I'm not dead.

I’m not just resting, either. Lots of projects going on to prepare for our first big living history event of the season. I’ve been doing lots of sewing … so much so (hahahah) that repeatedly pushing the needle through the fabric and into my finger has given me a tattoo of sorts. And a heck of a callous.

The closest think to a tattoo that I'll ever have.

This next event is very hands-on for the public, so I picked up a coffee grinder that had an 18th-century look to it. It also looked like the bicentennial threw up on it, but I figured I could always repaint it as a last resort. It’s not an original, but then, I won’t have aneurysm if someone drops it.

Before - with a stunning color scheme.

I think it cleaned up rather well – much better than I had hoped. The stain color was achieved by mixing together about 3 different sample packets I had. It kind of looks like cherry.

More posts next week - including what happens when you run an 18th century bayonet through a shirt and into a pot roast. Try to contain your excitement.

Want.

Really, really want.

The iPod/mp3 player can be connected on the outside of the A-BOX as well as the inside so you can listen to your tunes while running around with the A-BOX for example or just protecting your iPod from bullets and stuff.

But at these prices, I may have much better luck asking the office engineering genius if he’d like to build one.

Reworking a Regimental

I lurk on a Yahoo group that focuses on the American Revolution. A guy – let’s call him Eric, because, well, that’s his name – asked for some help in shortening the length of a Lottery Coat he’d picked up. He simply wanted to know how far above the knees the skirts should be as this coat wasn’t custom made and was too long. Now this group takes its research seriously, and for the most part they honestly just want to help others avoid mistakes they’ve made. In this case though, it felt like Eric was taken to task for buying suboptimal coat. Sort of like a school of piranhas descending upon a cow carcass. In defense of his acquisition (he bartered for it) Eric mentioned that he simply wanted to wear it to IGOLD and not look like an idiot. Or words to that effect.

At that point, I contacted Eric, told him to mark the alterations and send the coat to me and I’d take care of it. This was a completely selfish move on my part – I didn’t want an ill-fitting regimental reflecting poorly on reenactors or to have him show up on the 6:00 news in that story about those wacky gun-rights advocates looking like he dressed up in a costume from the community theater.

The coat arrived and I was … not impressed. Not only had the seams not been pressed during (or after) construction, the fabric didn’t appear to be pressed – ever. The lining was cheap cotton osnaburg. So, I cut out the lining from the waist down and replaced it with linen. I left the wool edges raw, and turned under the linen. I shortened the cuffs. I replaced the hooks that held it together at the front. I added the missing pleats in the skirts. I just wish I’d had time to rework all the button holes and make the pockets bigger. Eric will be replacing the brushed aluminum (!!) buttons with something appropriate in pewter.

New linen lining on the skirts.

And more pictures later - they're not downloading tonight.

So, if you’re at IGOLD next week on the 10th, and if you see a gentleman in a Continental uniform waving a Gadsden flag, please go up and complement him on his turnbacks. He's promised to take lots of pictures.

Thanks, Eric, for letting me use your pictures and your story!

Time to get rolling.

It’s that time of year. Time to get ready for the next reenacting season. Time to decide if I’m going to mend the shift with the shredded sleeves (when you buy $6/yard linen, you get what you pay for), or make a new one. Time to try on Sweet Daughter’s event clothes and heave a sigh of relief that the gowns will fit another year, but just sigh when I realize that she needs new shifts worse than I do. Pat myself on the back for picking up new “good enough” event shoes for her in a bigger size last month when I wasn’t under a time crunch. Time to start churning out the stuff I haven’t been working on for the past 6 months because I was tired of looking at all of it.


It’s also time to start working on the details to improve our impression for the year – like edible hornbooks! The mold is an 18th century reproduction from Trier, Germany. The receipt is from Hannah Glasse’s 1774 The Art of Cookery made Plain and Easy.

To make ginger-bread cakes.

TAKE three pounds of flour, one pound of sugar, one pound of butter rubbed in very fine, two ounces of ginger beat fine, a large nutmeg grated; then take a pound of treacle, a quarter of a pint of cream, make them warm together, and make up the bread stiff; roll it out, and make it up into thin cakes, cut them out with a tea-cup, or small glass, or roll them round like nuts, and bake them on tin plates in a slack oven.

First up, was to cut the recipe in half so it would fit in my mixing bowl. I decided to cut the amount of ginger in half so it wouldn’t be so hot, and substitute black-strap molasses for the treacle as it is more common on this side of the pond. That, and I couldn’t find treacle in the regional upscale grocery store, much less in the local Food Lion.


I threw two sticks of butter in mixing bowl, weighed the sugar, and creamed the two together. I added the spices and about half the flour. Then I weighed and added the molasses, some more flour, the cream, and the rest of the flour. The consistency was perfect. Not to stiff to roll out, but not so sticky that it clung to my cookie mold. I rolled the dough to a scant ¼” thick, pressed the mold into the dough, lifted it off, cut around the resulting design and put it on a parchment-lined cookie sheet. I baked them at about 325 degrees for about 20 minutes. I think I’ll cut the baking time back a little next time as these were a little dry. I don’t know why I was thinking they had to be baked to the consistency of hard-tack. Still, they were good – a very robust flavor, a little chewy, and not too sweet.

