More blacksmith
This is also a product of the blacksmith’s art. Despite the fairly elaborate decoration on the latch mechanism, it wasn’t made by a jeweler. It’s the locking mechanism of a 16th C and it’s a surprisingly fiendish object.
The entire box is made of iron. The docent couldn’t tell me how much it weighs, but she reckoned it would take four men to shift it. She let me try the lid on another similar box, and it was honestly all I could do to lift it vertical.
On either side at the top, you can see two stout rings for padlocks. Centered between them in the box proper is the keyhole, and it’s fake. It goes nowhere. The real keyhole is hidden behind a boss in the center of the lid. It slips sideways, and there’s the hole. The sound it makes when you turn the key is epic.
It is further compartmentalized on the inside for papers and jewelry and whatnot. The idea was that great men had to have lots of coin on hand to pay for everything, especially when they traveled. There are four holes in the bottom for bolts, to bolt it to the bed of a cart for just that purpose.
If Robin Hood ever did make off with one like this, I hate to think how many Merry Man it would take to file enough of a slot into it to make room for a wedge to make purchase for a hammer. I don’t know how else you’d get it open.
May 7, 2014 — 9:57 pm
Comments: 8
Steel ivy.
On Sunday, I watched a blacksmith make this on an ancient forge. It’s about the size of the ball of my thumb.
He took a quarter inch mild steel bar and hammered the end into a sort of arrowhead shape.
Folded in half.
Part straightened again (this made the big vein down the middle).
Beat the little veins into the sides of the leaf.
Nipped it from the rod, leaving a nub of the rod behind.
Turned it and hammered at the nub, over and over, until it became a long, thin stem.
Hammered the stem around the nose of the anvil until he’d tied it in a knot.
Not much more than five minutes. It was awesome. We asked to see more examples of his work, and the blacksmith reached his blackened and callused paw into his pocket…and pulled out his iPhone.
Heh.
May 6, 2014 — 9:48 pm
Comments: 13
And then there were two…
I strongly suspect both these guys are from the same nest. Same species, same size. Jack has been haunting one corner of the garden. He’s either able to climb the tree or he’s waiting for them the fledge and scooping them off the ground.
Blackbird #2 was uninjured, maybe sliiiightly bigger than the first, and very freaked out by the whole Weasel Experience. He kept opening his mouth for food and then spitting it out. I think, actually, the open beak was aggression in his case. Eventually, he got hungry enough to be a good bird. He sure wanted out of the cage, though.
We went out for a few hours yesterday, so I took a chance. I locked Jack up in the house and left the cage outside, high up, near the nest, with the door open. When we came home, one bird was gone and I didn’t find him on the ground. Zo! Happy ending, let’s hope.
Unfortunately, the one left behind appears to be Irritating Spit Bird.
NB: yes, indeed, catnip takes the dick with Efrem Zimbalist, Jr. I think I’m about three dicks behind at the moment. Apologies if you’re waiting. I’ve got an Irritating Spit Bird on my drawing desk at the mo. So, back here, Friday, 6pm WBT, Dead Pool Round 63!
May 5, 2014 — 6:00 pm
Comments: 11
I can see a lot of this in my future
In case you can’t quite make it out, that’s me poking a glob of KitEKat on a toothpick into the open maw of Jack’s latest victim (he didn’t mean to hurt innybody, he just wants to playyyyyyy). This is a very birdy place and Jack is a bird-loving sociopath, so I might as well learn to do this now.
Birdy alert and feeding well. Making a nuisance of itself hopping all over my study. Very nearly a fledgling (perhaps it was on its first flight) so it shouldn’t be in care long, assuming it survives the encounter with the deadly cat’s mouth bacteria. In fact, I tried to give it back to its parents twice by putting it on branches near the nest, but he couldn’t quite make his way home. When I brought him in the first time, I thought the cold had done for him and it was quite a while before I got him hopping and chirping again.
I can roughly make out where the nest is, but I can’t possibly get there because it’s very high and the fruit cage is in the way. Parents followed me all around the garden all day calling me the worst names they could think of.
Anyhoo, he’s a baby Common Blackbird (Turdus merula). This is a completely different bird than the New World blackbirds of home. In case you ever wondered why the Beatles wrote a pretty lilting song about a bird that goes SKWA, Eurasian blackbirds don’t go SKWA. They have one of the nicest calls going. Check out their Wikipedia page for a couple of examples.
Have a good weekend, folks, and send nice thoughts to the little birdie.
May 2, 2014 — 10:22 pm
Comments: 18
Throw your paws in the air like you just don’t care
I don’t usually talk about my personal life — ‘tcha, no wait, successful bloggers don’t talk about their personal lives; I talk about mine all the time! Anyway, we’ve been waking up achey and we think our mattress is shot.
Either that or we’re just old. (Attentive readers will recall that May is my birthday month — not merely the month my birthday appears in, but a month-long celebration of the awesomeness of me).
Mattresses are expensive and science is cool, so we bought a cheap air mattress and just popped it on top of the old one. Not a permanent answer, but to test the age-versus-crap-mattress hypothesis. So far so good, but the top of the bed is, like, four feet from the floor now.
