Some More Bits of The Old Bits and a New Little Bit

The wind started blowing again... Friday? or Saturday? To tell the truth I'm not sure. It started and hasn't quit. I'm sure.

Back on the ranch we lived in a little cabin that sat in a wind tunnel. The wind howled down through there, it once blew my 8500 pound shop trailer 8 feet. You could stand in the bedroom and watch the wall move like the cabin was breathing.

Bottom line is, wind wore out its welcome with my short tempered backside a long time ago.

Today... I've got Dances With Wolves soundtrack on the stereo... with the Volume cranked up trying to drown out the roaring sound of the freight train continuously heading for Kansas...

In spite of the wind... I got some work done standing in front of it yesterday. First project was to construct a small bit of equipment to ease a part of journal making; A "punching cradle".

*Punching cradle in front... Signature Stitching Frame behind*

For the un-initiated... you have to punch the holes in the signatures before you can put them in the stitching frame and sew all the signatures into a "book block". So... having a Cradle helps index all the sheets of a signature squarely and all of that...

If I can find the ambition that the wind has blown around here... somehwere... I should get to the book block stitching today... and maybe even get on to some of the leather stitching... I have to sew the decorative tooled plate and the closure billet together...

Also got a good bit of sanding done on the saddlebags yesterday. I keep putting that off...because I think I told you already... I HATE THE WIND!!!

Wouldn't be a problem except for the fact that whoever built the dang shed did it with  the door of the garage/shop opening straight into the prevailing wind... all they had to do was turn the darn thing 90 degrees to the south... some peoples kids...

A guy could just leave the door closed... but then the only illumination amounts to tiny points of light way up in the dark of the ceiling. Just enough so you see ghosts floating around in the shadows.

So... to work the door stays open and you try not to bang into the back wall when a big gust makes it through the wind break.

 Being unable to wait on that blustery wind any more...

I really ground on the bad saddle bag lid yesterday... removed all the top finish and the primer...

More bad spots appeared as the finish came off...

In places had to remove the gel coat clear to the fiberglass to get through the cracks that had developed and failed the paint...

It's all ground down now ready to apply a coat or two of fresh resin to repair the damage and seal it up... then repaint and reinstall...

IF... the dang wind will ever quit to allow it!!!

But for now... another cup of coffee... replay the soundtrack... and get to punching signatures for that journal... stitching covers... and stringing words in new novels...

Brian

Carving Leather on the Dinette... While the Wind Blows.

No work on the bike today. The wind is howling through the windbreak... making it too cold and blowy for my tastes... over in that garage.

Since it's gonna take some little while to figure out how to acquire a new work space... I'm tinkering with a few journals in the mean time... with the idea of working my leather carving skills back into shape.

Tooling leather is a perishable skill. Like riding a bike, if you step away for a while you can't instantaneously get back on and ride like you used to. The good news is, it comes back faster than when you had to learn it the first time.

Only took two evolutions to get a working pattern and the same number of efforts to get the tooled plate for the closure side of the cover done.

Still not back to what I used to could do... but it's coming. Have to stitch that plate in place and get the signature block stitched together. Then decide a couple of other small things to get her finished up...

This is the journal I'm planning on donating to the Drake fire department for its auction. Maybe so it'll gain 'em a bit of help.

Lord knows I can use the karma.

At the least... trying to do what I used to do in a 24 x 40, fully equipped shop... on a 2 x 4 table, provides a bit of motivation to find a solution to the workspace issue.

Brian

In The West Is a Place... Where the Grass is Tall, The Water is Sweet...

Stubborn is a word that often carries a negative connotation... a nicer word is perseverance. When you're tired but still have a couple hundred feet of fence line to string, it gets you to the end.

You put your mind to the task. You ignore the wind, the rain, the cold. You just focus on digging those post holes, hangin' that wire... building that fence.

But... it can blind you too... like frogs in a pan... and each little bit the water gets warmer... 9 of the 10 frogs swim around extolling the virtues of their world and how fortunate they are to have such a nice warm pool of water. The 10th lil green fella keeps looking over the edge of the pan...

