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I got a phenomenal response to my request for input on this newsletter. Thanks to all who messaged me. Turns out, an overwhelming number of you like the newsletter the way it is and simply offered encouragement. I also got several excellent suggestions for new features which I’ll be rolling out in the coming weeks. Keep those cards and letters coming!
How to Restore Yellowed Clear Plastic
In this quick Tested video, Adam Savage sets out to restore the lid of a gorgeous vintage Nagra IV-S audio recorder he recently acquired. The machine is in surprisingly good condition, but the clear plastic cover was scratched and badly yellowed. Doing research, he found many recommendations for using 12% hydrogen peroxide. He tried it with partial success. He discovered that finishing it up with plastic polishing compound returned it to something close it is original glory.
Making a Cheap, Simple Air Cleaner for a Small Shop
In this I Build It video, John shows how he made a simple and inexpensive air cleaner for his small woodshop. The air cleaner was made from little more than a small fan, a piece of duct piping, some scrap ply, and a several shop vac air filters. I love the way it can be expanded (with additional filters) via a threaded rod that holds the filters in place.
IKEA Wrenches on Your Pegboard
I just discovered a use for all of those hex wrenches that come with IKEA and other flat-pack furniture. They make perfect pegboard pegs!
Oil Can!
The tin man in dire need of maintenance.
The other day, while oiling a squeaky hinge with some lithium grease, I flashed on my granddad. A consummate tinkerer and inventor, Gramps was obsessed with maintenance. He frequently had his spring-bottom oiler in hand, blue shop rag tangling from his back pocket, going around the house, the yard, his backyard workshop, the car, lovingly maintaining the machinery of his life. I decided in that moment to try and be better at doing the same. Moments later, on Twitter, I saw this Kurt Vonnegut quote: “Another flaw in the human character is that everybody wants to build and nobody wants to do maintenance.” Exactly. OIL CAN!
Maker Slang
Slang, jargon, and technical terms for the realms of making things.
Crown pulley – A pulley designwhere the center has a larger diameter than the outer edges, thus a “crown.” Perhaps counter-intuitively, the belt on the pulley will always seek the area of highest tension, returning it to the crown. Via Maker Update.
Promptcrafting – In AI art, it’s all about the quality of the prompts you craft. The better your invocation, the better the magic that gets returned.
Rewilding your attention – Writer Clive Thompson has been promoting the creative benefits of exposing yourself to the novel, the offbeat, the serendipitous. Look beyond what the online algorithms feed you – rewild your attention!
Shop Talk
As stated in the intro, I received many fabulous emails from you, dear readers. Here is one from Paul Cryan. Look for some tips from Paul in a coming issue!
“Thanks for doing all you do. Your tip books [Ed: Vol 1, Vol 2.] are great and I’m really enjoying the newsletter. I bought and devoured both of your books, in Kindle and PDF formats. I refer to them often and having the search function (via either the Kindle app or iBooks, respectively) is really handy. Every few days, I find myself looking at objects in new ways and going back to your references. This past Friday, I didn’t have a clamp within getting-up-from-my-chair distance at my office desk, so I ended up using a pair of pliers and a rubber band to hold together a plastic part I was gluing. Thanks for putting that seed in my head.
“The only problem I have with the weekly newsletter is that it gives me way too many things to think about and try per unit of time!
“With your tips books, I’ve got months to read through them and try things out. This week, I experimented with the lanolin mineral oil mixture to rustproof tools out of your latest tips book and it seems to hold much more promise than Johnson’s Paste Wax for keeping my old restored Shopsmiths looking and working great. I still need to test whether the stickiness can be buffed sufficiently off the power-tool surfaces to avoid particles grabbing, but so far so good. And who doesn’t like that faint smell of ungulates on their metal? 😉
“With the newsletter, I’m interested in just about everything you cover, which leads me to a weekly frenzy of investigation and implementation. Within the past month I’ve upgraded our broken sink strainers to the OXO type (love them), picked up a Williams ratcheting screwdriver (my new favorite ‘good enough’ tool), and bought Fat Boy pencils and FastCap markers that have me wondering how I didn’t know about these things before. And now I’m browsing saw blades!”
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Winner of the Pulitzer Prize, The Denial of Death argues that the terror of mortality is the mainspring of human activity — that everything we do, from building civilizations to seeking love, is ultimately an attempt to transcend our animal fate and achieve symbolic immortality.
Core Principles
The Terror at the Core
Human beings are unique among animals in knowing they will die. This awareness creates a paralyzing terror that we spend our entire lives managing. The basic motivation for human behavior is not sex (as Freud claimed) but our biological need to control this existential anxiety — to deny the terror of death. The deeper and richer one’s life becomes, the more one senses how much there is to lose, which sharpens the fear of annihilation.
The Vital Lie of Character
To function in daily life, we construct what Becker calls “character armor” — a set of psychological defenses that keep the awareness of death unconscious. This “vital lie” lets us feel safe and pretend the world is manageable. Neurosis occurs when these defenses break down, and we can no longer maintain our illusions.
Immortality Projects
We cope with mortality by pursuing “immortality projects” — activities that give us a sense of lasting significance. These can be almost anything: religion, art, politics, wealth, fame, having children, or belonging to a group larger than ourselves. They buffer our anxiety and provide self-esteem by letting us feel part of something that will outlive us.
The Source of Human Conflict
Because our immortality projects are symbolic constructions, the mere existence of people with different beliefs threatens our sense of security. Wars, genocide, racism, and nationalism often stem from clashing immortality projects — each side unconsciously defending against death anxiety by destroying the “other” whose worldview invalidates their own.
Try It Now
Identify your primary “immortality project” — the activity or identity that gives you a sense of lasting significance. Is it your career? Family? Creative work? A cause?
Notice how you react when someone criticizes or dismisses this project. Does the intensity of your reaction reveal something about how much you depend on it for self-esteem?
Consider: What would remain meaningful to you if you truly accepted that you will die and be forgotten? Write down three things.
Pay attention today to moments when you distract yourself from uncomfortable thoughts. Shopping, scrolling, drinking — what might you be avoiding?
Ask yourself Becker’s question: “Am I living my own life, or am I living the lie I need in order to feel safe?”
Quote
“The irony of man’s condition is that the deepest need is to be free of the anxiety of death and annihilation; but it is life itself which awakens it, and so we must shrink from being fully alive.”
The tin man in dire need of maintenance.
