Piano Tracking Redo

I am loathe to say much on rebuilding on-line in a public forum. No matter what you say or do, it will be wrong to someone. The following transcribed bit from the 1978 Nation Lampoon parody Sunday Edition of the Dacron “Republican-Democrat” is the perfect illustration. The Ann Landers parody column was entitled: Dear Dorothy. The problems she solved.
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Dear Dorothy. At a luncheon at a friend’s house I discovered that there was no toilet tissue in the bathroom and as I needed some I had no choice but to use a hand towel. I put the hand towel into my purse fully intending to take it home, wash it and return it the next day. However, a while later my friend asked to see my new handbag. Needless to say she found the towel and accused me of stealing. What should I do now? EMBARRASSED PORTLAND, OREGON

DEAR EMBARRASSED: Anyone who entertains and doesn’t have the sense to check her toilet tissue supply isn’t considerate enough to have friends. If she’s really your friend, I hate to meet your enemies!

Dear Dorothy. I had a few friends over for lunch the other day and as we were visiting I noticed one of the gals was acting very peculiar. I suspected something right away and asked to see her purse. She was very reluctant to give me her purse and with good reason-she stole one of my towels! I’m shocked and don’t quite know what to do. ANGRY PORTLAND, OREGON.

DEAR ANGRY: Anyone who steals from her friends is no friend at all. Drop her like a hot brick.

Dear Dorothy. I am very generous about loaning things, but I’m really miffed. I loaned a neighbor my expensive good guest hand towels for a luncheon party. When she returned them the next day, one of them, was stained and smelled of urine. What could be wrong with her? REVOLTED PORTLAND, OREGON.

DEAR REVOLTED. I think your friend needs a hygiene lesson. And you need friends like her the way a cat needs swim fins.

Last week I put out a call for help to acquire the proper tracker bar linkage for my upright Franklin Ampico. I have owned this piano since 1975. The tracker pneumatic and linkages were missing when I bought it. I was able to acquire a tracker pneumatic and fixed up a crude tracking rod over the spoolbox which worked well enough. In the late 1980’s in patching up the Ampico to keep it playing, the tracking system was modified to shift the tracker bar.

This upright is an early A system. There is evidence of five bracket supports on the top of the spool box for a tracking rod.

Five years back I was considering “Craigslisting” this piano to free up space. It barely played and anyone reading this knows what the market value is on these instruments anymore. Still, this piano held sentimental value. After 40+ years I still enjoy listening and tinkering with it. I was able to get it to gasp through some rolls and made the decision to have it all professionally restored. It was late October 2015 the piano technician was at my house installing the works and fine tuning it all. It was heaven to have my Ampico operating again.

This past month the tracker bar stiffened up and would no longer move by the tracking pneumatic. That was the impetus to restore the tracking back to a rod system to shift the roll.

A MMD member came to my rescue. I could tell from the parts photos this would not be a “exact” replacement, but it could still be done. The tracking linkages and related parts were delivered to my door Wednesday the 27th.

I have dealt with antiques for over 50 years now. Believe me, I know the iron clad restoration rule to “never alter an antique in a way that can’t be reversed”. In my situation, I figured this rule did not apply. The chance of getting an exact duplicate of the original tracking rod was pretty much “0”.

To make this function, I would have to cut into the sides of the spool box. I do not have a fancy woodworking shop; I try to function with the basic hand and power tools. This will be a low tech installation. Painters tape was applied to the tops of the sides of the spool box and measurements were marked out. Using a fine finishing saw, two cuts were made on each side. A jewelers saw with a fine blade cut across the bottoms to make the channels. Once the rod was adjusted for the right depth, bushing felt was glued into the channels and over the rod.

The top board needed to be modified to accommodate the newly installed rod. A channel would have to be cut into the length of the top board. Again using painters tape, the measurements were laid out and marked. This board was duct taped to a scrap of plywood. A guide was set up for the circular saw. The blade height was adjusted. A run down each side and the middle of the channel was made with a finishing blade. I then “rocked” the blade from the middle cut to each side to knock down the remaining wood. This a far cry from a professional restoration, but this is not something anyone is going to see.

I was so glad Louis also mailed along the spool box parts which matched the linkages. I wanted to incorporate the new tracking rod and linkages from Louis with old brass existing roll parts in The Franklin spoolbox.  The system that originally held the piano rolls was too different from this later set up from Louis. The clearances were way off. The original brass components could have been modified with a lot of aggravation. It was easier to take off the existing hardware and replace with the “new” items.

I got this new tracking system all set up and working by late morning. The piano is playing and tracking wonderfully. I’m very happy!

