Not for everybody ...

[Thumper]

... but I think this is really cool. This was laid out at an estate sale and I think it was kind of cool to learn a bit about who's stuff I'm digging through. I guess he was a transplanted Yankee, like most Florida residents these days. A long read maybe, but I enjoyed it. Maybe someone here will too.


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He was a prolific collector and this place has EVERYTHING. The guy doing the sale said it is the biggest (as in volume) he's ever done in his years of doing estate sales. Heck, the house is totally packed with all sorts of neat stuff, antiques, old tools, name it, it's there. If that's not enough, there are 20 storage containers on the property ... all stuffed to the gills!


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[DeputyDog]

Sounds like your kind of sale.

[Thumper]

Actually, I get "junk drunk" at sales like this sometimes. I end up just wandering around in a daze. It's really weird and has happened to me a few times when the amount of stuff is overwhelming. It's like when we go to a restaurant with a 12 page menu! I get to the point I'm simply staring at the menu and not even comprehending what I'm looking at. I usually just put it aside and ask Lynn to order something for me. To be honest, she usually knows what I like better than I do! Sounds weird, but it's true.

Anyway, I've actually walked away from sales like this before with just a few trinkets.

[BarryBobPosthole]

That could have been written about a lot of people in my parents' generation. I consider myself a pretty salty shade tree mechanic, I took my correspondance course in electronics when I was 14 from the esteemed Cleveland Institute of Electronics, CIE to us alums, and there ain't nothing I'm afraid to try to fix. I even get most of 'em back together. Some even work. And I'm not qualified to walk in the shadow of those a generation ahead of me. My step Dad is the best radio engineer I know. He has a thrid phone FCC license and a seventh grade education. When I talk electricity or radio with him, I shut up fast and listen. He bought an old sawmill once that had a busted housing that held the bushing and bearing for the main drive wheel. He built a forge out behind his shop and fabricated the part himself. It worked. The sawmill broke down for some reason or another and my Mom wouldn't let him fix it. She was scared to death of that thing.
I never liked working with him because he never talked while he was working and we'd go a whole morning without hardly a word spoken until dinner (what we called lunch).
Yep that was a long read. But a good one. Those kinds of skills don't seem to be valued much any more.

To me they're still relevant.

BKB

[LJ3]

I can relate pretty well. My next door neighbor growing up was a huge influence in my life. I was his "labor force" and trusty assistant. Even if it tripled the time for him to do something, he always taught me as we went along, every step of the way. He explained how stuff works to me in great detail. Being able to look at a machine (or most anything else) and figure it out, tear it apart, repair it and put it back together is something that comes easily to me, because of him.

None of my kids could give two shits about stuff like that.

[Thumper]

I think we are the end of the "repair it" generation. I think it's mostly due to the fact it's the way the manufacturing world operates now ... we're a throw-away society. Many things aren't even repairable these days ... if it breaks, you throw it away and buy a new one. I also grew up in the "repair it" era and I could fix most anything ... or at minimum, get it working until it could be repaired correctly (back in the day, we called that "nigger-rigging" ... or to be a just little bit more PC, "Southern Engineering"). I was always the "go to" guy when our radio or tv would go on the blink. Dad would give me a couple bucks, I'd pull the tubes, ride my bike to the corner drug store, run 'em through the tube-tester and buy a new tube to replace the bad one. There actually wasn't much I couldn't fix ... old lady Stamolis (no clue how it was really spelled), who lived down the street, would always come get me when her car wouldn't start (I was maybe 10-12 at the time). It was almost always a stuck choke and I'd pull the air cleaner, operate the butterfly by hand and get her going. Nowadays, if a neighbor has a problem like that, I'll open the hood, stare at whatever that big metallic thing is under the hood for a while, then suggest he/she call a tow truck. I remember I was at my buddy's house a few years back and he decided to teach his son (a new driver) how to change a tire on his car in case he ever had a flat. The kid looked at him like he was nuts and asked why he shouldn't just call AAA!

But again, it's not ALL the new generation's fault. Probably 30 years ago we burned up a blender during a party while making frozen margaritas and daiquiris. The next day, I called to order a new motor. I was told the motor would cost something like $60. WTF? I'd only paid $30 for the whole blender! I threw it away and bought a new one. :(

[Thumper]

BTW ... my favorite entry on the above list is #32. :)

[airbud7]

Good read Thump...my fav is #20 /dam skeeters :)

[Thumper]

Minnesota .... that reminds me. WTF ever happened to Dave Estensen? The Supreme Dufus. He just fell off the face of the Earth.

[quercus alba]

I have no particular talent. Not a mechanic, carpenter nor electrician. I told my boys when I'm gone, no headstone, no obit no funeral with a bunch of people I barely know talking about what a great guy I was. Just cremate me and chunk the ashes out the window on the way home. Not worth much to folks alive and none dead.

[LJ3]

Minnesota .... that reminds me. WTF ever happened to Dave Estensen? The Supreme Dufus. He just fell off the face of the Earth.

Easy peasy.

https://www.facebook.com/david.estensen?ref=br_rs

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[LJ3]

I have no particular talent. Not a mechanic, carpenter nor electrician. I told my boys when I'm gone, no headstone, no obit no funeral with a bunch of people I barely know talking about what a great guy I was. Just cremate me and chunk the ashes out the window on the way home. Not worth much to folks alive and none dead.

Don't make me add Eeyore to your title :)

[quercus alba]

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[Thumper]

Easy peasy.

https://www.facebook.com/david.estensen?ref=br_rs

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I have pics of that dufus around here someplace from when we went up to TW's for some Canadian walleye fishing. Dang, I'm a pumphead and can't remember everyone who went. I went up about 3 times I think and I get the trips confused. I'm pretty sure some fugly Okie hairy red-headed dude was along on that trip. Trying to remember if Bucky was there. Dang my memory sucks lately. :(