Day 600:
During the day, I dig toward the big mountain.
At night, I’m learning how to make a carder for wool.
I’m kind of glad my parents used to drag me to all those historical reenactment sites as a kid. I mean, I don’t have any idea how to make all the fancy complex tools that they had, most of which looked so old and rotted away I’m not sure I would have understood them anyway.
But I do remember that to make the wool long and spinnable you had to brush it between two things called cards, which were like two big flat hairbrushes with metal tines.
So like everything else here, it’s not as easy as run down to the local storage synthesizer, where as long as the computer had a 3-d image of a thing it could produce it. I’ve got to melt the iron down and then roll it while it’s hot until i have thin enough chunks that I can cut them into nail lengths, then hammer the nail lengths into the wood.
(I did try to weld a set onto metal, but let me tell you, I don’t have the energy or patience to do that kind of delicate work after digging all day. It’s hot and smelly and hammering is more fun. )
Tonight’s attempt made nails that were too thick, so tomorrow I’ll try again.