He sees the big hand come down and turn the knob... and in a bit the water gets warmer... he adds it up, figures it out, and don't see a harmonious outcome. So... he tries to tell everbody and points at the hand.

Of course they all laugh at him. Call him names. Whiner, Complainer, downer... and worse... and he sees the hand again... and the water is yet warmer... and the ridicule sends him off alone.

It hurts him... but... he climbs out and leaves...  Some time later, he hears about a disaster where 9 frogs got boiled alive...

I'm goin' home...

*Brian - 1968*

*Cheiran - 1977+-*

*Cheiran - early '90's*

*Sonja - 2013*

*Leather Shop and Journal Making*

Somewhere... if I have to crawl... Is a place where I can fit... a place where the "mix" sorts itself out.

Sunrise on the farm this morning...

and views... around the place...

*The High Lonesome in the Distance*

Somewhere is a place... where the quiet allows horses to drive away the ghosts... Where your simple labor isn't stolen from you... where you don't have to guard your back 24/7.

I'm going there.

Brian

Just Piddling Along

Things along the front range just keep on keepin' on...

Finished up the new stitching horse a few days ago...

Only need to sand it up a bit and put a coat of some sort of varnish on it.

Going to put it to work pretty quick I think.

If I get my kiester in gear... There's a fundraising auction for the Drake Fire Department (the one in the hardest hit of the flood areas) in about three weeks...

I'm thinking of building a journal to donate for that. Might be a nice way to kick off restarting my leather.

Work on the bike is proceeding real slow... many 'second thoughts'...

Many times in the past I've sold off one thing I'd thought I didn't want or need... only to discover that I held it in greater esteem than I'd thought...

 Funny how you live with a machine for thousands of miles... but only really see the blemishes that developed when you focus in on cleaning her up...

Somewhere this past summer over along the west coast her wheels got chewed up... somehow.

Considering that motorcycle wheels are several hundred dollars a pop...

You don't just run out and replace 'em...

So... when I'd spotted this damage...

and from what source it came I've no idea...

I figured I was well and truly screwed...



It was a nice change to have things kinda go "right" with that though.

I discovered that with some fine "wet" sanding and some elbow grease...

The damage will clean up right well...

Turned out... it was ALL in a clear coat the wheels were finished with. Remove that and all's well...

and should be easier to maintain.

So then it was on to filling in the ditches of the lawn sprinkler irrigation system I've been remodeling in exchange for parking rights.

Now today... unless I decide to stay out of the dust and just go do laundry... again... It's back to the fiberglass repair of the cracked saddlebags.

The manufacturer of those has also decided that it has no interest in warrantying its product... which is truly what I expected they'd tell me.

And of course... there's the books... another plan gone awry. Funny how when you set your mind to a schedule... the sucker takes a leave of absence. ;)

Get a few of these outside tasks completed and maybe so I can find that errant wanderer and get IT back to work...

Still Kicking the Can Down the Road...
 Brian 

Tilting Against Windmills... Or ... the Benefits of Chemical Enhancement

and the last in a series running against the wind...

Well... IDK where to begin or what to say... considering that I'm nigh onto three sheets in the wind and cornfuzzled to the max to boot! knowin me... with sufficient lubrication the disjointed tangents could get difficult to follow.

So... here goes... it's up to you to decide... is the crazy drunken cowboy spinning yarns of fiction? or telling a wild story of genuine International Intrigue? Bwahahahahaha... who cares? It doesn't much matter cuz nobody listens to a wild eyed bald headed mountain cowboy any way!

That's the nice thing about a fine Ale... it doesn't change what you think... only releases the inhibition to say it!

This could be my first post written in a chemically enhanced state... but most times, chemical enhancement moderates my more aggressive tendencies...  it can also often degrade my language to less than polite... so reader beware!