Set up showing old linkage shifting the tracker bar:

Cutting in the side channels:

Gluing in the bushing felt:

Cutting in the channel:

Installation completed and working:

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Turn your Lemons into Lemonade

The internet is rife with the “moral stories” that are supposed to make you think and ponder. I often wonder how many of these stories are real, or pure drivel like the “True Confessions” published in the magazine of the same name.

This is my “uplifting story” of events which just happened this morning.

Miss Holly has a habit of flopping and rolling when she gets excited and happy. It can happen anywhere. Debbie related to how everything on my dining room table was on the floor one time she came in to check up when I was on my trip in February. (I’m still finding toothpicks from the knocked over toothpick holder!)

I should not have been surprised this morning when the water goblet I left on the dining room table was overturned and broken. It was my fault for leaving the thing out.

I was talking on the phone with my sister walking into the kitchen when inspiration hit to turn the disaster into an artistic application!

A few years back Billy received a shipment of antique stuff that was hardly packed at all. One of casualties was a LLadro figurine that lost its head. Billy gave me the pieces as he knew I’d come up with some use for the thing.

The Alabama thrift store had an abundance of glazed figurines at .79¢ ea. Using the brick saw, I was able to do a “head transplant” to the LLadro figurine attaching it with Minwax epoxy wood filler. The repair is almost undetectable! LOL!!!

Looking at the remains of the goblet I got a brainstorm to bury it into the garden so the stem and base would make a pedestal for a piece of art. The reassembled remains of the shattered LLadro head will work on the decapitated figurine. Only in Tuscaloosa, a successful head transplant and artistic application at the same time!

Turn your lemons into lemonade.

A History of Some of My Bricks

The organizers of the Spring Brick Swap in Terre Haute, Indiana put out a request for members to send in pictures of their favourite bricks or stories related to them. I got to thinking how the old bricks I salvaged back in 1983 have had such an impact upon my life. I began to pull pictures of these patterned bricks from my photo albums and realized the story was too complex too narrow down to just a couple pictures.

Let me begin by saying I salvaged out these circle pattern bricks in the summer of 1983. It was not till the summer of 1986 they began to see use around my house as edger bricks and even as a walkway.

It was the spring and summer of 1987 Ron and I got seriously to work fixing up my back yard. Ron had the green thumb for growing just about anything.

Closer shot of the bricks being used as edging:

The cement pad was taken out and replaced with garden stuff and bricks. The walkway is the patterned train station brick, while the large area is hill brick salvaged from Clinton Street Hill when it was redone in 1989.

It was in 1995 I finally built a deck to utilize the door I installed in the dining room to the backyard. To tie everything together, all the patterned bricks were brought together into a patio.

Early installation:

Roughed in deck:

Things were happening in my life. My neighborhood was getting seedier. I was no longer content in my old house. My mother died in December 1994. She was the main tie I had holding me to Lockport. The fall of 1995 I began to seriously contemplate relocating to Tuscaloosa, AL where my factory had a small plant principally to supply the Saturn line of GM cars with air cooling and heating systems.

It was January 1996 I visited Tuscaloosa, AL for the first time to check things out. I had a very favorable impression. I made up my mind to make the move. 

There was no way I was leaving my treasured bricks behind. The first load got moved south in March 1996 along with a truckload of other stuff. I rented a storage unit and slowly filled it from my numerous trips south. That poor 1995 Dakota had more miles on it nearly dragging the bumper on the interstate from being overloaded with those bricks!

Digging up the patio. Spring 1996:

One of my favourite cat pictures: Chloe is the tabby, Fuzzy is the yellow:

I had crocus growing up through my lawn in back. By the time I was moving, they had spread to where they had taken over the tiny back yard.

The bricks are gone. The finished deck. Me, Billy and Chloe. Early Fall 1996:

I closed on my Tuscaloosa house Aug 1996. The bricks I had stored in a storage facility were moved to my new abode. Chloe on the brick pile. The Train station bricks are in the back, the Clinton Street hill pavers in the front.

It was not till the spring of 1999 I was able to break out the cement sidewalk and install these patterned brick into a front walkway:

Now let us fast forward to spring of 2012. I purchased a hoard of Nelsonville Star bricks located just outside of Dayton, Ohio through E-bay.

The train station brick was taken up and the nicer salt glaze bricks took their place:

New and improved walkway with flower brick as the edge, star, and a few circle bricks and snowflake thrown in for good measure for the fill:

I was going to incorporate the old sidewalk bricks into the driveway, but they were not a salt glaze and the different dimensions in the brick did look right:

An early project back in 2000 was to install a cement walkway to my workshop. tThis walk was bordered by brick and divided into sections. That cement was torn up and replaced with brick in the fall of 2011. The one outside support "wall" was replaced with a cement footer topped with a plain solid brick salvaged from the old walkway.

