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#1 ·
Old thread.

For current episodes, visit Stumpynubs.com.

THANKS!
 
#943 ·
A 2 minute illustrated history of woodworking (2014 Nordy's Entry)

A light hearted look at woodworking from cavemen to today… in verse… with drawings…

This is my entry for the 2014 Rockler Nordy's contest. I won the competition last year. Can I repeat?

Watch it here, and enjoy! Then come back and leave a comment so we know what you think!

(Friend us on facebook, follow us on Twitter, and visit the Stumpy Store to help support the show!)

Gesture Font Line Art Illustration
 

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#944 ·
A 2 minute illustrated history of woodworking (2014 Nordy's Entry)

A light hearted look at woodworking from cavemen to today… in verse… with drawings…

This is my entry for the 2014 Rockler Nordy's contest. I won the competition last year. Can I repeat?

Watch it here, and enjoy! Then come back and leave a comment so we know what you think!

(Friend us on facebook, follow us on Twitter, and visit the Stumpy Store to help support the show!)

Gesture Font Line Art Illustration
Clever!
 

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#962 ·
VIDEO BLOG: Questions about the new Box Joint Jig 2.0 answered, and some upgrades!

The new super-duper box joint jig design has drawn LOADS of emails, so I made a video to answer some of the questions, and to show you how to make a couple of upgrades to yours. Plus- what's the next homemade jig project? And when will we finish that "No BS Sawstop Review?"

Plans for the jig are available here.

(Friend us on facebook, follow us on Twitter, and visit the Stumpy Store to help support the show!)

 
#978 ·

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#979 ·

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#987 ·
One man's artsy is another man's fartsy...

A closely watched internet auction ended this morning. And by closely watched, I mean a total of five people, including myself, noticed it a few minutes before the end and checked back from time to time to see if it attracted any bids. It didn't. Maybe it was the thousand dollar starting price that turned away prospective buyers. Or it could have been that the item was a worn out wooden hand plane with an old TV antenna stuck in the end. To be fair, it wasn't ONLY a worn out wooden hand plane with an old TV antenna stuck in the end. It also included a video game controller with a matching antenna. Why, you ask, would someone even possess such a set? One word: Art.

READ THE REST OF THE ARTICLE BELOW- OR OVER AT STUMPYNUBS.COM WHERE THERE ARE ADDED PICTURES AND STUFF (INCLUDING MORE USELESS WOODWORKING ART)... YOUR CHOICE…

Wood Art Machine Metal


A Bulgarian genius (and I use that term loosely) developed the "remote controlled hand plane". I imagine his process was simple, find a few bits of junk, stick them together and see who falls for it. Of course he couldn't have expected anyone to actually believe he was selling a genuine woodworking tool. Woodworkers are far too smart for that. No, his target was obviously the more discerning buyer. You know the type, they live in big city apartments full of uncomfortable European furniture made from stainless steel and plexi-glass. Their walls are covered in large canvasses with one tiny spot of paint in the center and a dirty soup can carefully mounted in a shadow box rests upon the mantle. They drink cappuccino from tiny cups, they eat only kale and hummus spread on leafs of kale. An evening out always includes a visit to a gallery where they look past their upturned noses, reading some hidden meaning into a particularly breathtaking modern piece. Then the janitor comes and empties it because it's really nothing more than a waste bin, but even that is somehow daring and audacious. Someone taps on a wine glass to smugly announce the opening of the newest exhibit, and everyone crowds around the remote controlled wooden plane. Whispers float about the room.

"Intrepidly bold!"
"See how the batteries speak to the hidden power of the underclasses…"
"Rash and insolent, yet wonderfully cheeky!"
"I heard this same artist also made a plug-in hammer!"
"Recklessly daring!"
"Clearly a statement about the social plight of sociological society…"
"Really, aren't we all just old TV antennas in the grand scheme of things…"
"What the heck is this crap?"
"Who let that simpleton in here? Call security and get me another Bordeaux."

Meanwhile the "artist" is counting his fat stacks and looking through the bathroom trash for his next inspiring piece.

