"Carl's Lounge" (Off-Topic Discussion, Traditional Knife "Tales & Vignettes")

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Pulled up that piece of flooring
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Found this guy inside! Harmless little garter snake, but he gave me bit of a scare lol
 
Thoughts go out to Jolipapa Jolipapa and to Paris & France due to the dreadful fire that is engulfing the Cathedral of Notre Dame at this moment. 800 years of history, art,spirituality and culture devoured by flames, the roof and spire collapsed. Beyond words a hideous loss for civilisation and world culture.

Regards, Will
 
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Thank you all for your thoughts for Notre-Dame.
I have a friend who live rue d'Arcole just across the Seine branch.The firemen have an emergency plan for such monuments, but this is much higher than the biggest ladders and in a very narrow place with ceiling trees cut more than 900 years ago.
Was devastating to watch the arrow fall down in live, think how many events she went through and resisted, including the Pariser Kanonen in WWI and air bombs during both WWs.

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Jolipapa said:
Thank you all for your thoughts for Notre-Dame.
I have a friend who live rue d'Arcole just across the Seine branch.The firemen have an emergency plan for such monuments, but this is much higher than the biggest ladders and in a very narrow place with ceiling trees cut more than 900 years ago.
Was devastating to watch the arrow fall down in live, think how many events she went through and resisted, including the Pariser Kanonen in WWI and air bombs during both WWs.

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So very sad. :(
 
Jolipapa said:
Thank you all for your thoughts for Notre-Dame.
I have a friend who live rue d'Arcole just across the Seine branch.The firemen have an emergency plan for such monuments, but this is much higher than the biggest ladders and in a very narrow place with ceiling trees cut more than 900 years ago.
Was devastating to watch the arrow fall down in live, think how many events she went through and resisted, including the Pariser Kanonen in WWI and air bombs during both WWs.

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Click to expand...
My heart sunk when I read this on my news feed !! An epic tradgedy
 
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Peregrin said:
I really don't know how to express the sadness I feel about today's destruction of the Notre Dame Cathedral. Such a huge loss to humanity. It's a reminder of how fragile the things we love really are.
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knarfeng said:
Quelle tragédie!
Je suis tres triste.

The whole world has lost a treasure. Our hearts go out to the Parisians, who feel the loss the sharpest.
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Campbellclanman said:
Oh man...any loss of History is a devastation, especially such an iconic Building- lets hope it can be restored?
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Thank you my friends.
In 1870 the Strasbourg cathedral was destroyed by the Prussians and it was rebuilt, in 1914 the Rheims cathedral was destroyed by shells and it was rebuilt (not speaking of Warsaw's cathedral).
We are lucky to have such firemen (they are militaries in Paris), they let the fire's share (roof and frame mostly) but saved the most important, the organ, the statues, stained glasses, paintings and relics. It will take much time and money (#400 millions € have been raised already) but all are determined to rebuilt. We often give a desorienting impression but in such circumstances we are all united whatever the opinions. :)

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This unexpensive medal (and another) has been in the family since the XIXth century. It is often said that Notre Dame is the patron saint of Paris, in fact it is Geneviève, who defended Lutetia against the Huns.
 
I'm impressed by the human effort, skill and devotion that went into the building of masterpieces such as this and the other great Cathedrals of Europe. We have nothing in our contemporary world that can compare to the awe medieval people, often living in huts or hovels must have felt on witnessing a skyline dominated by such magnificence, carvings and skill. The endurance part is important too, Köln was almost razed to the ground by air-raids but the Cathedral survived.

Consider that Notre Dame needed more than 1300 Oak trees to build its roof etc. 1300 trees that needed felling, sawing, prepared and fashioning,all by the hand of man not machines and drawn by horse. This in the c12th Oaks that might have been alive when the Roman Empire existed! Contrary to what people may believe, a building is a living thing too not just a repository for human hopes and ambitions. Let us hope it can be rebuilt anew, but it will take a very long time and demand much patience. A quality often lacking in our world.
 
We have the luck of having skilled carpenters (most are Compagnons, a guild that built these cathedrals), the main problem being there's no more large enough trees like in the middle age (the ceiling is called forêt, forrest).
An example is given by the Chartres cathedral, whose roof burnt in the XIXth and was rebuilt differently.
As you can imagine, the radios have special editions and it was very impressive to listen to the recordings when Gl DeGaulle and Leclerc entered the cathedral during the Paris Liberation, under the shots of rifles and guns of nazis snipers.
 
Jolipapa said:
Thank you all for your thoughts for Notre-Dame.
I have a friend who live rue d'Arcole just across the Seine branch.The firemen have an emergency plan for such monuments, but this is much higher than the biggest ladders and in a very narrow place with ceiling trees cut more than 900 years ago.
Was devastating to watch the arrow fall down in live, think how many events she went through and resisted, including the Pariser Kanonen in WWI and air bombs during both WWs.

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Click to expand...

Jolipapa may I extend my thoughts and prayers to my French cousins across the channel in light of the destruction of your beautiful cathedral. :(
From what I've seen today it looks hopeful though that many of her treasures have escaped mostly unscathed.

I was looking at pictures of the stunning rose windows in Notre Dame and it bought to mind this:

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The picture is the 'Rose Window' in the south transept of York Minster and it dates from circa 1500 and, like Notre Dame's stained glass is one of the historical treasures of western civilization.
In 1984 the south transept was struck by lightening which quickly started a fire that threatened to engulf the building. The building had no fire suppression system and the fire fighters faced the same difficulties with access that it appears the Parisian firefighters experienced at Notre Dame.
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The vaulted ceiling you see in the first picture was completely destroyed, the lead in the window melted and some of the glass cracked. And yet what you see in that picture is what the window was restored back to. If you stand today in the south transept of York Minster you wouldn't even know a fire had taken place. It took 4 years and (in 1980's money) £2.25 million to restore but the restoration was a true to the original medieval work in every detail.
Obviously the damage to Notre Dame is far far more extensive, but when I see what of Notre Dame has been saved and then look at what was achieved with the restoration of the south transept of York Minster I can't help thinking that your beautiful cathedral can be restored to it's former glory. It's just going to take a very long time.

All the best.
 
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