Hello everyone this is my first post to this forum. I’m an aspiring pipier with nothing really to say about anyting except my small time troubles with the pipes that seem common to all the other newbies. As a group you seem determined to live up to the notion of quarrelsome, so at least in that regard I suppose I find myself in good company. Just joking, you all seem generous and erudite, and subject to the same limitations of email as we all are. I hope I can contribute something, though it may take years of intense thought to match some of more contraversial posts over the last couple of months I’ve been lurking.
Regarding Lorenzo’s post on Dry Fingers, I’ve been told that lanolin (grease derived from sheep wool) has many marvellous properties, one of which is wood preservation, old shearing sheds have perfectly preserved timbers. Perhaps lanolin would serve a double function as moisturiser and preservative.
Brendan, welcome aboard. Its easy to be controversial here. Just say something stupid and everybody will jump all over you, but you will also learn good stuff from it too. Beard the lion!
FancyP, are you sure neetsfoot oil comes from calves? This is somewhat disappointing, as I had always imagined these little neets scurrying amongst the weeds with their feet chopped off.
Here’s a quote from a website on taxidermy…
“As I understand it Neats foot oil is a By-product of boiling Hide, hooves, horn sheaths, as in during the making of Hide Glue. The oils rise to the top and are skimed off. There may be other methods I am not aware of. but that should give ya a general Idea…”
Hey, Brendan, it’s Thanksgiving Holiday here in the US so thanks for dropping in and joining everyone at the Uilleann feast. I’m a newbie as well (nine monhts) which means I’ve been in labor long enough and I should be delivering a nice set of reels any day now. You’ll get great advice here from genrous people. I’ve learned a great deal. Wanna hear my backstiching! Also had a great time when I was seventeen in Darwin (US Navy). I wonder if Darwin puts you in the category of farthest away member? Cheers, Jim
Thanks for the warm welcome everyone. “Once upon a time” will probably come to mean “before the www”: as in "Once upon a time Darwin was a bloody long way from anywhere! " no longer true.