Yep, beware! Crudeness combined with the fact that the true story is so bizarre it eases the ability of the system to demonize anyone who exposes that truth. The truth being so wild it defies credibility... but what the hell... I'm half drunk so why not tell a good tale... even if it be the truth! Pull out all the stops and Tell it to the max!

Ha!... I said To the Max! Twice! ... I don't know if I've even ever said that once since my first hitch in the army... :)

I've often wrote 'bout never givin' up... never givin' in. That the only thing that counts is courage and honor. Trouble is... little honor exists in the highest "status levels" of humanity.

Bundy shmundy... this ain't 'bout him and never was... him and his are irrelevant to the big picture... His story is just the friggin game used to distract and manipulate... like a game of emotional chess.

You know as well as I, or you should... that those that strive and lust for power and control do it as the current managers of the family business. They see their elite breeding as blessing them with special rights superior to yours and mine. It travels through the generations. The "Ruling Elite" of today... when you trace the maggots back... you find they are, heavily, the descendants of the "Nobility" of a few hundred years ago...

Yep... the counts and lords, Princes, Dukes and Sovereigns... Lord Valdemort!... the name that shall not be mentioned! bwahahahahahaha... ooops... guess I mentioned it huh? 

... Kind of contradicts what you think of when you hear the word Noble don't it? The original "Double Speak?" useless vermin all.

Not real? Really? Then why does the U.S. Constitution specifically forbid the granting of titles of Nobility? ... think about it. Why do you see a constant assault on the Constitution? if it weren't an obstacle to them? hmmmmm?

But, that is the reality. When people say to me; "Who would bother to engage in things that won't pay off for fifty or a hundred years? They'll be dead then! It doesn't make sense!" I respond; "Those who see themselves in the light of "Old Money" ... "Nobility"... the "Family Heritage"...

When those conniving "nobles" got thrown out on their sorry asses those hundreds of years back... they immediately began working to regain their Family Line's power.

The increasingly educated masses could no longer be deceived with the pathetic; "Ordained by God" malarkey the parasites had been spouting... so they had to come up with a new plan.

And the new plan? We don't need dictatorial power. All we need is Control of the economics. Control the money... control the machinery of Government... control Information... and it's every bit as good as being the blood sucking, soul eating parasitic king or queen.

But secrecy is the kingpin of their operation.

Nowadays they can even hide their machinations in plain sight behind the cloak of National Security.

They don't even have to own the land either. Their names can remain shrouded in mystery... they only need CONTROL of it by having the government control it. Have the ability to manage the Sanctity of Law to impose their control.

They no longer need to collect rent directly from tenants and be a widely known prominent Target... not when they can filter their identification into anonymity while embezzling billions via the "good ol' boys" network of contracts paid out of Taxes!

Better even, because now if they do their jobs well and fine... Nobody can even see 'em doing it! So they can't get thrown out again!!!

It becomes comical when they engage in their clever little games though. Because it flies right on past most folks. It's fun to watch and see them Not. See. A. Thing. The ruling elite get bored counting their billions and need to stir the pot a mite. They delight in slipping out little gems to see if ANYONE is even awake to notice...

If anyone DOES notice... and points it out... "Look! Do you see that?"... it's easy... those poor dumb bastards foolish enough to point and holler at the beast in the bushes are painted with the; "right wing christian gun nut conspiracy theorist white supremacist" brush... It's hysterical.

Baaaa Baaaa Baaaaa ... and the "nobility", impressed with their own skills, laugh themselves to sleep...

Know this... they OWN the means of communication and dissemination of information. Information is THE power. If you control what people hear and know... you control THEM.

These people have more money than they could ever consume... so they have to find something to entertain their intellects... "Let's herd people" ... Your life, and what they do to it... is a friggin' game to these black hearted bastards.

So... let's see... one of those pearls they let 'slip'? ... The Wizard of OZ... "Pay no attention to the man behind the Curtain!"... Bwahahahahahahahahaha...They been playin' this game a long damn time people... hundreds of years...

