OldTools Archive

Recent Bios FAQ

153084 Christopher Swingley <cswingle@i...> 2005‑12‑05 Bio (update)
GG's,

I was fiddling around with the bios earlier today and noted that my bio
is from 2000.  Lots has changed since then:

> I've been working with wood for a long time, largely in a
> "construction / 2-by and drywall screws" sort of way.

Still doin' that; when you own your own home, it's hard to avoid tearing
apart stuff you don't like and replacing it with stuff the next owner
won't like.  Textured drywall. . . yetch!

> I only own two "old" tools (a bit brace and a wooden skew rabbit
> plane), and don't anticipate becoming a real collector 

I can only imagine the amusement this line must have generated among the
veteran slope-greasers in the group when I wrote that.  Needless to say
I've got quite a bit more than just a bit brace and a wooden skew rabbet
plane (yep, I spelt it 'rabbit' back then).

For awhile I was grabbing a bunch of iron (Stanley #3 - #6, #5 and a
half, scrub, tongue and groove (still missing it's irons and the wooden
knob), metal rabbet), but I've grown to really appreciate the woodies
and so now I do most things with the variety of wooden planes I've
accumulated.  Steve Knight gave me the push down that slope, thank you
very much!

My accumulation phase is largely over, simply because I've got a nice
working set of pretty much everything I commonly use.  I'd still like a
matched tongue and groove plane, a wooden plough, some better bench
chisels and more saws, but those'll come, I'm sure.  Someday I'll do an
infill kit too.  Oh yeah, and an anvil, forge and post drill.

Hmm., maybe that accumulation phase isn't quite over, eh?

But all joking aside, I've got a nice set of tools, and have had a lot
of fun building projects and some of my own tools over the years.  This
holiday break I'm considering building a wall cabinet to house various
collectibles, so that's probably my next project if I don't get too
sidetracked by the other things left on my list (window trim, drywall in
the watershed, etc.).

> I still use the table saw to cut stuff to size

At the time, I didn't know we were supposed to make that stuff look like
cartoon swear words, but now I do:  I got rid of that b*st@r... a long
time ago and haven't regretted it since.  My heart still skips a beat or
two when I think about the one kickback I experienced.  Not much to
tell, but it still amazes me that the back window of my wife's Jimmy
actually survived the encounter because my Adirondak chair sure didn't.

What else?  Well I'm still living in the same house in Fairbanks,
Alaska, and spend a fair amount of my time when it's not winter
preparing for it by chopping down trees and turning them to firewood.
Anyone who cuts their own firewood and has heard the "firewood warms you
twice" aphorism knows how much of a major understatement it is.  But
there's nothing better than a fall day in the woods cutting trees with
an axe or a saw.

In addition to woodworking I brew beer, listen to a lot of baseball on
the Internet, and have started doodling with bookbinding.  My wife is a
sprint musher, so we have a small kennel of racing sled dogs, and that's
a lot of fun in the winter.

Most of what I'm doing or have done in recent memory is up on my
website, which shares space and bandwidth (thanks to the University)
with the OldTools Archive.  If you're really interested, feel free to
take a look.

Cheers,

Chris
-- 
Christopher S. Swingley   University of Alaska Fairbanks
cswingle@i...     http://www.frontier.iarc.uaf.edu/~cswingle/

OldTools Searchable Archive: 
    http://nika.frontier.iarc.uaf.edu/~cswingle/archive/
    http://www.frontier.iarc.uaf.edu/~cswingle/archive/

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Recent Bios FAQ