Toolemera Blog

Mr. Nicholson Stands Corrected.

First off, I wish to make an announcement both short in length and short in duration: Mechanic's Companion has undergone a minor correction due to a problem with the pdf file. The problem has been corrected and as soon as the printer approves the revision, the presses will run. I expect that by next Monday we'll be back in business as usual. For the meantime, I'm holding orders for Nicholson for a few days.

Second off, Michael Stone, a layout carpenter in a professional Broadway scene shop, was reading our edition of Mechanic's Companion (blatant plug here) and discovered an error in the Geometry chapter. Michael's is the first person to point out this problem, which tells me that todays craftspeople are skipping over the Geometry chapter due to a lack of educational preparation in this most necessary of skills. I would like to state, for the record, that I while I failed High School Algebra (yet was graduated anyhow) I did pass geometry, of which I remember nearly nothing.

Here-with, Msr. Stone's solution:

My Net Worth

I always knew I could hit it big on the internet. Now I have the figures to prove it:

Toolemera.com has the estimated value of $9,851 and ranks # 1,114,368 in the World (Alexa). With the daily ads revenue: $3 and pageviews per day: 133. The website is hosted on server that locates in Houston TX United States.

Isn't that just the best thing ever? According to some site that does something of world wide importance, I can sell my domain and retire to the Keys. I do have some concerns as to the reading level of that creator of that site, but now that I am locates in Houston TX United States, who cares if the creator reads Sanskrit or?

Isn't life grand?

Till next, Gary

Adam Likes Me

At times the functions of blogs serves to reduce rather than increase the amount of verbiage clogging the net. In this case, I refer you to Arts & Mysteries, Msr. Cherubini's blog in which he lauds Nicholson's Mechanic's Companion, Joel responds and I respond to Joel, all using up at least a month's worth of words in the process.

Till next, Gary

Mechanic's Companion Review and a Thanks

First off, my sincere thanks to Chris Schwarz for his review of the reprint of Peter Nicholson's Mechanic's Companion over at his blog. If not for Chris and his insistence that Shop Woodworking carry the Toolemera titles, they wouldn't be carried there.

That statement of intense logic aside, I'ld also like to thank Chris and everyone at the magazine for their focus on woodworking, both hand tool and machine. They've gone the distance in bringing this most fine of crafts back into popularity. True, FW features articles here and there but not with the clarity, simplicity and pure love for the craft as do the folks at Popular Woodworking. Their focus on hand tool skills has done more, in my opinion (I've been watching The Good Wife and so have learned some proper legalese for sticky situations), for the craft than any other magazine to date.

In unrelated earth shattering news, I've nearly finished rebuilding the Toolemera website, cleaning up extra junk, polishing the brass and generally making it look spiffy. I'm sure there are a few problems hiding in it's corners and such problems will be addressed as I learn of them.

Now that Mechanic's Companion is done, I'm getting back to long needed updates to The ToolChest Blog, Hand Tool Makers, and whatever other tasks await my attention. More titles to reprint too.

till next, Gary

Blog Review: The Literary Workshop

You might suspect my interest in a blog entitled: The Literary Workshop, might just be somewhat biased. Think not, my friend(s). Ok, think so.

The author of this blog, who I shall henceforth call "Steve", passes time as a moderator over at Woodnet, an English teacher, a reader of what appears to be a great many books, both esoteric and common and a hand tool woodworker.

He is comfortable discussing a translation of a medieval French book which includes a description of a woodworkers tools and the relevance of Homer's Odyssey to his personal passion for wood.

Steve also has a decided preference for making and using his own tools.

What more can you ask for? Stop over at The Literary Workshop Blog and set a spell.