Hammer and Rule

From accurate to precise

January 4, 2026

The Hammer and The Rule

I am going to confess something to you. This thought had never come to me until this dark January morning. I wondered what would have happened if I had just realized that the Studio was done? That when Covid hit us, and I shut the doors and started classes online, that these were last gasps. The world had changed. We were all just so close to things that we couldn’t see what had occurred. The world would never look like it once had so I should have embraced that change.

Dark morning thoughts. Listen to Beethoven. His world changed when he went deaf. He was a composer! How do you do your life’s work when you can’t even hear it except in your head? He pressed forward. I’m sure he felt sorry for himself some days, raged against misfortune, cursed his luck. Then he pressed forward.

This is what I know. I am not a composer. There. That’s finally out there. Such a relief to get that off my chest. I cannot compose music.

I can however do some things with my hands and this fortune fell into my lap by my believing this wasn’t like a real job. It was different from the academic world I came from. I was not a lawyer, not a Phd, and not computer trained. I decided to work with my hands and my mind. What I have is this knowledge that I feel is too valuable for me to let fall by the wayside. It is in my nature to learn and then to share this.

But much like the fable of The Scorpion and the Frog, those of us with only a hammer as a tool tend to look at everything as a nail. Or as a computer problem. Or as something to sting. “It is in my nature,” said the Scorpion. Fortunately for us we have the ability to choose from among our many tools.

I have six hammers I use regularly. Each hammer has a specific whallop and therefore purpose. They all have different heads for their manner of striking and heft for the dent. These tools have accuracy in the right hands.

My measuring and marking tools are almost too many to number. From squares and bevels to rules, hook rules, straight edges, bendy sticks, and dial calipers. From accurate to precise.

On Saturday, Jan. 31, from 10am to 12pm Pacific Time, in a lecture entitled: Wedges, Hammers, and Rule I want to discuss hammer and rule and also our cutting tools, all wedge shaped.

Roll Over Beethoven.