the Post Office box.

galbert

First came the brilliant Chairmaker’s Notebook from Peter Galbert.  It arrived just in time for one of my periodic days at the ophthalmologist’s office (the periodicity depends on which of my eye diseases is acting up, and how severely) during which I had time to read a good part of it carefully and browse all of it to the end.  The book is only partly about making Windsor chairs.  In truth it is really about the way to think about, and the way to do almost anything of real consequence.

I am not a Windsor chairmaker and unlikely to become one other than as an amusement, my chairmaking runs from Point A, Gragg chairs, to Point A’, making slightly different Gragg chairs.  Still, Peter’s eloquence and deep understanding, and the exasperatingly skillful manner of conveying them, made me smack my forehead repeatedly with the silent exclamation,”But of course!” while simultaneously silently muttering, “Man, I wish I had written this.”

printers proofs

I also received the printer’s proofs from Virtuoso, and to tell you the truth, the combination of the sumptuous imagery contained therein combined with the realization that almost five years of work are nearing the end made a sizable lump in my throat.  It has been a project of passions — sometimes love, sometimes hate — as are most such undertakings, but it it noteworthy to celebrate its conclusion.

Finally, my good friend of three decades Dr. Walter Williams just send me a signed copy of his latest book.  A collection of scores of columns, it will make for enticing bite sized bits of common sense wisdom.

All in all, a good week at the post office.

Dealing With Book Acquisition Disorder – 4, a/k/a The Revenge of Occam’s Razor

I just finished a few days of production of glazed doors for the library bookcases.  It gives me all the more respect for those artisans to make acres of kitchen and bathroom cabinetry.  I am not really set up for large scale joinery production, but great progress was made nevertheless.

Corner JointIn following Occam’s Razor, the philosophical construct that suggests simplicity as the best answer to a convoluted question, I decided to make exceedingly simple glazed doors using the pile of southern yellow pine I had left over from the barn flooring along with a dozen or so sheets of plexiglass from a house project that never materialized (it actually evolved into a much better one).  Of course I overlooked the inverse of Occam’s Razor, namely that the simpler the structure, the greater the need for skillful design and execution.

cIMG_3078My plan was to build open faced mortise and tenon corners (bridle joints) using my table saw to cut all the joints.  In principle the idea was fine, but in practice, let’s just say that a $25 saw from Craigslist is probably not the one you want for such a process (especially when the fence is such a piece of garbage it almost isn’t even worth the effort to throw it out the door).  But, it was what I had on hand.  My Unisaw was back in Maryland,  along with my home-built but perfectly useable tenoning jig.

cIMG_3096The first thing I needed to do was make a simple tenoning jig, which I did.  Then, I cut all the open mortise shoulders on the rails, which were purposefully 1/2″ wider than the stiles.  This went smoothly.   I was left with several score of identical wooden tiles, which I gathered to save for the myriad times I need a small shim or spacer.

cIMG_3089Cutting the open tenons was not so easy as the tenon length, corresponding to the wider rail, was deeper than the saw blade could cut when fully exposed by almost a half an inch.  Grrr.

cIMG_3094Quickly I set up the band saw to make the necessary shoulder cuts and it went fairly smoothly.  Near the end things began to bog down a bit, and you can see why here.  Even though well dried (almost three years for 5/4 stock) the rosin in the southern yellow pine was so gooey it clogged the 3/4″ 4 tpi blade.  The only reason it worked as long as it did was the friction kept the rosin soft, so the saw blade could still do its work.  Once I stopped the pitch cooled and hardened into a rock.  I will either need to clean the blade completely or throw it away.  Fortunately it is not my only blade.

 

cIMG_3103Since the glazing was 1/8″ plexi, and I like fully housed glazing, I ripped an off-center groove on the inside edges of all the door elements into which I would insert the glazing.  In retrospect I should have been more careful to line up the groove with the outer edge of the tenon.  It would have made the fitting of the corners a lot cleaner, but then so would a well-performing table saw.

 

cIMG_3101I moved to the work bench, my first Roubo model, and trimmed the shoulders of the tenons and cut the blanks from the open mortises with a coping saw.  It literally took only ten or fifteen seconds per mortise.  Most of the corners fit together without further attention, a few needed a handful of strokes with the rabbet plane for them to slip together.

I then glued the frames together with the plexi sheet inserted, and when dry they were ready for trimming and installation.

cIMG_3105As a sop to motivational psychology, I temporarily installed two pairs of the doors and filled the cases with books.  This fatuous gesture was very encouraging.  When I return probably at the end of the month I will assemble the remaining doors, and finish the detailing of all the doors before I install them and load the units with boatloads of books.