Replies

1. 
   forestgirl | Dec 14, 2002 07:10am | #1

   Yeah, I picked one of those up a couple months ago.  Sweetie was gathering stuff for his hunting trip, and I was tagging along.  The mallets were in the sporting goods section, like the ones you found.  Exactly the same, near as I could tell, as the ones sold in their hardware section for 2-3 times as much.

   forestgirl -- you can take the girl out of the forest, but you can't take the forest out of the girl   ;-)

   
   

   ---

   Edited 12/13/2002 11:11:36 PM ET by forest_girl

1. 
   Splintie | Dec 14, 2002 08:18am | #2

   Add a *whew!* from me as well...Christmas is officially over for this elf except for making my own friends' presents. I got the last of the trays, barrettes, crib boards, hand mirrors, and boxes finished this morn and delivered this afternoon. After a darn slow start, the sales turned out OK. I wished i'd had that mallet about 20 years ago when i did my first show. I'd have paid the difference in price to hire someone to whack me in the head with it.

   For a nice change, i'm thinking of sleeping some and then sewing some of those flaxseed warmer pad thingies you heat in the micro. Oil in the seed warms up, you drape the gizmo around your shoulders...almost as good as a freshly dead cat, which doesn't pass the microwave test, BTW. 

   Trivia: one uses flaxseed bec of its high oil content, whereas rice or some other grains are largely water, which gets driven off by the heat. Unfortunately, none of them are washable or they tend to germinate, though the flaxseed apparently can go right to slime without passing sprout. One of the things the dead cat won't do. Well, not for a while. 

   Edited 12/14/2002 4:50:45 PM ET by SPLINTIE

1. 
   mitch | Dec 15, 2002 12:20am | #3

   on the subject of the microwaveable seed warmer bags- my brother's family gave all of the rest of us those things a few years back as xmas presents.  the other day our mom asked me if i ever used "that stupid thing".  i replied enthusiastically, "you bet, every day!"  she asked if i was kidding and i told her, "heck no, i use it as ballast to keep the studio lamp behind the arm chair in the living room from tipping over!"

   merry xmas to all, and to all.. yeah, yeah, yeah, whatever

   mitch

1. 
   Splintie | Dec 15, 2002 01:11am | #4

   Yes, mitch, but i'm giving mine to old people with arthritis who probably couldn't bend over to stuff them behind their chairs. I have tracking devices implanted in them in any case and will know instantly if they drop them off at the Goodwill. If that happens, they get mail-order baklava next time and a hand-painted card that says, "It's the thought that counts."

   So what are you giving? I've about maxxed out my loved ones on wooden gifts, though i have a computer desk to make for the cranky fart who types on the other side of the office and keeps putting milk in the tea he brings me. <G>rrr... 

1. 
   mitch | Dec 15, 2002 01:48am | #5

   gee, baklava?  i always thought fruitcake was the semi-edible lump of coal used for these circumstances...

   m

2. 
   Splintie | Dec 15, 2002 01:59am | #6

   "...fruitcake was the semi-edible lump of coal..."

   ...and i could include the $1.97 mallet with it as a serving utensil.

3. 
   mitch | Dec 15, 2002 02:40am | #7

   you laugh, but my parents once had an expensive carving knife replaced by Buck Knives when the blade snapped off just fore of the handle while cutting a piece of- you guessed it- fruitcake.  i'll bet that photograph is still tacked up on the wall in the company's service dept.

   m

4. 
   besea | Dec 15, 2002 04:27am | #8

   So much for the rubber mallet subject but y'all crack me up anyway !

   Bill

2. 
   forestgirl | Dec 15, 2002 10:16am | #9

   Splintie, after 20 years I guess you'll just have to live with your decision, LOL!!!

   When we had our gift shop, we sold some wonderful microwavable pillows that were stuffed with cherry pits.  Not only did they feel great, the smelled yummy!  Sold a ton of those a couple of years ago.

   I have another tube-shaped neck warmer that's filled with various herbs.  Our big "fat kitty" who is also getting pretty aged has a little session with it on the living room floor every night.  Lays her head on it, kicks it a little with her feet, and generally just purrs like crazy. 

   Congrats on finishing your Christmas stuff.  We're having a pretty late buying surge also.  Don't think the season's going to match last year retail-wise, buy I'm loving our new spot.

   Speaking of cheap tools, I saw that Costco has a couple of Jet Shopmaster items in stock -- a 3/4HP dust collector and a floor model drill press.  The DC was tempting, but I'm gonna hold out for that new model with the pleated filter on top.

   Happy sewing!!  Better you than me :-)forestgirl -- you can take the girl out of the forest, but you can't take the forest out of the girl   ;-)

1. 
   Splintie | Dec 15, 2002 11:36pm | #10

   I've got a whiz-bang marketing idea for you: acquire some of Mitch's folks' fruitcake and offer a half-money back coupon inside the box if it's returned unharmed to the store. Put updated coupons on it the next year, rebox...

   This idea is hereby copyrighted and royalites may be sent to the address listed on your screen.

   I used to make some money in high school from sewing: cheerleader outfits, wedding dresses--often the same customers..there was a high pregnancy rate among cheerleaders, for some reason--and i was the first on my dirt road to do macrame plant hangers, which i sold to gift stores. I really think i missed my calling as a tinker, where i might have used that mallet...again.

   Cherry pits, you say? I may have to do some research next summer when the harvest off Flathead Lake ripens. I always make the same mistake of buying that luscious fruit while driving. I'm pretty sure if a cherry tree instead of that apple had figured in the Eve legend, that a good case of the runs would have fixed her wagon and we'd all still be in Paradise where Sgian Dubh would by thigh-high in warm beer and you and i would be swimming in lakes of dark chocolate, perfectly suitable replacements for the gift of Knowledge, if you ask me.