Good night solo in the shop

I had a good night working in the shop tonight. I put Zoe to bed, walked Moe, rode a couple miles on the bike and got down to business with a vengeance.
Things I got done:
1. Fixed a rivet that broke on the handle to my new buckler
2. Finished the hammer work on the new shield boss, leveled it, trimmed it to be more round, planished it, punched the holes, fired it and tempered it. It has some good depth which I'm pretty happy with. Raising really was worth it, and the sucker is LIGHT!
3. Annealed the helm halves for Eleanor's helm
4. Made a spacer for putting a little gap in my articulation.
5. Tore apart my new arm's articulation and used the spacer to replace 5 of the rivets. The articulation flows a lot better now. Replacing 3 more rivets would help a bit more, but it's pretty good as it is.
6. Filled the new garbage can slack tub up with water. That was nearly a horrible disaster. Here I am juggling all these projects, listening to my tunes (got a new mp3 player from Stef for Christmas and loving the heck out of it) when I hear a splashing noise behind me. The can had filled with water and was over flowing- so I'm half deaf, the forge is blazing with the boss in it, and I have a hose going full bore in the can. I didn't completely flood the garage or over heat the boss, so despite a few unhappy minutes it wasn't so bad.

During the bike ride I got excited again about the idea of making a new hurdy gurdy or two. I'll probably tackle a symphonium like from the Lutrell Psalter, though there might be issues with volume. We'll see. I have some good ideas on tuning pegs, double string tangents, and I would LOVE to add a chien. Man, that would be fun to play for the dance guild.
Oh, a couple things on that front-
1. I bought a new recorder off ebay which turned out really nice. The high end of the register is a little tough to hit, though with patience it can do a high B. Can't go too far wrong for $30!
2. Found one of my old ones under the seat of the van, and it's playing surprisingly well (though the low E is a bit flat)
3. I'm buying a shawm from Steven Loraine. Should be a couple weeks before he's done building it, but it'll have a removable bell, so I can make some different filters for it.
4. Got the contra bass racket from him working well enough to play with the guild, though it's quieter than I'd hoped.
5. I'm now the kingdom A&S deputy for Dance and Music
6. I started a new yahoo group to pull together music, dance and all performance in Ansteorra, and it's off to a good start.

I hung out in Max's (Master Peter) shop a couple weeks ago, and had a good time. He came over yesterday and we mostly talked and looked at books. That was fun too. It's been great bouncing ideas off each other and sharing resources. He's been exceptionally generous with loans and outright gifts of tools.

I'm really thinking of entering the A&S competition at candlemas, and trying to wrangle going to Gulf War. There's a combat of the 30 style thing happening this year, and I'd LOVE to fight in it. I have the kit, though it could use some improvements. Just have to convince Stef...

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