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Carpal Tunnel
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OP
Carpal Tunnel
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In my boyhood, junkies were guys who came around to buy scrap iron and other stuff. In those days scrap iron was badly needed to start off blast furnaces to turn ore into molten iron. Now the process has changed and scrap iron is not needed, so its value has dropped so low you have to pay somebody to take a junk car off your hands instead of getting a hundred bucks for it.
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Joined: Oct 2000
Posts: 5,400
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Oct 2000
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Really? i am surprised to hear that.. some 10-15 years ago, there was a well reported theft in NYC-- someone stole a building (a cast iron building) for the scrap metal..
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Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 6,296
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Sep 2001
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What did they call the little boy who pumped the bellows on those old tracker-action organs? That occupation is bound to be obsolete now with electric bellows...
Bellows regards,
WordWeimar
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Joined: Apr 2002
Posts: 200
enthusiast
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enthusiast
Joined: Apr 2002
Posts: 200 |
Another one which I imagine must be obsolete except in wine making regions is the 'cooper' - the man who made the barrels.
The maker of arrows is the "fletcher", I believe.
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Joined: Dec 2000
Posts: 13,803
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Dec 2000
Posts: 13,803 |
the little boy who pumped the bellows on those old tracker-action organs?
Boy.
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Joined: Jul 2000
Posts: 3,467
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Jul 2000
Posts: 3,467 |
I have a special term for the person on the back of the tandem. CRAZY!
The person on the back has no control at all, and must have absolute faith in the ability of the driver, who controls the steering and the brakes. Some years ago I was on a group ride called Ride the Rockies (6 days totalling 361 miles across several very high mountain passes). On the last day I was descending Loveland Pass, exhilarating in the thrill of doing 56 mph (the fastest I've ever gotten my bike) when I heard a high-pitched scream behind me. Then I felt a whoosh as a tandem roared past me at a bit over 70. The scream I heard was from the stoker, a female, who repeated over and over as they rode out of sight, "I'm seeing a lawyer tomorrow. Tomorrow, do you understand me? TOMORROW!"
Apropos of nothing, I was stopped once for doing 32 mph in a 15 mph school zone. I begged the cop to give me a ticket and he refused. Said not giving me a ticket was punishment enough.
TEd
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Joined: Jul 2000
Posts: 3,467
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Jul 2000
Posts: 3,467 |
There are still quite a few coopers in NYC, I believe, where they make the huge water barrels that sit on top of a great many buildings in the city. They are reservoirs for firefighting, as I understand it, and are still required by city code. Of Troy may know more.
When I was a very young lad we had a neighbor in rural PA who was a tinsmith. His name was Mr. Dietzel, probably couldn't read or write, but he used very large tin cans to make household items. My brother still has a watering can that is a series of conic sections soldered together at odd angles. The mathematics of such connections are very complex, apparently, and this old guy did them by eye and by hand. This is truly a lost art.
TEd
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Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858
Carpal Tunnel
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OP
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858 |
Whaler. In the early 1800's every New England seaport had whaling ships. It is hard to imagine anybody being willing to spend five years at sea, horribly hazardous, terrible tablefare, slow cycle of monotony alternating with terror. And a pittance at payoff. But many young men had not better choice.
My uncle told me a yarn about two brothers in Belfast, ME. They were digging potatoes when one of them threw down his fork and declared he would never dig another potato so long as he lived. He went down to the harbor and signed aboard a whaler. He was gone twenty years. When he got back to Belfast, he saw his brother digging potatoes in the same spot. His brother looked up, and said: "Where are you going, Jake?" Jake blew up. "You goddam Yankee! After twenty years you might have asked where I've been!"
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Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 1,289
veteran
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veteran
Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 1,289 |
In fact, it wasn't always a little boy. A large organ needed a full grown man to pump it, often the village idiot.
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