More ruminations, rambles, rants and raves from the downhill side of the mountain.
Just so you know exactly where I stand vis-a-vis today's polarized politics, let me recommend this organization to you.
And I also recommend my gentle employer to you as well. The Barnes & Noble Affiliate Network, which seemed to have stopped working, is back in operation, so the links and banners are working again.
Now, go buy some books.
And I also recommend my gentle employer to you as well. The Barnes & Noble Affiliate Network, which seemed to have stopped working, is back in operation, so the links and banners are working again.
Now, go buy some books.
Links:
Fox Den: Creative (i.e. Fiction)Writing
A Pilgrim's Progress
Ian's Knowledge Modelling Weblog
Future Scan: Future Studies Department University of Houston at Clear Lake
PLSJ (aka Anne, the Anthropologist)
link
Lost in Transit
link
Coffee Grounds
Traveling in Style
Slacktivist Recommended with a bullet!
Hoofin To You: Bridgewater, NJ politics
Inadmissible Evidence
Big Black Van
Overflow
In Spite of Years of Silence
Metamorphosism (Mig's new blog)
Real Live Preacher
Skippy the Bush Kangaroo
Alas, A Blog
A Fistful of Euros
BuzzMachine
Eschaton
Pedantry
The Poor Man
Barefoot and Naked
Boing Boing
Craigblog
Fafglob
The Road to Surfdom
link
E-Mail Me
My Other Blogs, Journals and such
Fox Den: Creative (i.e. Fiction)Writing
A Pilgrim's Progress
Business/Economics/Future Studies and other Social Sciences
Ian's Knowledge Modelling Weblog
Future Scan: Future Studies Department University of Houston at Clear Lake
PLSJ (aka Anne, the Anthropologist)
link
International
Lost in Transit
link
New Jersey New York Pennsylvania and Delaware
Coffee Grounds
Traveling in Style
Slacktivist Recommended with a bullet!
Hoofin To You: Bridgewater, NJ politics
Inadmissible Evidence
Personal/General
Big Black Van
Overflow
In Spite of Years of Silence
Metamorphosism (Mig's new blog)
Real Live Preacher
Blogs with Attitude
Skippy the Bush Kangaroo
Alas, A Blog
A Fistful of Euros
BuzzMachine
Eschaton
Pedantry
The Poor Man
Barefoot and Naked
Boing Boing
Craigblog
Fafglob
The Road to Surfdom
link
E-Mail Me
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And finally, here are a few books I might recommend for your edification and amazement.
What's the Matter with Kansas?
Tuesday, October 22, 2002
"antiqueitis". I came across this term in a comment to the 10/20/2002 Entry here. I had to laugh because it seems to describe something I've been sufferring (if that is the right word) with for a couple months now. I have come to the conclusion that the problem with most antiques is that, before they were antiques, they were once just used furniture. It is in that period in a piece of furniture's life that lies between being new and a source of pride and when it becomes an antique that it is most at risk for horrible things happening to it. People paint and or alter furniture during this period without care to its potential in the future. What brought me to this epiphany has a great deal to do with THE SIDEBOARD, but some history is involved here, so you'll have to bear with me for a bit.Some 20+ years ago, my cousin and her husband rescued a Victorian sideboard from a church flea market . They paid all of $25 for the thing. It wasn't that they actually wanted it, they just thought it needed rescueing. It sat in their barn for a while and then my sister, who was living in New York City at the time, heard about it. She had need of a sideboard (she had need of anything that vaguely resembled furniture at that point in her life), so she asked and they said sure...just get it out of the barn. So the sideboard went to live in New York. It was still really ugly.
When sister and family picked up bag and baggage and moved off to Atlanta, the sideboard ended up in my Mom's basement. It was not thought that this monstrosity was worth the money it would cost to move it down there. So, it stayed in the basement--for about eight years.
You have to picture this piece of furniture. First, it is massive. About six feet long by 3 !/2 feet high by about 2 feet deep, it will dominate all but a fairly large room. And it is dark with a finish that is(was) cracked and crazed. In short, it looked terrible--a shabby old wreck of a sideboard that had nothing to recommend it as a usable piece for a dining room. But we were desperate for something to put on one wall of our new dining room, so we thought this would do as an interim piece. My goal was to get rid of the worst of the surface flaws and then use it until something better came along.
I started off with a solution of turpentine and linseed oil as a way to clean it up. I was hoping that this would be all that was needed to make it servicable. It wasn't. So, I moved on to Howards Antique Restorer. Now, if I really worked hard with a 0000 gauge steelwool pad and the Howards, I got rid of the worst of the crazing...except that in a couple places it went down to the original finish so there were patches of wood interspersed amidst the old varnish. It looked as bad as it had with the stains and really bad crazed old coatings. So, with a fatalistic shrug, I went out and bought a can of Minwax Antique Refinisher. I was relieved to learn that the folks at Minwax are telling the truth: this is a refinisher rather than a stripper. Strippers take everything off and leave you with bare wood that has to start aging again. The Minwax refinishing product gets rid of all those old coats of shellac and varnish without attacking the patina of the original wood surface. That's the good news. The bad news is that one has to work fairly hard to get through all that old gunk. It is hard work and it eats up 0000 fine steelwool pads like a kid going through M&M's.
I'm now on the last stages of this project and I am floored by what is emerging. The drawer faces and the center cabinet doors are covered with a mahogany vemeer that is downright beautiful. The rest of the piece has a gorgeous grain and, if it isn't actual mahogany, a great color. This dark, brooding piece turns out to be actually quite nice. And the fact that it is a Nineteenth Century factory piece only means that the design was standardized and they used machines like lathes and other powered tools (the power being mechanical and not electric in nature) as opposed to the hand tools used by the master cabinet makers of that age. The assembly line wasn't invented by Mr. Ford yet. So, the investment which includes about 5 quarts of the Minwax Furniture Refinisher and 4 or 5 packages of 0000 fine steelwool (16 pads to a package) and about 40 hours of my time seems to be panning out better than I had hoped. When I get it installed in the dining room, I'll see about getting a picture up here.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License.
©El Zorro Viejo 2002-2005