And Walt Disney... the sheer number of hidden little "Gems" in those animated movies... is STUNNING! They play with your minds like children play with marbles.

Also... To understand what goes on... on the "World Stage"... you have to understand the mindset and goals of the Major Players...

"Why is this important to me?" you ask? "I don't have anything to do with international intrigue, I'm a plumber!" It's important Because it's your life I'm talking about! Your children's lives. Their children's children!

Because... everything they do is about herding the masses to serve THEM, however they see fit. splinter society into innumerable factions. Set this group against that one to prevent ANY group from ever building enough power to challenge their command.

You vote for your democrat against his republican? Bwahahahahahahaha... they get their marching orders from the same place! Bwahahahahahahahaha.

All the wars... throughout the history of Humanity... were ordered by one "Ruling Elite" in the effort to seize land, power and servants from the Other "Ruling Elite"... and the obedient masses were the patriotic cannon fodder...

...the masses... march  along... Baaaa Baaaa Baaaa to their doom like good little obedient sheep.

You know who does manage to slip behind the curtain and see the truth? The soldier... but for him it's too late.

I have herded hundreds of cattle... hundreds... by my lonesome... with nothing but the slight of hand that led those damn fool cows to believe that ~I~ held some great power over them. One horseback 160 lb. runt... conquering the minds of a hundred 1200 lb. beasts.

This is not one damn bit different... You are being herded by a slight of hand MIND game... wake the hell up... it's not just in the movies...

Or stay in a self medicated state of chemical enhancement... at least the pain of betrayal is less sharp then.

Just a right wing christian gun nut conspiracy theorist...
Brian

Politics... Religion... and Never Being Understood

I have spent the greater part of my life running against the wind... I say blue, people hear green. I say east, people hear south. I speak Mountains, people Believe I MEAN desert... I say most... people insist I said ALL.

Frustration says; Give it up. You can lead a horse to water but you can't make him drink.

Debating politics or religion (which IS only theology used as a political tool having nothing to do with belief) is the proverbial Fart against a windstorm; Because most are going to twist your words if they don't fit, into what Does fit their agenda. If you didn't say it they simply say you did.

It's like standing under a falling Redwood and thinking; "If I'm smart enough I can conjure up a way to deflect it."  ...nothing but pure, human arrogance about to receive a solid dose of reality.

There is in this life no stopping or deflecting the falling trees. History is replete with inumerable examples... IF... you are awake enough to learn from history. But, most think they're smarter than those before, so education rarely occurs.

Not only do they... believe they will be the ones to make the repeatedly failed foolishness work; they also believe their superior intellect gives them the moral authority to impose their already failed arrogance on all others by whatever force is required.

"Tyranny of the Majority occurs when the majority places its interests above the rights of an individual or minority group, constituting active oppression comparable to that of tyrants and despots."

Your "interests" do not outweigh the rights of the individual... though current political thought is contrary to that reality. This child will not be imposed on and he damn sure won't be tyrannized.

There is but one viable option for such as me; Stand back out of the way and out from under the collapsing weight of that tree. Put yourself where you can be one of the survivors that builds a new cabin from the rubble... and heats it from the splintered pieces after the tree hits the ground.

Human society in its overpopulated, over-regulated, over self-involved, chattel-of-the-state condition has grown too corrupt, too polarized, too manipulated and propagandized for salvation. There is no communication, no co-operation. There is only "the party" and "the cause".

Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness? Those things are largely gone, replaced with dog and pony shows to keep the masses distracted and placated ~or~ They are kept scrambling by a system designed to do just that, keep them scrambling to subsist, so they've little time or energy left to question or resist.

Life is by permit. Liberty is assigned. The speech of "Freedom of speech" is proscribed. Pursuit of Happiness is licensed.

You are free to speak in this country? Really? Ask the ex CEO of Mozilla. Only Gays are free to speak... Anyone else can only express their beliefs if they don't need a job. Fire a gay for supporting his beliefs and see how far you get. Double speak and double standards are the Standard for the day.