This was filled in with Star Brick I acquired in Virginia:

In 2012 these Star bricks were taken up to be used in the driveway. The Train station bricks took their place in a herringbone pattern:

I acquired a another hoard of patterned brick in Tennessee which allowed an expansion and improvement project in the summer of 2013 on that walkway. It was such an aggravation to cut and trim the small odd patches of grass. Brick is so much better!

That is the history of the bricks that changed my life for the last 33 years. This just proves Ron to be true. He always explained me to people as, “That Jimmy. He is like a squirrel in a cage just going round, and round, and round!”

Remembering Aunt Rita

There was a message on my answering machine from my good friend Janey. Soon as I heard her voice I knew Aunt Rita had died. I’ll get more details today, but Janey said how Rita had provisions for no announcements of her death or any kind of funeral or memorial services. I can totally relate to Aunt Rita feeling this way.

For the record, Aunt Rita was not my biological aunt. My co workers in Department 862 at the GM Plant and I took to calling her “Aunt Rita” because her true nephew Terry, who also worked with us, was forbidden to address her as “Aunt Rita”!

That old department 862 was a special place. I probably spent ½ of my GM career working in that department. That area had a low turnover in workers. We became family over the years. Being on my own I realized early on the importance of cultivating an extended family. Aunt Rita was an important part of that family.

It was in the late summer of 1976 I was transferred to Department 862 from the “brown lines” in Building 9, because I had job rights to the open clincher job. I had trained and ran a clincher in another department where I worked off skids. In 862 I had to pull parts off a moving conveyer line. Some of those parts looked so alike, I was always mixing them up which resulted in panic for me as I would attempt to get my clincher unjammed, cleaned out, and not lose rate. Watching me run my clincher in those early days was a great source of amusement for the “clincher boys”.

That summer of 1976 found me in my first apartment on my own. It was like a rite of passage as I went through my “back to earth” phase. I had a pair of real Kelso “earth shoes” and bought food at the health food store. I made homemade Granola, which baffled my co-workers. Aunt Rita swore I was eating bird seed!

I could write a book on what transpired in 862. Aunt Rita was a great enabler. It was back in the mid 1980’s. Our foreman Lou pretty much left us alone as he knew we would always give him his numbers and quality. It was a win-win situation all around. One day Lou was particularly exasperated, and he told my clincher partner Mel and I to “Go fly a kite.”

The following day Aunt Rita showed up with a kite for me and Mel to launch. It was summer; we would take our last break outside behind the plant at some picnic tables. We got a ball of string from Bud, who ran the tool crib. My old 862 foreman Charlie encountered us as we headed out the back door of the plant. He saw the kite and took a “I see nothing” attitude.

We got that kite way up in the air behind the plant, but we ran into trouble when it nearly crashed into a taxi driving up the side road. The kite got away from us and landed up on the roof. We lost it just in time as plant security soon showed up asking who was flying a kite. Mel just answered back, “What the Hell? Who would be stupid enough to fly a kite back here?” We were guilty as Hell. We knew it, plant security knew it, but they could not prove anything.

Word quickly spread. Aunt Rita told Bud, security had found the kite and string and they were trying to trace the string back to the tool crib! Bud was a nervous wreck over that one!

Another adventure happened when we got sent home early before lunch on the day shift. I suggested to the crew we all stop by Mary Sharky’s in Lowertown. Sharkys was an institution, it was a “beer and shot” bar located in the mist of the old paper mill complex on the corner of Mill and Center St. Mary was a legend in my hometown. She told us stories of getting bootleg booze in North Tonawanda during prohibition and adding caramel colouring to it.

We all had the best time. Aunt Rita never got over the huge dog turd she spied on top of a flat rock in front of the place!

Some of my work crew outside Mary Sharkey’s.

Nick and Aunt Rita:

I’ll be reliving a lot of Aunt Rita stories in my head today.

Aunt Rita was such a vibrant, down to earth person. She lived a good life and will be sorely missed. Her health had deteriorated so, I’m thankful she passed peacefully.

I’ve been thinking too much about mortality lately. It is pretty much a given that after a generation or two families pretty much forget about their ancestors. Names are forgotten and faces in photos are unknown. This quote from the book, “Let Us Build Us A City. Eleven Lost Towns of Arkansas” by Donald Harington pretty much sums up the best we can hope for. An elderly woman ended an interview with one of the most insightful lines I have ever read. She simply said, “I want to believe that years later on you’ll still think about me.”