Perhaps I go too far. After all, art is in the eye of the beholder. But I was an artist before I became a woodworker. I painted portraits in oil that actually included two eyes, a nose and a mouth. I sculpted in wax and clay and alabaster, and when I was finished you didn't have to spend an hour gazing thoughtfully in order to interpret its hidden meaning. If I wanted to paint a bowl of fruit, I painted a bowl of stinking fruit. I didn't haphazardly fling pigment onto an old ceiling tile and call it fruit with a hidden message about Darfur. Perhaps my work wasn't very good, after all nobody ever called it "edgy". But I believe it took some amount of talent to create, and that's what made it art. When you start calling anything art, everybody becomes an artist. I'm sorry, but if anybody can create it, where's the value?

It's the same in the woodworking world. Some woodworkers are artists because they can do things few others can. Others, myself included, are craftsmen- and there's no shame in that. If I build a chair, it's a chair. It's not art. If I create a truly unique design that nobody else has tried before, or if I build something flawless and inspiring, then I would call it art. I don't know, maybe I'm old fashioned. I just believe that putting something in a jar of urine or letting my bed sheets stagnate for a year (both are recent exhibits in NY), or even gluing a power cord and a USB stick to a yard sale find and calling it a wifi-level is something else entirely. It's a con, an April fool's joke, and those who consider it otherwise are the biggest fools around.

...Oh, and for those that were asking to see some of my past "art", here's one of the few I still have. It's a pointillism version of the famous "Migrant Mother" portrait from the great depression era dust bowl. It's made up entirely of tiny black dots. It took me over a year and a dozen black pens to create. It may not be the most beautiful thing in the world, but at least nobody will mistake it for a garbage can.

Forehead Hand Hairstyle Facial expression Beard
 

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#988 ·
One man's artsy is another man's fartsy...

A closely watched internet auction ended this morning. And by closely watched, I mean a total of five people, including myself, noticed it a few minutes before the end and checked back from time to time to see if it attracted any bids. It didn't. Maybe it was the thousand dollar starting price that turned away prospective buyers. Or it could have been that the item was a worn out wooden hand plane with an old TV antenna stuck in the end. To be fair, it wasn't ONLY a worn out wooden hand plane with an old TV antenna stuck in the end. It also included a video game controller with a matching antenna. Why, you ask, would someone even possess such a set? One word: Art.

READ THE REST OF THE ARTICLE BELOW- OR OVER AT STUMPYNUBS.COM WHERE THERE ARE ADDED PICTURES AND STUFF (INCLUDING MORE USELESS WOODWORKING ART)... YOUR CHOICE…

Wood Art Machine Metal


A Bulgarian genius (and I use that term loosely) developed the "remote controlled hand plane". I imagine his process was simple, find a few bits of junk, stick them together and see who falls for it. Of course he couldn't have expected anyone to actually believe he was selling a genuine woodworking tool. Woodworkers are far too smart for that. No, his target was obviously the more discerning buyer. You know the type, they live in big city apartments full of uncomfortable European furniture made from stainless steel and plexi-glass. Their walls are covered in large canvasses with one tiny spot of paint in the center and a dirty soup can carefully mounted in a shadow box rests upon the mantle. They drink cappuccino from tiny cups, they eat only kale and hummus spread on leafs of kale. An evening out always includes a visit to a gallery where they look past their upturned noses, reading some hidden meaning into a particularly breathtaking modern piece. Then the janitor comes and empties it because it's really nothing more than a waste bin, but even that is somehow daring and audacious. Someone taps on a wine glass to smugly announce the opening of the newest exhibit, and everyone crowds around the remote controlled wooden plane. Whispers float about the room.

"Intrepidly bold!"
"See how the batteries speak to the hidden power of the underclasses…"
"Rash and insolent, yet wonderfully cheeky!"
"I heard this same artist also made a plug-in hammer!"
"Recklessly daring!"
"Clearly a statement about the social plight of sociological society…"
"Really, aren't we all just old TV antennas in the grand scheme of things…"
"What the heck is this crap?"
"Who let that simpleton in here? Call security and get me another Bordeaux."

