Things that make men go “Oooooh!”
Here’s a nice little tribute piece about the Buck 110 folder.
I’ve always loved Buck knives — pretty much of any type or description — and I sometimes wonder why I don’t own more than one, a Buck 500 Gent (now called the “Duke”), which has been a constant companion for over forty years.
That 110 is calling me — drop point blade, ebony grip plus brass caps… what’s not to like?
[Add to cart]
I believe I’ve ranted a few times [hyperbole alert] on this back porch against modernity, and quite often against things that operate automatically as opposed to being physically operated by the user.
I know that automation makes things easier; it’s just that this ease comes at the expense of control, and I don’t like that. Here are two examples:
Bolt-action over semi-auto rifles. I know that it’s a lot of fun shooting an M1 Garand or M1 Carbine; I’ve done it often, and love it. But nothing gives me more satisfaction than working a fine bolt action, whether a Mauser turnbolt or a Schmidt-Rubin straight pull. Yes, it’s a bigger hassle to rechamber a cartridge manually than to have a mechanical doodad do it for you — although I would suggest that reloading a 30-round magazine is an even bigger PITA, as all the mag-loading assist devices on the market would suggest.
Manual transmission over automatic gearboxes. As with the above, there is a case to be made for the labor-saving nature of the auto gearbox — in stop-start traffic, for example — but with a stick shift, one is always in better control of the vehicle. I know, I’ve suggested that one doesn’t drive an automatic car as much as just steer it, and I’m not altogether wrong, either.
Now I’m going to add yet another category to the manual/auto dichotomy.
Some time back I was given a watch as repayment for a favor — I hasten to add that said repayment was absolutely not requested nor even expected — and this is the watch, a Tissot Heritage:
Note the supreme simplicity of the watch face: easy-to-read numerals, no date, and… a manual action. It’s the first manual watch I’ve owned since I was a pre-teenager, and I love it with a passion. I even wear it around the house, unlike all my other watches.
One of the things that has always bothered me about quartz (battery-powered) watches is that the damn batteries have to be replaced about every year, requiring a trip to the watch-repair place or jeweler. (I purchased a lifetime replacement policy which at least takes away the nagging cost of replacement — best $100 I ever spent — but it’s still a hassle to schlep my dormant quartz watches over to the mall, every damn year.) I have two of these things, and I love them both, for different reasons. They are the (l-r) Tissot 1853 and Dooney & Bourke Explorer:
(I know, the D&B is overly-complicated and a little bulky, but when I saw it back in 2003 I fell in love with it despite all that, and bought it on the turn.)
Neither of the above cost more than $300.
My only automatic watch is a Seiko Sports (about which I’ve ranted before):
The issue I have with this watch is that when the spring runs down (and it does that overnight), it is a huge PITA to reset the day and date. To keep it going, I would have to buy one of those winding motor thingies, and… oy, they break, stop working (just read the 1-star comments) and that would irritate the living shit out of me. En passant, they’re all made in China except for the German ones which can cost well over $500 (!!!). So… no.
The Seiko is the only, and last automatic watch I will ever own.
I don’t mind winding the Heritage every morning — it’s like making the coffee, pouring the breakfast gin or brushing the teeth: a simple daily maintenance chore, and the watch-winding can be done while I’m reading the newspaper. But it keeps time well, it looks great on my wrist, and… well, that’s really all I need from a watch.
Of course, it doesn’t end there. Having established that principle, I immediately went to Teh Intarwebz to see what other steam-powered watches I could get if Teh Lottery Gods were to ever get their shit together:
And if the lottery money was BIG:
As a rule, I don’t like gold watches… but Vacheron’s looks fantastic — and hey, everyone should have at least one gold dress watch, right?
And finally, this one because it’s a truly eccentric way of putting the date function onto a watch:
Needless to say, it is by far the most expensive watch ($25,000) on the list, but I did say a BIG lottery win, after all.
And every last one is a mechanical-wind action.
Over at Wristwatch_Revival, Marshall gets an old (1960s-era) Omega Constellation working again. And by the time he’s done…
I have no words. That tapered dial, the simple numerals… it whispers “elegance” like their newer bling-studded geegaws can’t (no pics: I don’t even want to put them on the same page as this beauty).
I would wear this watch every night of the week, and most especially if I were eating at a fine restaurant each night with, say, Nigella Lawson.
Am I alone in loving these things so much?
By the way, this is one of Marshall’s earlier shows, where he was still finding his way around the craft. There are a couple of mishaps, one hilarious.
Via Reader Old Texan in his Friday email, I see this lovely little thing:
…which leads me to ask: whatever happened to cap guns?
I grew up with the things — I mean, that one on the pic could have been the one I had as a kid, except my gun’s ur-nickel plating was long gone through much pocketing and abuse. And my poor mother had to deal with my constant nagging each Saturday morning (when I got my paltry allowance) to take me to the hardware store or drugstore to get five rolls of those excellent caps (which would last me till, oh, Sunday afternoon; I haven’t changed much).