Who knew?

Way, way back, in a previous life, the last time unemployment AND interest rates were in the double-digits, I was making maps for a living. Considering my B.A. was a double major in American Studies with an Emphasis in Heritage Preservation and Geography, I was thrilled to have a job that justified my student loans and paid the rent. AutoCAD was a rarity in the private sector, and so topographic maps were edited by hand. The resulting image was digitized on a giant light table (again, by hand – Click. Click. Click.) that fed into a VAX system. Numbers were assigned to elevations manually using a temperamental stylus jabbing somewhat futilely at a crappy monochrome monitor while the other hand keyed in elevations. The resulting product was used to guide cruise missiles.

So boy was I surprised when I found out via an interview with Shaun White that I was culpable for the war in Iraq.

"It works well if you think about the Tomahawk missile, and that's what created the whole Iraqi War."
-- Kyra Phillips, CNN

Boom.

Shorter Half (who was born after man walked on the moon) and I were watching curling the other night as I was sewing away. They broke for a commercial and I heard SH ranting about “selfish, greedy, narcissists”. I glanced up to see the commercial for Tom Brokaw’s special on the baby boomers.
“What?” I asked.
“Baby Boomers, he said.”
“WHAT did you call me?”
“You’re not a boomer!

“I was alive when Kennedy was shot. I’m a boomer.”

You’d think the reading glasses would have clued him in.

The Bone

Or, “What Happens when a Rocket Scientist/EMT starts thinking about 18th Century Gunshot Wounds”.

You may have noticed a reference or two to 18th century living history on this blog. I’m a member of group that portrays a British Detached Hospital in North America. Most of the members are medical types and/or engineers. The Narrator of this tale, a member of our group and a Gentleman Engineer, who is also an EMT in Real Life, begins:

So the other day I was sitting around with my .50 caliber muzzleloader – great way to start a story, huh?


I had been hunting with it, but hadn't shot it in about a week. It was going to be awhile before I went again, and as you know, even with the modern synthetic powders, it's not a good idea to leave it in the guns for too long. So I needed to unload the gun. While there are other methods, the most expeditious procedure for unloading the gun is 1) point gun, 2) pull trigger. But it seemed like such a shame to just “waste” it. I needed something to shoot at. The butternut squash that got pushed to the back of the fridge and now needed to be thrown out was a tempting target, but oh look, the dog's old bone. A long time ago, someone had given her one of those really large cow bones that you see in the grocery store. She never had any interest in it, and I kept forgetting to throw it out.


My little mind started working – you know, I have to shoot a .50 cal bullet. If I shot it at the bone, I could be cool and have a bone with a bullet hole for medical demonstrations like Dr. Mike. So I got out my gun rest to make sure the hole would be nice and centered and, having heard them say they shot their bone at 6-8 feet, set up at a range of about 15 feet. Okay – when I say the bone exploded, I don't mean fell apart or pieces flying off. Think Wylie Coyote shoving a stick of dynamite into the marrow hole kind of explosion. Now while REALLY cool, and prompting a mystified eight-year-old to say, “Whoa …”, it did not produce the desired effect.


I have three thoughts as to what went wrong.


1. I think I remember the vet telling me that those kinds of bone have been hardened for the dogs. I can see how this could cause the bone to resist being punched through, but instead have all of the fibers act as a whole.


2. There was no meat on the bone. I supposed this could affect the velocity some and may even help hold the bone together.


3. (and I think the real problem) While my projectile had an appropriate diameter, it was not a ball. It was a 335 grain, conical hollow-point. I now have a new appreciation for what happens to the deer when it is struck by such a thing.


Okay – new plan.I have a friend who runs a family operated grocery store. They do all their own butcher work. We were in there Sunday, and I mentioned the kind of bone, with some meat, that I needed. She said she would find me something. I picked it up yesterday. Not wanting to reproduce my previous effort (at least not at this time!!) I thought I would call an expert.

So they called us. Shorter Half for his weapons expertise, and me for my reproduction flintlock pistol and digital camera. The cow leg was propped up. About 3 feet away (good 18th century pistol range) the pistol was primed and loaded with a single ball. The trigger was pulled, and “Click! fffft”. Misfire. The pan was re-primed, and “Click! Bang!” Direct hit. 

Powder burns and entry wound. Renmber, the muzzle was about 3 feet away.

Fragments from the lead ball.

Entry hole with the meat cleared away.

Exit wound

Follow up from our Gentleman Engineer:

I just came back from The Bone's inaugural demonstration at (Local Elementary School). Actually it was the same presentation for 8 separate groups. Now I have to tell you, it turns out, the bone shape you see in the picture is being accomplished by the cohesion of the surrounding tissue. When said tissue was removed, I now had a life-size 3-D bone puzzle. At first I was a little disappointed, but then I thought, “Why not show the true destructive power. This is supposed to be a demonstration.” So with the help of some industrial strength ceramic glue (which comes with the warning “only use outdoors or in extremely well ventilated areas” – no seriously, I feel fine) I had reconstructed Frankenstein's bone. The 4th graders' most common comment was “WHOA!!!

Frankenbone: Entrance

Frankenbone: Exit

Can you say "amputation"?