Meanwhile the "artist" is counting his fat stacks and looking through the bathroom trash for his next inspiring piece.

Perhaps I go too far. After all, art is in the eye of the beholder. But I was an artist before I became a woodworker. I painted portraits in oil that actually included two eyes, a nose and a mouth. I sculpted in wax and clay and alabaster, and when I was finished you didn't have to spend an hour gazing thoughtfully in order to interpret its hidden meaning. If I wanted to paint a bowl of fruit, I painted a bowl of stinking fruit. I didn't haphazardly fling pigment onto an old ceiling tile and call it fruit with a hidden message about Darfur. Perhaps my work wasn't very good, after all nobody ever called it "edgy". But I believe it took some amount of talent to create, and that's what made it art. When you start calling anything art, everybody becomes an artist. I'm sorry, but if anybody can create it, where's the value?

It's the same in the woodworking world. Some woodworkers are artists because they can do things few others can. Others, myself included, are craftsmen- and there's no shame in that. If I build a chair, it's a chair. It's not art. If I create a truly unique design that nobody else has tried before, or if I build something flawless and inspiring, then I would call it art. I don't know, maybe I'm old fashioned. I just believe that putting something in a jar of urine or letting my bed sheets stagnate for a year (both are recent exhibits in NY), or even gluing a power cord and a USB stick to a yard sale find and calling it a wifi-level is something else entirely. It's a con, an April fool's joke, and those who consider it otherwise are the biggest fools around.

...Oh, and for those that were asking to see some of my past "art", here's one of the few I still have. It's a pointillism version of the famous "Migrant Mother" portrait from the great depression era dust bowl. It's made up entirely of tiny black dots. It took me over a year and a dozen black pens to create. It may not be the most beautiful thing in the world, but at least nobody will mistake it for a garbage can.

Forehead Hand Hairstyle Facial expression Beard
well said and a very impressive piece of "ART", thank you for sharing.
 

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#999 ·
Black Friday 2014: The Legend of Pappy Nubs

As you know, Black Friday is a big event around the Stumpy Nubs Workshop. Every year we put on our parkas and confront the horrors that officially kick off the shopping season. It's like a sport that combines the dangers of alligator wrestling with the rewards of… well, alligator wrestling. If you don't get bit in the face you know you've won. These days I stick to the woodworking stores and occasional home center and I never arrive before opening time. But when I was a younger, dumber man I could be found in the crowd outside warming myself near a burning car or fighting off a police dog just to save a buck on a DVD of Bonanza, season two. I've done things I'm ashamed of; unspeakable things involving small children as human shields and empty soda cans as toilets. (And I don't mean number one…) Does elbowing an infant or two and overturning the odd stroller make me a bad person? I suppose it does- at least that's what the criminal justice system told me. But things are different now. I'm reformed, and not just because it was a condition of my parole. I realized that life is too short and Michigan winters are too cold. No discount is worth losing more toes.

I wasn't the first to be caught up in the Black Friday buying frenzy. It's a little known fact that the whole Thanksgiving shopping tradition dates back to the Pilgrims themselves and was started by none other than my grandfather. Pappy Nubs, as we call him, was quite a character! (He's familiar to those of you who watch our hand tool woodworking videos, The Old-Timey Workshop, at Stumpynubs.com) As the true old-timey woodworker, Pappy hand-planed his way through some of the most exciting events in history. He loved to tell his stories, and never ceased to amaze me with where he'd been or what he'd done. It was one such story that inspired me to carry on the shopping tradition Pappy started way back in 1620…

(Read past Black Friday humor blogs: 2012 and 2013 )

Most of the woodworking Pappy did on the Mayflower was below deck- replacing vomit soaked planks in the crew quarters or extracting splinters from the corns of the passengers. Not exactly the type of thing suited to a true craftsman. So when Captain Jones told him that the main mast needed hand planing one brisk November day, Pappy scurried to the top like a spider monkey and set to work sending wispy shavings floating off into the breeze. That's when he saw it. "Land ho!" he cried.

