Pencil Frustration

[Tim]

This is the sort of posting that defines "rambling".

Does anyone else have trouble keeping a pencil close at hand when working on the boat? It seems like I am forever putting one down somewhere and then not having it on me when I need it. I try to keep a couple in my pocket or one behind my ear, but somehow I still manage to misplace them.

If I'm working in the woodshop, all the pencils seem to be on the boat; somehow, when I'm on the boat, all the pencils are down in the shop. How is that possible?

It's gotten to the point where I left a full box of new pencils on the boat so that there would always be several there...but they're not sharpened, and when I need one I find that I can't seem to locate a utility knife either. I tried scattering a dozen of those around, but they still seem to travel on their own...

I just thought it might be amusing to share one of work's little frustrations.

[Ceasar Choppy]

If you have your workshop on the boat, they will always be where you need them!!!

Of course, you still have to go hunting for them.

I actually HATE the flat pencils like the kind you get at Home Despot. While they don't roll around, they don't stick so well behind my ear unless I have a hat on which is not normally.

[dasein668]

Does anyone else have trouble keeping a pencil close at hand when working on the boat? It seems like I am forever putting one down somewhere and then not having it on me when I need it.

Don't put it down. Ever. Bad habit!

Hey, here's an idea: attach a tether to it, like the strings that connect kids' mittens to their jacket.

[Jason K]

This is probably a consequence of you being so neat and organized. If you take a page from my book, all of your surfaces will look great, but any storage medium will be like a very small Wal-Mart. Pens and pencils will be found in the bottom of almost every drawer, in any bag, in your glove box, and between the pages of about a third of your notebooks.

Plus, you'll have tape measures, screw drivers and spare change in abundance.

I know you're recoiling at the thought, but give it a try. You may need to file a float plan to sit down at your desk, but you'll never develop a conspiracy theory about roving bands of pencil thieves either.

[Figment]

Can't keep one behind the ear AND wear glasses/goggles.
They always break when in pockets.
The hatband is the only reliable pencilholder I've found. Wearing a hat is key.

The good thing about the flat carpenter's pencils is that they fit nicely into the guide slot on the table saw, so that one always has a home. Similarly a normal pencil fits in the slot on the bandsaw.

Utility knives are elusive little buggers. I've become a HUGE fan of those bright-colored plastic $0.99 snap-off knives. I must have twenty of them scattered around.

These things all seem to migrate to the top of my dresser in the closet. The same with office pens. I'll come home with two or three in my pocket on any given day. Every so often J fills a quart-sized ziploc with them and stuffs it into my satchel so they can migrate en masse back to the office and get worked back into the rotation.

Tape measures seem to congregate in the passenger's footwell of my car. I think at the moment the jeep has a 60', two 25s and a 12.

[George ( C&C 40 )]

Hi Guys,

It's an epidemic! I was putting "Delphinus" back together after the huge winter projects list and found 9 pencils plus 6 neon yellow snap-off knives.

George

[Tim]

I can't use those carpenter's pencils either. I feel like a kindergartener with one of those silly things in my hand. They're OK for rough house framing work, though I still prefer my Ticonderogas.

I don't wear hats, so the hat band won't work. Over-the-ear storage works, except for the need to continually put on/take off the safety glasses. (Which I always wear around power tools, etc; I like me eyes.) So this is where this fails me. But it's my default location. (Often, I'll go searching for a pencil only to find much later that one's been over my ear the whole time...duh!)

I don't break too many in my front pocket, though it does happen. More often, I get stabbed. Not a good thing. Still, even though sometimes I end up with three or four in there, there are almost as many times that there are none. Even when moments before there were two. It's gotta be the pencli gremlins.

They end up in my mouth a lot. But I get sick of the taste after a while. Death by pencil paint? It could happen.

Frankly, it doesn't matter if there's a pencil (or five pencils) 7 feet away in plain sight; usually, you need it NOW because you're holding something in place, or what have you. If it's not within reach, it might as well be on the moon.

Tape measures deserve their own topic, I think. They're always in the wrong place too. And the metal tab at the end always sticks in some crack or under something when you don't want it, but somehow fails to grab when you need it to.

Apparently I need some real problems to worry about.

