THE SAME, JUST TOTALLY DIFFERENT

HI STANDARD .22 TARGET PISTOL & ESTERBROOK PEN

OK, What the heck is this now?  I may be the only person in the world that would make this connection, but I find it fascinating.  This Hi Standard 102  Supermatic Trophy .22 target pistol is one of my favorite pistols.  The Esterbrook "J" fountain pen is one of my favorite pens.  They were both made about the time I was born.  I have many of each in all their different varieties.  But, for the sake of mood, I chose rich, dark hues for the comparison.  The contrast is irrelevant. The similarities are almost bizarre.  Hi Standard was the only manufacturer to come up with the idea of removable, interchangeable barrels.  Except for the earliest of Hi Standards and the fact that they changed the mechanism shortly after implementing it, essentially any Hi Standard barrel will fit on any Hi Standard frame.  Esterbrook, America's oldest pen company, until they went out of business, about the same time that Hi Standard also pulled the plug is the only pen company to market a fountain pen that had interchangeable nibs.  Rather than being press fitted into the section, the nib and feed are one unit that screws into the section so, one pen can take essentially all Esterbrook or Venus nibs.  The marketing idea was the same.  One pen barrel (yes, the body of a fountain pen is called a barrel) and several nibs rather than several other entire pens. 

 Hi Standard sold some of their higher end target pistols with sets of three barrels of different lengths.  This particular model, or series, the 102-104 Supermatic series, was called the "Space Gun" because with the weights and the futuristically shaped muzzle compensator made it look like the Ray Guns in the robot from space movies of the 50s.   Well, ok, the marketing was probably a good idea, but imagine for a moment what they did to me.  Yep, I've got barrels and nibs....barrels and nibs.  Don't say that fast too many times.

Now that you've read this...can you admit that two things that you thought you had absolutely no interest in actually are quite interesting now that you know some stuff that you probably wouldn't have ever heard anywhere else?

GAIL AND HELEN vs. GALAPAGOS CATTLE

Here, Gail and Helen, (different Helen from the porpoise picture) in the midst of a stand-off with some bulls in the back country of Isabella island.  They were not being friendly at all.  Gail eventually had to wrestle one to the ground to establish dominance.

PROOF OF WHITNY'S LEGITIMACY

Whitny likes this picture because she can see herself in her mother.

GAIL'S BABY

2000 Pontiac Trans Am WS6

For Nancene and Byron:  This one was easy because all I had to do was go out and photograph it.  Back in 2000, Gail was ready for a new car and was going to get a 7 series Beemer.  Then she heard that this WS-6 Ram Air Trans Am was the last one they were going to make with a real engine.  She's kept it garaged the whole time.  It only has 30K miles on it.  Every once in a while when we leave the garage door open, guys come to the door and ask if we want to sell it.  I'll keep looking through our photographs and see what other cars I can come across that we've owned.  I still have the International Travelall too and have completely unrealistic plans for it.  I don't really have a place to restore cars right now because we are restoring 5 Airstreams.  Eventually, if that ever happens and we get them set up in the meadow at the Yosemite house, I want to build a shop up on the hill where they are now and restore the Pantera and the International.

WHITNY AND THE RODENT BACTERIA

Abbott Pharmaceuticals give away from the 60s

Amazingly enough, I was actually looking for this.  Just the other day Whitny and I were going through all the stuff in the room over my workshop, looking for something.  Its a room that serves absolutely no purpose but to house all the things that I could never bring myself to throw away.  This is an icky little rubbery thing about 2 inches long.  It says Abbott on the back and I believe it was a give away from Abbott pharmaceuticals.  I got it from my dentist when I was about 7.  Dr. Lau always had a box of toys to choose from when you were done and this little guy just fascinated me.  He told me it was what bacteria looks like and if I didn't brush properly, I would have millions of these in my mouth.  Fair enough.  I have always wondered what the "E" stood for.  After all these years, the best part was when I actually found it in a box of old toys.  When Whit saw it, she screamed, thinking it was a dead rodent of some sort, despite the green color and the obvious fact that it is rubber.

Just a busy day

Well, sorry, I don't have anything visual for you today.  But, its because of what happened today that caused me to just run out of time.  But, I will make up for it tomorrow.  The day started out taking Whitny to drop off her Mini Cooper at the dealership.  Several things happened there.  BTW, I really dislike Mini Cooper dealerships.  They are essentially BMW dealerships.  You can't work on them yourself because they have all their own tooling.  Just to rotate her tires and align the thing...$400.00.  The explanation?  because they can only be aligned on their particular alignment machinery.  But, on the bright side, they had a really cool original Mini which Whit and I photographed and I got a great idea for a coffee table.  Mine will look considerably different from theirs, but just the idea of using an engine block as the base...I like it.  I have a 1930 Marmon engine I found in the forest at the Yosemite place.  Actually, I found most of the car, but, a horrible accident and 7 decades of laying in the forest has taken its toll on pretty much everything but the engine...not like it would ever run again, but it would lend itself to an artistic endeavor.  I also found an International stake bed which really only has the block left...but I have plans for that now as well.

More importantly, after we left the Mini dealer, we went camera shopping.  Gail has a new laptop and I got a Nikon D3100.  We also spent a lot of time talking to a guy at the local camera shop who is still into 35mm and he gave us all kinds of ideas.  So, if anyone is reading this, in the next day or so, there will be much more detail and in the weeks and months to come...maybe some really interesting stuff.  I also found my postcard collection, so we're going to start scanning them on a new website for people to use as clipart, or whatever they want.  It's a pretty substantial collection that covers most of the 20th century. So, just some things to come.

Things I need

These desk organizers are made by Bucket Boss...a company that makes tool bags I like.  I need more desks to put them on, or psychiatric help.