Cape Cod wasn't much to look at back then. It would be years before Pappy invented the Cape Cod house, and after two months at sea nobody wanted to see more fish. But a large grouping of tee-pees on the beach looked promising. It was Pappy himself who led the first group off the ship, pausing to collect neat looking pieces of driftwood before continuing up the beach toward the settlement. As they approached a brave wearing nothing but a breech-cloth and white body paint Pappy raised his hand and said "How!" Failing to get a response he continued "Are you folks Indians?" Now, you can't blame Pappy for his faux pas. How was he to know the locals preferred to be called "Native Americans"? Before they knew it, all 130 Pilgrims were tied to giant spits for roasting.

Most people would be terrified in a situation like this. Not Pappy Nubs! As the natives were chopping vegetables and bringing the big cooking pot to boil Pappy pulled a dovetail saw from his underwear and cut the entire group free faster than you can say "how did he hide a dovetail saw in his skivvies?" Soon they were all back on the Mayflower and off in search of a more hospitable landing site. They found it near a big rock called Plymouth. As the snow fell Pappy kept busy making crude pieces of furniture for the new plantation. He spent that entire first winter in his shop building sideboards and fighting dysentery. At first business was good- he made a killing making racks for people to hang their Pilgrim hats on. But as the weeks passed and the provisions ran out, customers were harder to come by. When someone did stop by the shop all they offered as payment was tuberculosis. But Pappy was determined to keep busy so he built furniture all winter long, stockpiling it for better times.

Better times did come the next year. The natives surrounding the plantation were far more accommodating than the last ones. They even started a football league. The colonists called their team the "Plymouth Pilgrims", and the natives called themselves the "Pokanoket Palefaces" ( which wasn't racist because it was intended to honor their new friends). Both teams made the playoffs the very first season, and wouldn't you know it, they met each other in the championship game! It was a historic contest that broke all previous attendance records for football in America. Squanto was voted MVP, having thrown the corn cob they used for a ball for over four hundred yards. But it was the Pilgrims who won the first Corn Bowl. Their prize? A little bowl of corn, shelled off the ball before the game. The celebration lasted all night. The natives and the colonists came together for a great feast of boneless chicken wings and deluxe pizzas.

One thing I always admired about Pappy Nubs was his ability to seize an opportunity. As everybody ate he began writing little advertisements on slips of paper which he distributed among the crowd. Not only did he invent text messaging that day, he was also able to spread the word about the amazing deals to be had at his workshop the next morning. "I'm closing my doors early to mark down prices, and tomorrow morning at five o'clock I'll reopen with the best deals of the season!" Soon the conversation had turned from tips on how to grow crops and cure rickets to sofa tables and wooden cookware. The campfires were out before sundown that evening. Friday was going to be a big day!

When Pappy opened the shop early the next morning a mass of people stretched from Plymouth to Roanoke. Customers from as far away as Jamestown were fighting for their spot in line, and a nasty group of squaws threatened to storm the door before he could get out of the way. They were buying everything in sight! Captain Jones bought a spare mast for the Mayflower, Governor Carver got a new gavel for the colony meetings. Pocahontas took home a bedside table while Sacagawea bought new wooden place settings for a fancy dinner party she was planning. Even Sitting Bull purchased a whole set of high back chairs. Man, that guy loved to sit! Pappy's register was ringing with each sale as the drawer filled with pumpkins and squash and whatever else people had to offer in payment. When everyone's pockets were empty he saved the day by offering sales at zero down, six harvests same as cash.

That first Black Friday began a great tradition, one we continue at the Stumpy Nubs Workshop. Every year on this day we celebrate the spirit of shopping just as our forefathers did. The lines may be long, it may be dangerous, and we may have way too many clamps as it is. But wherever there's a sale on woodworking tools, we'll be there. After all, it's what we Nubs do.
 
#1,000 ·
Another tale, well told, Stumpy.
I alway suspicioned that our history books were a bit skewed. So glad you got to the truth. Although, you forgot to mention all the Barracudas the natives gave to the settlers at Plymouth to fertilize their corn.
 
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