Shop Truths, Phrases, Tales; and Outright Lies

[Toolmaker51]

Anyone familiar with performer and title knows the gist of that message "........war, what's it good for; absolutely nuthin!".
I always appreciate a musical reference.

We can thank each other for service, I'm retired as well, just under 26 years.
Out of that now, yet not even half that time given though.

[WmRMeyers]

Anyone familiar with performer and title knows the gist of that message "........war, what's it good for; absolutely nuthin!".
I always appreciate a musical reference.

We can thank each other for service, I'm retired as well, just under 26 years.
Out of that now, yet not even half that time given though.

Music can help us express things we have a hard time expessing in words of our own. I mostly enjoyed my time in the Air Force, and would have stayed until I dropped if they would have let me, but there were things I didn't like about it, too. Among them, we left Saudi Arabia & the Middle East without actually getting things set up to be peaceful there. I do not know if it's even possible without depopulating the area, nor am I willing to bet even that would work. For some things, simple solutions work quite well, but for others, maybe not.

[Frank S]

I stumbled on to something I wrote years ago Thought I would share.
The other night I dreamed that I died. And this is how I wound up in Hell; by Frank S
I don’t know why but I died and was escorted up a seemingly unending stairway to a reception desk where St Peter was sitting in a long very heavy looking robe. Since I had died while sitting around the house I had on only light clothing and felt a chill coming on.
The first thing St. Peter asked me was would I like a drink of something. I said a cup of hot strong black coffee would be nice.
He said I’m sorry but there is no coffee in Heaven would you like a nice cool drink of water instead?
I grudgingly said OK if that is what you have.
He told me to go over to the well and draw up a bucket full of the purest water in the universe and drink to my fill.
So I dropped the bucket into the well that seemed to be millions of feet deep and hauled it back up and had a drink. OK it was water nothing tasted special to me I don’t really like water that much unless it is made into something else.
Then St. Peter summoned me over to a hard wood bench to sit while he went over my life report.
HE said it says here that you are noted for being an engineer and that you even have a PHD in engineering that you have designed many things throughout your life.
I said Yes I have a been blessed with a small amount of abilities in the field of engineering, and have built a few things over the years
St. Peter said your humility is admirable that is a check for you
Frank, it says here that most of your life you couldn’t be bothered with attending Church and when you did attend it was more to insure that your children went than anything else. May I ask why, don’t you believe in the sanctity of organized religion and the worship of the all Mighty.
I told him I believe in the All Mighty but I do not believe in religion, when asked what religion do you follow I would respond with what religion does The All Mighty follow
HE then said you only get a half check for that one.
Then he said now Frank this is an important question it goes along with many of the other things you have done in your life and will determine whether you will spend your life in Heaven at leisure or an eternity in hell destined to work hard throughout all eternity with no praise for your work.
I said OK shoot, I haven’t had a vacation in a hundred years it seems.
SO he asked me why I believed that most of mankind didn’t deserve to occupy space on the Earth and why I was such an advocate for cleansing of the Gene Pool as I had said many times throughout my life, Wasn’t All of God’s creatures sacred. Didn’t they all deserve to live their lives the way that I had?
I said well it is like this PETE ol boy, from my up take on life a large percentage of the people that have occupied the Earth for the past several thousands of years were born just plain stupid many without even the remotest amount of self intelligence they had to be led around and told what to do they would blindly vote for, and go along with anything that would let someone else have the power to make decisions for them. They would breed like guppies in a pond, to produce more just like them who would grow up to become a further drain on those few that were actually capable of producing anything. Yes I believe that there is only just so much knowledge to go around in the universal pool of intelligence and that most of the problems in the world today is because of the Earth being vastly over populated with ignorantly stupid people many of which are in position of making decisions for others when they themselves do not possess the cognitive ability to produce anything on their own as well. While I might not advocate anyone causing the death of another I do feel that most of the population alive today should have been neutered at birth so that they could not reproduce.
Well I am truly Sorry that you feel that way Frank because the All Mighty created man to be fruitful and multiply and to venture out throughout the lands He gave them free will to worship him or not to as their choice. Should they follow his few simple guidelines they are promised to spend eternity in Heaven.
You on the other hand are somewhat of an enigma; actually you are the enigma of all enigmas. You have throughout all of your life praised the Creator of the universe, and have done many good things. But it’s your lack of repentiveness that leaves me no choice but to tell you that you cannot enter the Kingdom just now do you will have to go to hell, and descend into the deepest depths until you repent.
OK fine just show me to the elevator and I will be on my way, it has been nice talking to you, it is too bloody damn cold here and you don’t even have hot coffee to warm a soul’s spirits, and what’s up with that million mile rope on the water bucket anyway?
Frank there is no elevator to Hell you will need to take the stairs.
So off I went descending step after step it seemed like years before I got to hell, once there I was greeted if you call it that by none other than the archangel himself Lucifer or Satin if that is the name you know him by.
He had a puzzled look to that red and deeply rutted face of his, when I arrived.
He said Frank, Frank, Frank! I’m so glad to see you. I have heard many things about you from several of your friends that came before you. By the way I must thank you for telling most of them to go to hell over the years many did just that. HA, ha, now you just go right over there I have your computer all set up for you to start your stay with us. You will not like it here I can assure you the air is foul the heat is intense the water to make coffee with is rancid; your computer will break down a lot because it gets too hot.
Lucifer, no offence but for all I care you can kiss my back side I’m not doing one damn thing until I get a cup of coffee and a cigarette. As far as the heat well I have lived and spent most of my life in places much hotter than this, Texas, Arizona, Columbia Kuwait Iraq and many more, and hard work won’t kill me. I’ll make something to clean up enough water so I can enjoy my coffee, and why the hell don’t you have an elevator? And that big furnace you got over there could be put to use with a bit of piping to produce a lot of electricity and the byproduct of all that heat will work perfectly for the refrigeration system I am thinking of. And if you don’t like it you can go to Hell.
OH God! I always heard you engineer types were non conformist.
Shove it Satin ol boy, I’ll do as I damn well please and if you don’t like it you can go to hell. Now the first thing I want you to do is clear out all of this rubbish and get me a factory set up I have an eternity of work to get done and send me in a cup of coffee hot and black and no sugar.
So I set into work what would be Hell for most I found relaxing. The first thing I did was design an air- conditioning system and piped it throughout all of the depths of hell. This increased production of cutting brimstone to fuel the furnaces so much that we soon needed conveyors to carry it all. So I built them then I built a huge elevator right up to the surface of the Earth so that all of the souls destined for Hell could arrive quicker that way we could put them right to work. Satin learned how much he liked coffee that I had to design a pump to pump the water down from the surface to keep the coffee pots filled. Life was so busy that I had all but forgotten that I only needed to repent my thoughts of mankind to be allowed to enter Heaven.
One day Satin gets a phone call from God.
Lucifer my evil brother how’s life in Hell.
God I can’t thank you enough for sending me that engineer, he has built us an elevator and conveyor systems we now have clean water to make our coffee with and he has turned my hell fire into a heat source for the air-conditioning and refrigeration system.
What? You say you have an engineer? You need to send him back he’s not supposed to be there I had forgiven him a long time ago for any and all of his transgressions. You can tell him that he was right all along and I have decided that there are too many people on the Earth and that it is high time to thin them out with my promise, so you send him back right now!
Sorry God but you can’t have him he has the place running so well that people are dying to get in here.
Lucifer you send Frank back to heaven this instant or I will sue.
God! Do you have a lawyer?????????????????
Frank S Prof. of theoretical Engineering philosophy

