What's become of us ????????????

Gramps

Gramps

Joined
Nov 17, 2002
Messages
1,507
It use to be:
1) a 3'' pocket folder for $6.99...for everyday chores

2) a 4" Shrade for $19.99........ for cleanin' and skinin'

3) a $5.00 machette .......for clearin' brush

4) a 23" "Cruiser" for $19.99...... for fellin' trees

5) a hatchet for $9.99.....for splitin' knidlin'

6) and a bow saw for $14.99.....for sawin' branches

Now its $200 dollar kirkris...and $350 dollar custom all terrain choppers......$500 dollar bowies......and $375 dollar pocket folders
......and $200 dollar huntin' knives to gut a squirel !!!!!!
No one around here uses an axe anymore......half of what you spend your money on either sets in a safe or ends up on the Exchange Forum ( NIB....their ALL NIB !!!)and have never seen a good days work since someone smelted the steel they are made from. Everyone's talkin' like someones waitin' round the bend to do I'm "in" ....so we all are lookin' for the latest "bad ass" blade to cut our neighbor with !
LORD OH LORD we have gone crazy....I like a good piece of "steel" as much as the next guy or gal ....but we're gettin' outa control here....my $.02!!!!!
 
I'm not gonna touch this one. I Just wonder how long it will stay out of W&C.:p
 
Well, the answer to this question is both simple and complicated!
As I see it, this has happened all through history. When a tool is developed in it's simplest form, function is all that matters.
As the tool is used and refined, it gets more and more important that it lasts longer as well as works and looks better.
People are different and as (I am guessing here) some knights would have desired a sword with gold, ivory and precious stones, others would have gone for a simple, no nonsense weapon that would get the job done just as well as the "status symbol" of his buddy!:)

It's still possible to get cheap and well working edged tools, but the human desire to make better and invent makes some people look for excellence, perfection and beauty in what started out as simple tools!
When that happens, the price of the item goes up!
The question may then be if we really need a $ 200,- folder for the usual day to day tasks of tactical letter opening and so on - but that's a different story!:D

The Porcupine
 
Your spot on Mr. Porcupine. No doubt all you say is true. Back in my day we all wished for that Stag handled Hunter that got left at home when the real work began. They were just too pretty to thrash around the campsite with ! Those golden blades with jewel encrusted hilts you speak of....I'll bet they never tagged along with those boys when things got fierce or some firewood needed cuttin'.
 
(This will certainly get it put in W&C)

Let me be the first to go out on a limb and guess that "Gramps" is actually a 30-something, soft-handed suburbanite who has never done any "clearin'", "skinnin'", "fellin'", "splittin'", or "swain'", and knows how to spell...or is suffering from multiple personality disorder.

I submit the following well-written and well-contructed posts as evidence of his good pedigree:

http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=257241
http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=257742
http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=257313
http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=256571
 
Well if your Freudian, you'd believe that some people like status knives or overpriced pry bars because it's their surrogate johnson. The proof of this with some people is the way they react when their sacred cow is criticized. Now some say they buy it 'cause its art, but to a Freudian, your art can also be a surrogate johnson. Some say they buy it for self defense, well by nature weapons are surrogate johnsons for Freudians. However, I am not a Feudian, but it's fun to play with their concepts.

On a side note is the dichotomy between a person who has New Testament quotes in their bi-line, but owns a set of knives that are so expensive they're way past the point of being tools. It's like wwjd, buy a sebenza? Doubt it, he'd get a SAK and pocket the rest for travel money.
 
Your not too far off RH....my hands are as soft as they are arthirtic, I live in suburban Seattle, I sit with a dictionary by my side when I post.....it's been many a year since I skined or felled....but OH to be thirty again! ( I was feelin' ornery when I posted this one after seein' all those expensive Busse for sale on the Exchange Forum, thinking about yesteryears....guilty as charged !!!)
 
Oh....and my wife consistently accuses me of having a personality disorder!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! You hit the nail on the head with that one too, RH ....I'm as nuts as they come ! But you've got to admit it, there is a lot of money being exchanged for "instant gratification" and MANY of those custom pieces of sharpened steel never see the 'sunshine' let alone some everyday cutting.
 
Originally posted by Gramps
It use to be:
1) a 3'' pocket folder for $6.99...for everyday chores

2) a 4" Shrade for $19.99........ for cleanin' and skinin'

3) a $5.00 machette .......for clearin' brush

4) a 23" "Cruiser" for $19.99...... for fellin' trees

5) a hatchet for $9.99.....for splitin' knidlin'

6) and a bow saw for $14.99.....for sawin' branches
Click to expand...
Uncle Jed, it's true ya kin use them cuttin' tools ta dew tha sayme job as a Buss knive fer a lot cheeper. Jes' lahk ya kin use either a caculater or a cornputer fer cipherin' yer tax's. But some fokes lahk ta have sumpin' a li'l fancier fer Sunday-go-ta-meetin'. Now put that in yer corn cob pipe an' smoke it.;)

Best Regards,
Jethro
 
And a knife for self defense???????????......unless your Special Forces or LEO (IF then !) .....its NOT going to happen. My daughter was a nurse in a large hospital emergency room years ago and when she saw the occassional stab wound, so she says, it was typically two young boys who knew each other, were drinking excessively, and got into an argument. It may be heroic and some what comforting and anxiety releiving to think that a knife, any knife, is going to keep the goblins at bay....but mostly it's only the mail, some cardboard, and an occassional apple that needs to be taught a lesson. What the hell are Most (NOT all, but most) people going to do with $500 dollar knife except look at it, admire its craftmansphip, forget about it, and eventally put it up for sale on the Knife Exchange !....OK...OK....now you can pass me the WHINE and CHEESE...I suppose in some sense I deserve a helping of both...but I make some sense. Don't get mad at me because my old $7.00 Trapper did all your expensive folder ever has.....
 
