A pencil of one's own

The symbol of the Lead Pencil Club is a yellow Number 2 pencil with the text NOT SO FAST.

I have learned that American Number 2 is equivalent to Australian HB. The Australian ( in reality British ) system is that pencils with soft dark graphite are called Black - B. The more black are modified with a number - 2B, 4B, 6B, etc. Pencils with hard graphite are designated H, these make a fainter line. They are also graded with harder - and fainter pencils modified with a number - 2H, 4H, etc.

HB pencils are supposedly the happy medium between H and B. They are the most popular grade. You can buy they in packs of a hundred.

In 1971 - in primary school - I had moved to a new grade and - disgarding my slate - I was using HB pencil and paper. The teacher disgusted at the grubby marks on my writing pads called my mother in and said that I was to use 4H pencils. This would prevent me smearing graphite over the page. I did all my school right through to university with 4H pencils.

Recently re-looking at pencils - in my attempt to not use plastic biros - I find that I prefer 4B sharpered to a fine point. This gives a dark legible line.

The Lead Pencil Club

The Minutes of the Lead Pencil Club edited by Bill Henderson ( 1996, ISBN 0-916366-84-7 ) is a great read from the beginning of the internet. Some of the contributions are prophetic - I thought M. Kadi (page 175) was particularly accurate. 

Sweet Heinrich

The sugar shaker is 1950s German technology - it dispenses sugar without using possibly contaminated teaspoons. It is making a comeback in a covid world. As a bonus it has no moving parts to wear out and can be constructed without plastic.

Custom Clamp

The improved jockey wheel at the front of the camper trailer came with a clamp that allowed for a load up to 400kg and had 4 different clamping heights.

Great! Except that the clamp only suited a 75mm bar. I asked a local engineering firm to attach a backing plate for a 100mm bar and it all works very well.

King of Australia

Dr Edward de Bono died on 9 June aged 88.

He authored two of my favourite books -

Simplicity

Teach yourself to think.

He is also famous for- 

Lateral Thinking and

Six Thinking Hats.

He once said he wanted to be King of Australia because he sold so msny books here.

Using the tools he taught, I have surprised my colleagues many times with a creative idea.

Still as Stone

The stone curlew freezes if it thinks you are watching. It is like a Weeping Angel.

It seems to think itself invisible if it is not moving. It blends in well with dead leaves and stones.

On the Beach

The ocean shore at Minjerribah.

The sea like glass fractures at the edge of white sand. Nature at rest.

This is not the despair of Neville Shute.