[Rachel]

Hey, here's an idea: attach a tether to it, like the strings that connect kids' mittens to their jacket.

Right, good old mitten strings. And then you'd have two pencils.

Isn't it weird how much longer it feels like there's one behind your ear even after it's long gone?

[bcooke]

Tim, you wear Carhardts so just use the long side pockets.

I always keep a couple of pencils in there. Until I wash them and then I find the pencils banging away in the dryer...

[Tim]

Yes, but you see the problem is that the gremlins take the pencils out of my pockets and scatter them about without regard to my convenience.

[Mark.Wilme]

Hey, here's an idea: attach a tether to it, like the strings that connect kids' mittens to their jacket.

You can buy these elastic 'self retracting' tethers at HD.

[JetStream]

I think the problem is that you guys only buy MALE pencils. They are never around when you need them. You have to buy MALE and FEMALE pencils, then you will always find little pencils around, even when you don't need them.

[bcooke]

Yes, but you see the problem is that the gremlins take the pencils out of my pockets and scatter them about without regard to my convenience.

Hmmm... tough one.

Maybe you should preempt the little rascals and take a boxful and cast them willy-nilly around the shop. Then you stand a chance of finding one when and where you need it.

Or ... remember to put them back in your pocket. How hard can it be?...

[Tim]

How hard can it be?

Darn hard, apparently!

You have to buy MALE and FEMALE pencils

Oh! OK. Now, where do I go to find FEMALE pencils?

How do you tell them apart, anyway?

[Quetzalsailor]

I rebuilt a house some years ago. Basement, first, second and finished attic, 22' X 32'. I, too, could never get my hands on a pencil. I was working for an architect then back in the days of paper. We'd sharpen the pencils as necessary until uncomfortably short, but then we could never bear to throw the stubs away. There were maybe a hundred in two coffee cans. I had the utterly brilliant idea of simply dispersing them around the house, thinking that I'd just have to look down and there would surely be one. So I seeded them all on the three wood floors (not the muddy basement).

I never saw even one of 'em again after the first day.

[JetStream]

Female pecils are hard to distinguish. The only way you can really tell is when you mark a board to cut, it always comes out too short. So, with a female pencil, you always need a little more. The little pencils are sometimes a pain because they are always broke and they never grow up.

[bcooke]

The little pencils are sometimes a pain because they are always broke and they never grow up.

Hmmm.... that sounds familiar... :-)

[Tim]

Female pecils are hard to distinguish. The only way you can really tell is when you mark a board to cut, it always comes out too short.

Well, there must be some females in my pencil inventory then, because I have been known, on occasion, to cut boards too short.

(This makes me really happy when it happens, of course...)

[Scout]

I guess I'm lucky, there is always a ponytail or a braid popping out of my head, it always stays there, it never gets lost.

I will however spend HOURS collectively looking for my sunglasses which are on top of my head the whole time.

[Figment]

As frustrating as pencils and knives may be when they're lost, one can at least give oneself a fighting chance through sheer numbers... have enough of them around and there must be ONE nearby at any given time.

My chief source of "where did I leave it this time" frustration is my little foam sanding block thingy. There have actually been times when I've quit in the middle of a task and gone home because I can't find it after looking for twenty minutes. I'll return the next day to find it in plain sight.
Usually, it turns up after I go out for coffee or something, always in a location that should have been perfectly obvious fifteen minutes earlier.

It's quite the skilled camoflage expert. If it falls from the bench or deck or whatever and lands abrasive-side-up, that side is naturally the color of whatever dust happens to be the predominant element of the day. Even if it lands grip-side-up, the grip that began life a nice happy high-vis yellow is now the color of seven kinds of chameleon dust.

I can't tuck it in my hat or behind my ear, and it doesn't fit in many pockets. I suppose the only remedy is to have ten more and play the numbers game just like with pencils and knives.

[Tim]

My chief source of "where did I leave it this time" frustration is my little foam sanding block thingy. There have actually been times when I've quit in the middle of a task and gone home because I can't find it after looking for twenty minutes. I'll return the next day to find it in plain sight.

You just need less detritus in your shop, that's all.

[Figment]

Well, yeah, of course. But that's neither here nor there, Mr. Meticulous!!