OldTools Archive

Recent Bios FAQ

27862 Ray McCaleb <ray_mccaleb@o...> 1997‑10‑07 Bio, and Re: The voices within...
I too arrived at the porch PB (pre-bio).

I had always been around tools, my dad being in the construction trade. He 
ran a small business in Florida specializing in screened enclosures, 
aluminum and fiberglass. We were never allowed to kill mosquitos, we just 
shooed them over to the neighbor's, the one without the screened porch. I 
worked summers. On hot days the pool looked inviting, 'till you remembered 
that you were above it with a drill in one hand, a metal beam in the other 
and your feet dancing on a 12 inch wide scaffold. We didn't have to worry 
about the boys at OSHA, they'd have been crazy to come around where we 
worked.

Fast forward 20+ years. Married (again), household repairs, etc., etc. Got 
into antiqueing (in Georgia it's ok to turn nouns into verbs) with the 
wife. One day, while flea marketing (see?) I happened into a stall with 
tools. Walked out with a #8...$40...not pretty, but my first old tool. 
Found out that I didn't really need that tailed jointer I was saving for. 
Downhill since. Started receiving boxes from Ashby. I'd order a user and 
wind up with something so spiffy it'd go on the shelf. He does that 
ya'know.

Fast forward three years. Still working with my hands...at a keyboard. 
Having just completed my twentieth year with the University System of Ga., 
I've begun thinking more and more about retirement. Gubment employees do 
that, spend that last 6 - 10 years of their working life planning for 
retirement. Mine is sure to include tools, old ones, and wood working, and 
of course, the porch.

Ray...just say (tm/PL) if this porch ever need screening, lemme know.

Ray McCaleb
(706) 369-5678; FAX (706) 369-6429
ray_mccaleb@o...
Office of Information/Instructional Technology
Business and Finance Systems
University System of Georgia



Recent Bios FAQ