Epping Forest Olympics

The pic I'm using for a header at the moment is one of our favourite spots in The Forest - it's called The Lost Pond.  It's easy to get lost round there if you go off piste.
Nothing against cyclists but - Thank God they didn't put the Olympic cross country cycle track through here as was originally planned...

The City of London, in their role of Protectors of The Forest, took a really firm stand against the proposal citing various historic and environmental factors, SSSI etc.

Tree Listening

A bijou event that we attended on Sunday was Tree listening at The Vines in Rochester, Kent.  Alex Metcalf has worked out ways of listening to the inner workings of trees - sounds a bit like a gurgling, popping peristalsis.  Now he's working on ways of identifying particular species from their sounds.

The tree we were listening to was a Caucasian Wingnut (Pterocarya fraxinifolia) - quite rare and not one I've seen before.

Wonder what the wood's like?

Bench Hook

I think the humble Bench Hook is a useful item to have in the workshop and also enables you to work on the kitchen table - if you're allowed.  Made from any old bit of board (could be chipboard or mdf) with a batten fixed at either end as a stop to hold the work against.  The battens are about 1" narrower than the board so that when sawing you don't hit the table or bench.  Left handers, leave the gap on the left hand side.
I used to screw the battens on until I hit the screw on an old, well used one with a nice sharp chisel and took a big lump out of the edge.  Now I glue and cramp them and run a couple of dowels through when dry.
Good for wasting wood off spoons with a chisel and handy for sawing up and sharpening my twig pencils and crayons.

Make one now if you haven't already got one.

A ? of Spoons

Just emptied out my satchel of roughed-out spoons etc to look for something to work on during the rainy afternoon and was quite shocked to see how many have managed to accumulate there.  I often manage to do a couple on courses whilst the novice turners are struggling to come to terms with the skew chisel.  Better sharpen the knives and get cracking.

Anyone suggest a good collective noun for wooden spoons?