There are consequences ONLY for those who speak un-approved ideas. What part of Censorship do you not understand?

Open your mouth outside of BLM assigned "First Amendment Areas"... and you get tased, assaulted by dogs and thrown on the ground... as recently proven in Nevada. Freedom has been reduced to a relic of history... except for those individuals and groups who are willing to endure the wrath of the majority for daring to disobey their edicts... in order to remain a free human being.

Saving the "system" as it is, has become akin to; finding a house so eaten up with termites that the only thing left standing is actually only the paint that coated its structure... and thinking you can repair it.

The core... the spine of the house is gone. Nothing salvageable remains to be saved. That such a house... or that tree hollowed by rot will fall is inevitable. It is only a matter of time.

I have known human ugliness so soul blackening it sucks the light out of the sun. Joy surrounds me yet the echoes of that ugliness override the light. Now, the people party on around the campfire ignoring the warnings... Cursing those who try to warn them...

... only the guard standing on the wall hears the creatures and sees their shadows moving around out in the dark... The partying folks, living the good life, are willfully ignorant of what lurks in the shadows. They just turn the volume on the boombox louder so they can't hear the warnings. They deliberately shout down anyone who utters a warning they don't want to hear.

Ok. Fine.

~~~~~~

It is said that we leave home so that we can come back again and see it with a new perspective, a fresh appreciation...

... Some how, some where, some way... I'm going Home.

It has been said of those who stand and that those who resist the insidious growth of Tyranny; are but savages hungry for bloodshed. The worn old cliche' of "stop complaining and count your blessings" is used to beat them into submission.

We fully understand our Blessings. That. Is. The. Point. We understand their value with full appreciation of their cost. We stand to defend them with our lives.

The claims I enumerated just above insult the finest men I've ever known and denigrate my duty to them.

My duty is to THEM...

Those who can only defile the character of those with the courage to stand... and seek to publish only their faults... need to understand that they live in the grace provided by those whom they defile...

Brian

A Bit of Truth About Cliven Bundy et. al.

This isn't about cattle or who owns the land. It's not even about Cliven Bundy.

It's about one man acting in ways that says YOU and the "American People" and their corrupt government are losing their power to control one man and his family.

"Free" society doesn't like such disobedience.

The truth is the American experiment is dying... just as surely as the prospect of Freedom is dying in those soviet republics now being reconquered by Putin... with the world drawing line after meaningless line...

That carries the echoes of Chamberlain and Hitler... "Peace in our Time"...

Now we bring that same sort of arrogance home to a small corner of Nevada... and one man standing against corruption, malfeasance and a political order that sees people as cattle... and NOT the free people they like to fantasize themselves as being.

Sure, you can run about and spout your ideas... as long as you stand within the "Free Speech area"... move out of that and you are tased and beaten... You are only permitted to speak your mind in approved ways. Step out of those approved ways and your ideas won't be questioned or debated...

YOU will be personally demonized. YOU will be shouted down and YOU will be crushed under the weight of obedient Sheeple. Your ideas will be buried under the volume of the personal assault... and THAT is the intention.

Let a man like Bundy stand up against your corrupt and cannibalistic masters in D.C. ... and the good little serfs who complain day after day of the actions of those same corrupt parasites will be the FIRST to line up and shout what a vile and selfish person he is... because he's not "Paying his fair share"... Paying to who? Them?

And those saying he was damaging the land? Endangering a freaking tortoise? What do those hypocrites and liars do? They tear out the water tanks and the water lines put in by that "damaging rancher" that made that land even habitable for wildlife...

You know what Jim Bridger and those mountain men found throughout much of the west? NOTHING. That's right. A very great part of Nevada, Utah, Arizona... all across the west was uninhabitable by deer, coyotes, birds... just about anything... because there was NO WATER...

But there is water you say? There are stock ponds and wells... 