Illustrated: what happens when you hop up onto an air mattress where a cat is sleeping.
Bonus: I found this while image searching “bouncy castle” — bouncy Stonehenge!
May 1, 2014 — 10:50 pm
Comments: 26
Happy Walpurgis Night!
It is the 30th of April, the night before the Feast of Walpurga, AKA Walpurgisnacht. Walpurga was an 8th C English missionary to Germany, and that’s enough about her, because it’s mere coincidence that she was canonized on the 1st of May.
Walpurgis Night is the Germanic version of Beltane or May Day. It’s halfway between Spring equinox and Midsummer. A remnant of pagan “welcome Spring!” celebrations. But with witches and bonfires.
I burned some shit in the garden tonight, but for the comfort and safety of my neighbors, I kept my blouse on.
April 30, 2014 — 9:28 pm
Comments: 8
A bargain!
Géza Nikelszky (1877 – 1966) was a Hungarian artist and this is his “Jug with Pigeon and Weasel,” for some reason.
You can own this spectacular object for a Buy It Now price of only £4,999.00, shipped direct from Budapest.
Mr. eBay may be trying it on here. One came up for auction in 2012 with a starting bid of $783. They don’t say what the winning bid was, though, so perhaps demand for…this object went through the roof in the final moments.
Uncle B sent me the link. I fear he is shopping for me.
April 29, 2014 — 10:30 pm
Comments: 11
Fearless
And by fearless, I mean really fearless. Totally not afraid of things of things any sensible animal is afraid of, like rooftops, fire, lawn mowers, vacuum cleaners and the heavy traffic that goes up and down the road in front of the house all day.
That road. He’s not oblivious to it, he seems downright attracted to it. He’s been carried to the door by motorists twice. I run out when I hear car horns. I usually see him sauntering up the drive, but I caught him once sitting in the middle of the road with his tail curled around his paws, looking the other way while cars honked at him. For a while, I thought he might be deaf.
I’m really starting to wonder if this one will live to adulthood. That makes me terribly sad, because he’s such a nice little animal and we’ve gotten attached.
He’ll usually stay in the garden when we’re out there. We’ve taken to shutting him in when we’re not, at least during the hours of heaviest traffic. This is a hard house to seal up, though, and he’ll as soon go out a high window as a low one.
The internet doesn’t have any suggestions other than making all cats inside cats. Any idea when the fearless period wears off?
p.s. I beg you, no squashed pet stories. I’m sad enough as it is.
April 28, 2014 — 10:07 pm
Comments: 35
Socialized medicine sucks
I stepped on a rusty nail yesterday. Right up through the shoe and into the foot. It was a classic weasel trap: two old nails sticking up through a piece of wood in the tall grass in my next door neighbor’s back yard.
Typical. Her grandkids ran around back there the whole long weekend, and nothing. Me, I step around the back some sunny afternoon and bang. I’m disappointed there weren’t seven or eight rakes lying around so I could do the full Sideshow Bob.
I had no problem getting a same-day appointment from our local medical centre for a tetanus booster. I’ll say that about ’em…they always seem to be able to make time.
I asked the nurse lady if she’d like to see my boo boo. Her mouth said yes, but her eyes said, “why the hell would I want to see your dessicated old lady foot? I bet you haven’t had a pedicure in, like, forever.” Then she looked at it and nodded, like, “yep, there’s a small hole in your foot.”
What she didn’t say, and should have, is that it’s a quite small, shallow wound and so much more at risk of septicemia than tetanus. Because the nail shoved a lot of junk in there and it didn’t really bleed enough to clear it out. I should have been instructed accordingly.
But never mind. I gave it a good, long soak in salt water right after the injury. And another, later, in a mild bleach solution. I should be okay. Anyway, mortality from tetanus in the Western world is quite low nowadays.
Raise your hand if you knew what to do because you’ve spent most of your life mentally preparing for surviving the apocalypse…?
Good weekend, preppers!
April 25, 2014 — 9:39 pm
Comments: 30
A tale from the Kattholt
This saucy Icelandic lad is Birkir Fjalar Viðarsson. The cat is Örvar. Seven years ago, Birkir got a puppy, and Örvar said, “see ya!” and boogered off.
Reykjavík is a smallish place, Örvar was microchipped, so Birkir checked with the shelter regularly hoping to get him back. No joy.
But here they are, reunited, seven years later. It would have been sooner, but when Örvar turned up at the shelter, all his microchip info was outdated and they had to Google for Birkir. Cat is skinny but otherwise well.
A pretty ordinary story, I realize, but it does give a small glimpse into the feline brain. The cat reacted strongly to the first sight of Birkier, apparently — lept to his shoulder and obsessively sniffed his hair and beard. If you scroll down this Icelandic version of the story, you’ll see pictures of the cat burying his face in the man’s hair.
Be careful if you translate the page, though. You’ll get a bit more information and a bit more weirdness.
For example, Google Translate tells me Kattholt is Icelandic for shelter. But Birkir Fjalar Viðarsson means Green Helen Foster Hematology. And, you know, I’m not sure that’s entirely right.
April 24, 2014 — 10:10 pm
Comments: 18