I’d assumed that they’d been declared illegal because eeeevil guns, and caps ditto because EXPLOSIVE MATERIAL!!!! but I see that plastic ones (eeewww!!!), die-cast revolvers and even cap roll guns are sold through Amazon. Sadly, the first two of these use “ring caps” which are terrible because boys can’t create mini-explosive devices out of them, as we did with the cap rolls when I were a Lad Of Extreme Mischief. (I should point out that my Dad showed me how to do this, which says it all, really.)
But can you buy ring caps or paper roll caps through Amazon? Silly rabbit, of course you can’t, no doubt because you have to fill out ATF Form #4376-5-3 or some such bullshit before such a sale can be “allowed”.
I think you can still buy the cap rolls at Tractor Supply stores and ring caps at Big Lots! (note: they are out of stock in both outlets). But wait: what have we here? Aaahhh, Tin Toy Arcade to the rescue:
I have to say, though, that relatively speaking, those guns are Colt Python-expensive, for toys. Especially when you can get the Real Thing for a little more than three times the price:
…and the plainer .22 LR-only version for little more than double:
…as used by Daughter as her first gun.
But let’s not go there.
I suspect, by the way, that societal pressure is forcing these lovely cap guns to be disappearing fast because We Cannot Allow Children To Play With Violent Toys.
What a load of old bollocks.
An Austrian supermarket was evacuated after the store manager reportedly spotted a banana-loving spider capable of causing permanent erections in men.
The Penny shop in Krems an der Donau, 45 miles west of Vienna, remains closed since Tuesday over fears of the four-inch black and red spider.
Emergency services were called and warn the spider, still at large, may have been a highly venomous Brazilian Wandering Spider, known to reach Europe by hiding in bunches of bananas.
The creature is one of the planet’s most venomous spiders, and bites can be fatal after causing hypothermia, blurred vision, convulsions and, in some cases, erections. The spider’s venom is even being studied for use in erectile dysfunction treatments after it was found that a bite from one of the spiders can give male victims a painful four-hour erection.
Speaking as someone who as a young teenager suffered from an almost-permanent condition like this — thank you, Adolescent Hormone Flood* — this is actually no laughing matter.
So quit giggling, you maniacs.
Is there any good to be had from Third World countries other than as a place for massive and sustained nuclear ordnance testing, I ask myself?
Probably not; but then the same goes for Australia.
*Anecdote time: back in boarding school, one guy (no names, just in case) actually had a massive and sustained erection — so much so that after nearly a day of torment he went to see the school nurse. She smacked it on the tip with a metal spoon — yes, I know — whereupon he emitted a truly splendid and seemingly-endless ejaculation all over her and himself. That wasn’t the expected nor desired result, of course, but at least his woody subsided. When later asked by someone whether he couldn’t have just had a wank to achieve the same end, his reply was immortal: “What, in the fucking biology lab?”
Every so often one will come across a question to which the answer is self-evident, but someone’s going to ask it anyway. Here’s an example:
1. “When you find a rusted-out old kitchen knife, why not just toss it out and buy a shiny new one from Williams-Sonoma?”
— because nothing looks as fine as a well-restored blade, not just in appearance, but in its intrinsic history. Need proof? See here, where some guy with mad skillz goes after an old cleaver.
Here’s another one:
2. “Why would someone spend $170,000 on a replica of an old car?”
— because as long as the replica has been manufactured by engineers with all respect for quality as well as heritage, it’s worth it, and not the least because the originals require not just stupid money, but insanely-stupid money available only to Russian oligarchs, software company founders and parvenus like Jeff Bezos (also criminals, some overlap with the aforementioned).
(watch the second video at the link…)
Here’s another question of this ilk (but by no means the final one):
3. “Why is The Repair Shop such a popular TV show? All they do is restore old junk.”
…it’s not “junk”, it’s heritage, history, treasured artifacts and sentimental objects. To watch Steve Fletcher fixing an old clock, Will Kirk restoring an old piece of furniture or even those two old pink-haired biddies bringing wrecked toy dolls and teddy bears back to life is to see and feel the joy of a miniature triumph of life over death. If you are not moved by that, you are a foul, crass and cynical human being.
The overall answer to all the above questions can be summed up in one word:
Craftsmanship.
It’s a rare talent (and becoming rarer still when so many people are seduced by cheap, fragile and nasty knock-offs from China or Eastern Europe), and if we hold on to no other custom, craftsmanship is worth everything. To quote Oscar Wilde’s words from Lady Windermere’s Fan :
Cecil Graham: What is a cynic?
Lord Darlington: A man who knows the price of everything, and the value of nothing.
Cecil Graham: And a sentimentalist, my dear Darlington, is a man who sees an absurd value in everything and doesn’t know the market price of any single thing.
I know I’m always teetering dangerously close to the latter, but all I can say is: guilty as charged. Especially where beauty and craftsmanship are involved.