Who put in that water? The forest service? The BLM? ANY Federal agency? No. It was THE RANCHER. and not with their Fees. They did the work directly (above and beyond the "Fees"). The fees just flow back to D.C. to pay for Congressmen's pensions.

...and then all the people reviling the actions of men like Bundy scream that he's not paying his fair share... because the federal mordida hasn't been paid.

The ranchers did the work. They drilled the wells, dug the ponds and tanks. Ran thousands of miles of water lines so their cattle could utilize the land...

... and WHO or WHAT benefited? The Wildlife that could now ALSO utilize that land... and YOU who had the lowest cost of food of any "developed" society on earth... due to the improvements sweated, bled and PAID FOR by the Ranchers and Farmers who put them in On Their Nickle.

It was the Ranchers... not the sierra club, wilderness society or friends of the earth. It was the Ranchers who have spent their lives nurturing the land with their sweat, their blood and their hearts.

Now, in reward for generations of hard work nurturing and improving the land while running against the federal wind... they are run off it at gunpoint.

You always hear the fabricated claims of overgrazing...and how they do it for generations... except for a tiny, little, ignored fact of physics... Ranchers who overgraze - Don't last. It's a mathematical equation. The land is an unmerciful mistress. If you don't live with it in sustainable ways... She will crush you. The only way a Rancher can remain in business, is to nurture the land with care and wisdom... but care and wisdom is a foreign idea to government.

Government is Only concerned with power and the obedience of the ruled.

When the metal meets the meat... there are only 3% who are going to stand with the likes of Bundy. The rest, the Sheeple, are going to sit quiet (when they aren't bleating obediently to their masters; "There's one! There's one! Get him!) and wait to see which way they are to be herded.

Baaaa Baaaa Baaaaa...

You wonder how the Germans did what they did to as many? You are watching it!

Don't like my language and my ideas... Tough.

Brian

Custom Made Saddles...

Two custom made saddles... Two pretty different ways of going...

The saddle on the Yamaha was built for me by Dan and his crew at Bitchin' Stitchin' in Lakewood, Colorado...

It carried me to Alaska, across Montana, down the Pacific Coast Highway a ways... across the Arizona Desert and through a few snows and muddy roads in Colorado.

The other is the working saddle I designed based on a Wade Tree and had built by Rocky Minster in Chandler, Arizona back in about '88. I changed the cantle a bit, had him leave out one of the ground seat pieces to lower the front of the seat even more than usual, changed the horn to be even a bit stouter than normal.

It's the best saddle I've ever owned and the most comfortable I've ever rode.

Both of those saddles have carried me quite a few miles. I rode that Wade for a lot of years. That Cowboy saddle took me through blizzards, heilatious hail storms, mud bogged and got upside down with a fool bronc once or twice.

I think it also may be able to lay the stronger claim to any part of me that I like or that's of any use.

There's an old saying around the ranches; "I never sold my saddle." ... well... I never did... when it comes to that Wade... I never will.

There's a lot of memories in both those saddles...

Thinking of the Sunny Slopes of Long Ago
Brian

Forgotten Wreakage..

Much of the Country, more concerned with the latest troubles of the Kardashians and the most recent political scandals ... haven't given a thought... to real difficulties.

The dashing of hopes and memories... the near erasure of entire communities...

The summer of 2013 was the summer of the floods for Colorado... after a couple of years of devastating fires...

The Name for the continuation of living around here is Come Hell or High Water... Colorado Mountain Strong... from the burning hell of the fires to the raging waters... Colorado has taken it and kept on going...

Took off for a drive up into the Big Thompson Canyon area headed for those far blue mountains. The canyon runs up into the mountains pointing at those snowy peaks which stand above Estes Park.

It's coming up on a year since the storms. The damage yet remains. Years will pass before it is all healed. It wasn't just a little bit of water. From just west of Loveland on into the mouth of the canyon the damage begins and repairs are ongoing... for miles.

The town of Drake... was largely erased. Two or three buildings remain... the general store and the post office. Another across the road... but most else is pretty much gone. The cabins on the higher slopes are there... Rebuilding has begun.

The road itself, running up the side canyon appears to have largely been scoured out. Miles of pavement are gone. What appears to be largely fresh fill replacing it...