This is a person I have never met, but I have used her insight more times than I can remember. With my journals I often wonder if such will be the case for me. Decades from now will these musings still be read? I like to think so and that somehow my writing here can give a perspective to a life in constant transition.

New Addition to this Home

Life sure takes turns. This wallpaper nightmare has so consumed my everyday existence. I have to admit I have been taking my time with this. Years past I would have had this job cranked out in no time.

It was late Sunday afternoon my neighbor Christy stopped by. She is a wonderful woman who works with the feral cats in the neighborhood. Her group traps these cats and then has the females fixed to help keep the population in check. Christy was heart broken when I lost Stumpy and Kitty Belle. She understood as to why I was holding back on letting another cat into my life till after the trip in January.

Christy was on her way home after feeding the feral cats. She told me of a Tortoiseshell cat just six doors down from me she has been looking over. This cat lived under a student rental house. The students already had two cats and were unable to care for another. The students called this cat “Patches”. Christie related how this cat is so loving and friendly and it broke her heart to think with the cold nasty weather coming this cat would have to fend for herself. She also added the finishing touch how she would stop by every day of my trip to love this girl down and feed her if I decided to bring her into my life. That did it!

The ice around my heart melted. This house has really been lonely with Stumpy and Kittybelle gone. Monday around 4:00 p.m. Christy was at my house with this cat. We let her out of the carrier in the “wallpaper room” to let her get acquainted a bit with being indoors. She came right to me for pets and loves. She was purring a mile a minute with her whiskers fanned out, which means. “I feel safe and secure” in cat language.

This little cat passed her feline leukemia test, so she has a pretty clean bill of health. She has her ear clipped which is a sign she is feral and she has been fixed. She appears to be pretty young. In a few weeks I’ll get her to my vet for her shots. No outside for this cat for quite a while. I want to acclimate her to this house so she knows she has a home. I knew she was at home when I discovered her asleep on the back sofa cushion. Every cat that has ever owned me has made those back cushions “home”.

I need to find a name for this little cat. I’m sorry, but I can’t call her “Patches” as it brings to mind that horrible, morbid song from the 1960’s of teen love, angst, and suicide. My sister suggested “Holly” because it is around XMAS… I’ve slipped a number of times in calling her “Daggy” as she is so like my old girl.

Christy called last night about 8:30 to see how we were getting on. I had to laugh when I related we were both lying in the bed watching the “Beverly Hillbillies” on the Youtubes! Some things never change. A dialogue between me and Ron from nearly 30 years ago plays on an endless loop in my mind:

1:00 a.m. a long time ago.
Ron: Jimmy, get to bed now!
Jamie: In a minute Ron, Honey (Ron’s old tabby cat) wants to watch the rest of “Mr Ed”.
Ron: (With extreme exasperation in his voice) Jimmy, Honey does NOT want to watch “Mr. Ed”, get to bed NOW!!!!

It was like old times to have a cat jumping in and out of bed all night long. As I type this out, my new kitty stops for bits and pieces, then continues on her expedition of exploring her new home. Just as I’m going;pl[[[[[[[[[[[[.;llllllllll to save this entry my kitty has returned and I can hear her purring....( she just jumped up on my lap and keyboard!) Life is good…

Thanksgiving Entry from the old Open Diary site from 2010

I’ll be heading out on the road for a Thanksgiving journey for the first time in many years. Road trips at Thanksgiving wore me out back in 1996 & 1997 when I was commuting between Lockport, NY and Tuscaloosa, AL. I was not keeping a journal at that time of my life. However, the events of the trips are burned into my memory.

I was stacking aluminum radiator cores in Building 7 on the day shift the day before Thanksgiving 1996. This was a rate job I was very good at. My partner in sharing the center machine was Karen. She taught me how to stack and she was fast. Once we started work for the day we tried to keep the machine which made up our air centers running all the time. Starting the center machine from a dead stop would increase the chance of jam ups and down time. When our parts table would fill up, an electric eye would get covered cancelling out parts being sent. If my eye would get covered Karen would then get all the parts. She would yell.. “JIMMY my table is filling up!~!!!” That would always light a fire under my butt!!

Stacking was a rate job. I had made extra parts earlier in the week I did not record so I would give a legal count for my weeks work when I left early. This day I worked through my morning breaks and was able to get my count out just into my lunch. Karen promised to put my finished parts on the line, and record my count so I could head out on the road early. I ran out of that place to my truck and hightailed it to my house. The truck was packed with paving bricks and odds and ends.