[Toolmaker51]

Terrific story Frank S, visuals and all. After reading and a good laugh, only found one possible error.

God! Do you have a lawyer?????????????????
Frank S Prof. of theoretical Engineering philosophy

I believe the real question is along the line of... "God! HOW did you find a lawyer that dared enter???????????????"

[Frank S]

Terrific story Frank S, visuals and all. After reading and a good laugh, only found one possible error.



I believe the real question is along the line of... "God! HOW did you find a lawyer that dared enter???????????????"

Yep I doubt that even honest Abe made it in

[Philip Davies]

Here’s a saying, which few toolmakers will have heard, told to me by my friend, Norman Boulton.

“In glue and dust, we place our trust,
If the railways won’t employ us,
The council must!”

Since Norman’s products were on sale in Harrods, I doubt whether he needed to correct his joinery with sawdust and glue, (as I do)

[Frank S]

I grew up on my Grandpa's farm so I knew him mostly as a farmer, although in actuality he was a retired carpenter/ cabinet maker. He made the prototype cabinet for the first Curtis Mathes console TV stereo system. We had a Mathes fan in our living room that he had made the cabinet it was in Also his name was Mathes. A cousin to them I think but anyway the box fan we had had a lot of intricate inlay in it, I figure he must have done that himself to personalize the fan, but I never knew for sure. One thing I do know though is once while he was making a pair of entry doors for a church I saw him carefully carving a series of very small groves in them then the next time I managed to sneak into his wood working shop the doors had several inscriptions in them which looked like the inlay in the fan he was there rubbing and polishing the doors. Being a young kid my curiosity made me ask him what he was doing. Boy did that turn into an educational lecture. he showed me how he would take a plane and slice off a long curl of soft wood wet it down with very hot water then flatten it out and press it between 2 plates to dry once dried he would carve the designs he wanted then lay them over a project and trace the design into the wood then carve the groves then glue the design into he grooves anywhere there might be an imperfection between the carving and the grove or imperfections in the inlay, he filled it with a powder he made from the dried scraps of the inlay, making the powder in something that looked like an old coffee grinder but to get the grindings to the fine powdery consistency he needed he used a mortar and Pessel like the pharmacist used to make medicines. I don't know what he used as a bonding agent but by the time he had it rubbed in to his satisfaction it was nearly impossible to find the blemish if not impossible.

[Philip Davies]

Thanks for this, Frank. I have never tried marquetry, but my friend Norman was very skilled in laying veneers. He has a bookcase bureau veneered in rosewood. Your grandfather was clearly equally as gifted. The description of processing a shaving is especially interesting.

[Frank S]

Thanks for this, Frank. I have never tried marquetry, but my friend Norman was very skilled in laying veneers. He has a bookcase bureau veneered in rosewood. Your grandfather was clearly equally as gifted. The description of processing a shaving is especially interesting.

Philip you have to remember that was the observations by an 8 year old kid and 60 years ago, somethings stick with you throughout your life but the finer details may not. Since I have never personally tried to duplicate the things I saw him doing I couldn't be certain I have remembered everything in context and probably have not. Sometimes I would watch him for nearly an hour before he would even notice me being there, particularly if I could wedge myself into a good hiding spot.

[Toolmaker51]

Veering off into a snowdrift, or herd of snowflakes, IDK.