Bridges start nowhere... and end nowhere... the land gone on both sides...

This little bridge... had served what appears to be a pic nic ground or campground... served by this outhouse...

Not much of that camp is left...

Cabin after cabin, house after house left hanging above... nothing... those that were even left at all...

We passed great large areas of canyon bottom...scoured clean by the floodwaters... where I remember cabins and small farms...

 

Another pic nic / camp area... look at the picture above... the abutment in the center... used to be... the far side of the stream... You can see the fireplace and tables in the background...

Now... from the other direction... you can see how much land was removed... and this is miles of destruction above the confluence of this side canyon and the main Big Thompson Canyon...

Estes Park itself seems to have weathered the best... Though it was quiet in this early season... But along the main canyon of the Big Thompson river... Mile after mile of ruins...

These are just a few that remain to even be photographed... saw many spots where what had been there... was just... gone...

Here... they've already filled back in that whole hillside, which had washed away... below these cabins...

Crews and folks are moving everywhere with the advent of spring. Hauling debris, dumping fill. Tearing out the ruined... building new... picking up what's left and moving on.

Even the road that was built after the last great flood... designed to withstand such rages...

Was nearly lost... when the river ate out the rock underneath it. You're not supposed to be able to see those pilings under the road way. They'd been set into the rock of the river bed. Until the river removed the rock! They were repairing a mile or so of this sort of damage...

Wreakage... you look at what's left... and what you can do with it... and then you pick up the pieces, move on and get to work.

Brian

Whittling, Waiting and Fancy Feathers

Making some progress on the stitching horse... Ended up having to bring a couple parts over to the trailer to laminate up. When it's too chilly out in the garage for the glue, you got to find other options.

I've got the base most all together. I changed the design, as is my usual way, on the fly. I'd planned on just cutting shims to set the leg angle and then on a whim, chose to bevel cut into the side bars... I think it'll make a better tool.

I've got to finish laminating up, and then shaping the jaws, put on the lower leg braces. Then it's mount the jaws into the frame, cut the seat deck and the most tricky part of all; cut in and assemble the operating mechanism I've got imagined (that I've NEVER seen built into a stitching horse).

That goes through the leg on the left (as you face it) and will work that off side (right side as you're sitting on it) jaw. The longer one. I should get that done in the next few days... barring any diversions... which are ALSO my usual way.

I'll also need at some point... to come up with the seat cushion for my bony kiester... an eight or ten inch wide chunk of wood gets a guy a mite wiggly after perching on it for a couple hours of stitching and braiding...

This piece is a requisite in any complete leather shop. Gets used not only for stitching, but braiding and lacing are much simplified if you're not trying to hold the piece you're working on with your teeth and a third hand... that don't exist! Much easier to fabricate that third hand.

I still need that high dollar leather stitching machine, not to mention the fabrication of a clicker... but my hopes remain high that some long lost Irish Count relative I never knew about will die and leave me a modest fortune in the next six weeks or so...

The bike work has been suspended while I wait a slight bit for warmer weather... It's parts aren't so easily brought to the rig to work on. ;) So she just sits there in the back of the garage and waits her turn.

Today I'll crawl into Evin's basement... and check out that sagging floor... and hopefully go locate the support post and other necessities to get her bathroom floor doing a bit less of an imitation of the deck of the titanic...

Then... if the weather holds... might could even start digging a ditch or two... beats splitting the wind in the Arizona desert... don't it? ...

Um... not so much... ;)

The farm has seen some changes. They've torn out a lot of the old concrete irrigation ditches and put in a fancy new Pivot system and dug a big retention pond for it's supply water.

Preparations are in high gear for the spring planting... which makes finding supper a little bit of a problem for some of the locals...

Just a couple days ago he and his gals had a field of corn stubble to sift through for groceries... plowed and disced... now... there's not much left for a meal.

One Day at a Time
Brian