I had moved most of my antiques south in October using a 17ft U-haul. Mom’s cat Fuzzie moved in with Chloe and me after her death in 1994. That October move was the trip my sisters found Fuzzie dead when they came to feed the cats. That was so horrible. There was no way I was going to leave Ron’s old cat Chloe behind this trip. From now on we would be travelling as a team. Chloe was startled when I scooped her up, plopped her into the cat carrier and carried her to the truck.

Chloe settled right in and travelled wonderfully. The traffic was as you would expect: Miserable. Naturally I hit Columbus, OH right around 5:00 p.m. I hate driving through this city. Rush hour makes it the worst. Cincinnati was not much better. I can still see in my mind the unbroken line of red taillights snaking into and through the metropolis.

Once I got over the river into Kentucky things calmed down a bit. I decided to stop for the night at what was then a Budget Host Motel in Erlanger, KY. I had stayed there before and knew there was not a problem with Chloe. Right next door was a White Castle. A BIG plus in my book.

Chloe was a trooper. She made herself right at home in her regal manor.

We got an early start Thanksgiving Day and had smooth sailing into Tuscaloosa. Chloe explored the new house. It met with her approval and she claimed a perch on top of boxes stacked up in what is now the back study.

Chloe made a number of similar trips the following year. She developed cancer: the Thanksgiving trip to Tuscaloosa in 1997 was her last. She was such a special cat. There was something mystical about her. When she would look into your eyes it was like she could see into your soul. Her ashes are in a tin in my front parlor. I have it in my will I’m to be cremated and our ashes are to be mixed together and spread off the Appalachian Trail.

Homage To Stumpy

My Vet and his assistant were in tears as Stumpy went to sleep. My Vet hates to euthanize, but even he agreed it was time when I explained the only food Stumpy had eaten in the past three days was some baby food licked off my finger. Stump had such a fast decline this week.

Stumpy was buried in two old heirloom pillow cases with tatted edges. One of his favourite spots to relax was next to the driveway where he would blend in and still be able to observe everything going on. Cornelius was right when he said, “Stumpy owns this neighborhood!” Stumpy’s final resting place is in that spot next to the driveway he “helped” me install.

Stumpy hard at work helping with the bricks August 2012:

The ground was hard but not impossible to dig for Stump’s grave. I had to take the carrier apart as his body had stiffend up, and I did not want to change anything by forcing him through the door. Doc arranged him so it was like he was curled up sleeping. This was one of the carriers Ron used to send his cats Honey and Sister from Rochester, NY to Houston Texas back in the fall of 1989. This was put in action after his death to ship Chloe to me in the fall of 1992. It has seen such service moving cats over the years.

Lifting my beautiful lifeless black cat out of the carrier base caused me to have my breakdown and cry my tears. I was alone and did not hold back. It was so cathartic to just let go. It was as if a huge weight of worry and apprehension had been lifted. I gave my boy last hugs and kisses, and covered him in the “pillowcase shroud”.

I plan on switching out one of the border bricks on the driveway here with an engraved brick signifying Stump’s final resting place. I can look out the side door from my bedroom as I work on the desktop, or the kitchen window when I have to set up the fan to blow out the cooking grease so not to set off the smoke alarm and see him.

Stumpy’s grave:

I know I have pictures of Stumpy sunning in this spot, but have been unable to turn them up. I really need to name those shots rather then trying to remember the dates they were downloaded to be able to find them via a search. The photos in my files must now number in the thousands.

I’m so sorry now I did not have a digital camera, or Open Diary when Daggy and Stumpy were kittens. What they put me through! I would not change it for the world. But, the world and Internet were so different 17 years ago. I can remember trying to stream radio on a dial-up AOL connection!

My friends here at Prosebox and Facebook have been such support to me. I honestly don’t think I could have pulled through without the encouraging and kind words of compassion. This type of interaction is what still makes such an impression on me on how the internets can so improve life and make a hard situation better.

Stumpy Daggy and I all had such a good life together. I relish the memories.

Putting these entries together has been so cathartic. I have been interacting with friends and am feeling much better.

Let me add a montage of pictures here for closure. Stumpy touched many lives all over the world. He truly was one special cat.

Stumpy and Daggy on the bed:

Trying out the new dresser:

On the truck:

Enjoying some steak:

In the early spring grass:

On the front porch:

Helping to shell pecans:

Relaxing:

Waiting for the bus:

I could not find these photos on my photobucket account, so had to do up a fresh scan.
The top picture was from December 1998 showing Daggy and Stump as real pals. The bottom shot is just before Stump attacked! He looks more like a bear cub with that stump tail!

These photos bring back such happy memories… they are the best ones.