Hi, my name is Tom Watson and I'm a recovering rec.normer.  I've come here
to get in out of the rain (and it rains aplenty on rec.norm) and this here
porch looks mighty inviting.  I'm a cabinetmaker by trade and have a host
of tailed tools, both large and small.  Still, there's a Stanley 55 tucked
away in my neander cabinet out in the shop and a few galootish devices
that I use on a day to day basis.

I live one county south of the Mercer Museum, which I believe to be a
Galootish Shrine and at which I have lit a candle or two while standing
with mouth agape at the wonders wrought by our forebearers.  Although I
started my woodworking journey during the sixties, with a Rockwell 315 in
hand and an attitude, I was reading 'A Reverence For Wood' at the same
time and have always felt the pull of that sort of thinking.

I'm looking to move my business from building big ole liberries,
bookcases, kitsch cabinets and such, to making traditional furniture on
spec that I'd like to make using a combination of Normite and Neander
techniques.

My primary interest just now is to learn about the acquisition, tuning and
making of molding planes, to be used in making this vaporware furniture.

This seems like a good place to learn about such things and so I stand,
hat in hand, and ask if you might find a small, out of the way spot in
some porchly backwater (don't have to be a clean spot) where I might
crouch for a spell and learn with eyes and ears.

Regards,

Tom.
Thomas J. Watson - Cabinetmaker
tjwcabinetmaker.com