Torz....I was born in Up State NY years ago....what "tiny" town are you from ???? .........Gotta' go " Granny's" got some vittles on the stove...all the best !
 
It may be kind of simple, it is "supply the demand". You have a knife maker a long time ago who raises the bar on what is being made or available and with that comes a higher price which at the time is unheard of, well lo and behold people buy it. Why? Because it is new, better, refined and then it starts. Other knife makers say well gee, if they are buying that then let's try this and the next thing you know there are several knife makers all trying to out do each other and make a buck and we buy them. All of a sudden it went from a working knife to a collecting knife and the world of knife collecting is born.
 
....but of course I haven't acknowledged the artistry that goes onto some of those handmade knives....many deserve to be exibited in a gallery and are as lovely as any Monet...I guess it's more Whine and Cheese for me!!! I'm choking on the "stuff" arn't I? That will teach me not to be so impulsive!!!...and frank!....
 
Originally posted by Gramps
Torz....I was born in Up State NY years ago....what "tiny" town are you from ???? .........Gotta' go " Granny's" got some vittles on the stove...all the best !
Click to expand...
Hey Gramps,
I'm currently living in the bustling town of Wingdale, which I won't blame you if you've never heard of. We do have a stop light on route 22 though.
 
Originally posted by Gramps
And a knife for self defense???????????......unless your Special Forces or LEO (IF then !) .....its NOT going to happen.
Click to expand...

No offense, but what a idiotic thing to say. My brother saved his girlfriend's (now his fiance) life with his knife. If it weren't for him stabbing one of the FOUR men beating her, then she would have lapsed into a comma and died.

Oh but we all know knives will never be used for self defence...just like guns will never win a war. :rolleyes:
 
the most expensive of which was $150, none of my knives are expensive. On me right now are a Micra I picked up at Target for under $20, a Camillus trapper from AG Russell that was $26 with shipping and a Spydie Rescue I got from a fellow forumite for $30 shipped (thanks Ryan). I am in the first stages of designing a custom, but it will be a small, plain, fixed blade. Not a fancy folder. I've been wearing the same pair of CAT steel toes for five years. I drive a '65 VW. I try to lead a simple, honest life. Jesus said it is easier for a camel to get through the eye of a needle than it is for a rich man to get into Heaven. The Buddha said suffering comes from the desire for material things, which are impermanent. I'm no saint or monk. I see something shiney and I want it as much as the next guy. But I try to remind myself that happiness is not having what you want, it's wanting what you have. I've been passing along things I don't need/want to people who do want/need them. For my Birthday this year I'm giving presents to my friends instead of hoping I get presents from my friends. I'd rather form attatchments with people than things. YMMV

Frank
 
Originally posted by SilverFoxKnows
the most expensive of which was $150, none of my knives are expensive. On me right now are a Micra I picked up at Target for under $20, a Camillus trapper from AG Russell that was $26 with shipping and a Spydie Rescue I got from a fellow forumite for $30 shipped (thanks Ryan). I am in the first stages of designing a custom, but it will be a small, plain, fixed blade. Not a fancy folder. I've been wearing the same pair of CAT steel toes for five years. I drive a '65 VW. I try to lead a simple, honest life. Jesus said it is easier for a camel to get through the eye of a needle than it is for a rich man to get into Heaven. The Buddha said suffering comes from the desire for material things, which are impermanent. I'm no saint or monk. I see something shiney and I want it as much as the next guy. But I try to remind myself that happiness is not having what you want, it's wanting what you have. I've been passing along things I don't need/want to people who do want/need them. For my Birthday this year I'm giving presents to my friends instead of hoping I get presents from my friends. I'd rather form attatchments with people than things. YMMV



Frank
Click to expand...

If only more christians thought that way...You are truly a good man who seems to know the TRUE meaning of what it means to be close to God.
 
TORZ.....near Poughquag and Quaker Hill....about 5 miles from the Connecticut boarder !
 
Gramps....The nerve you have hit here is the one
that controls our obession about knives. All that
you say about cost is true which is why you're
getting so much heat. Nobody likes to be told that
the their buying decisions are flawed when they
overspend on a knife. What that spending does
reflect is an over abundance of disposable income
coupled with dual incomes and/or easy credit.

If this thread is moved to the W&C forum you will
have all the proof you need that the tempo here
doesn't want facts but instead choose fiction about
a shared obession. What a thread such as this
treatens to expose is the ugly underbelly of the
knife hobby called overspending.
 
OH, OH......boy did I open a can of worms......when will I listen to my wife and keep my mouth shut ? All I desire to say is I'm sorry that your family was endangered, I'm happy that they are alright, how terrifying that exprience must have been for them , and how brave your brother was to come to her aid.....and thank GOD he had a knife ! Now please pass the CROW; I have a rather large serving to digest !
 
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