Pencil Sharpener

Day 232: Pencil Sharpener
Our peach painted lady in San Francisco was built with such fine craftsmanship that we couldn't insure it at replacement value. If the place had burned down, we would only have been covered to build a similar, lower quality house. I was never very worried about that - after all, the house had survived Loma Prieta in 1989, and the great earthquake of 1906. Sure, it was a kit house, but everything from the handmade nails to the fancy wooden trim to the six-foot-tall double-hung windows was solid.

Just like this old-fashioned pencil sharpener. When I was in elementary school, every classroom had one of these. I liked my pencils sharp. I remember feeding my pencil into the opening and plying just the right amount pressure on the eraser end to get the blades inside to bite. I liked turning the crank, feeling the resistance as the blades scraped away the wood, and that sweet moment when the resistance dropped, the blades spun smoothly, and I knew my lead was perfectly sharp. 

This pencil sharpener would have lasted forever if I hadn't dropped the sturdy metal cover piece on the cement floor of the basement one too many times. It was built to last. Not like those little rinky-dink plastic pencil sharpeners the kids stow in their pencil cases at the start of the school year. Or even worse, the whining electric ones that melt your pencil like a popsicle in the July sun.

What is the rationale behind an electric pencil sharpener? Are our arms really so  weak? Must we use fossil fuels to do a job that can be completed in 30 seconds with nothing but a sharp knife and a careful eye?

And what about leaf blowers? Can leaf blowers possibly be faster and easier than a sturdy metal rake?

We live next door to an apartment building. I estimate that the lawn is about 2,000 square feet. Maybe less. It requires two men with rider mowers and leaf blowers at least two-and-a-half hours to mow. The two-and-a-half hours usually commences at 7 a.m. on a Saturday, or at exactly the moment I take my book and glass of cool iced tea out on the deck for a relaxing moment, or five minutes after we light the coals for a backyard barbecue. I honestly believe we generate less noise and use less fuel caring for 800 acres at the Arb & Gardens than my next-door neighbor does for his 1/8 of an acre.

What's so bad about a reel push mower? Cheap, quiet and zero emissions.

Kind of like my busted pencil sharpener.