Hi dale and all, The discussions of plastering brought back some wonderful memories of my father-in-law and a few of Karen's uncles. Karen's grandfather was a builder. Her dad learned the trade of mason and plasterer, one uncle was taught the plumbing trade and the other an electrician. They worked together when building their homes. Karen's dad had tons of mountain stone delivered. He cut and faced every stone for the home and fireplace. He told me that when plastering he had several people mixing the mud for him so that they could keep up. He walked around on stilts plastering the ceilings.He could plaster one floor of a new home in a day. Even when he was in his sixties he built a patio. I could not mix the mud fast enough for him. He could lay 1,000 block a day.
There was one fantastic story about her uncle who became the plumber. A man dropped something in the basement and broke off the drain plug on his oil tanks. he was sitting on the floor like the little Dutch boy with his finger in the drain hole preventing a bigger oil spill. When Gus arrived. He replaced the valve in full tanks without spilling more than a few ounces. He took his vacuum cleaner and taped the hose to the fill tube and totally taped up the vent pipe. When he turned on the vacuum cleaner it made a slight vacuum inside the tanks preventing the oil from running out. he just then turned out the broken valve and installed a new one. That happened forty to fifty years ago and since has become a common practice. I know that I never would have thought of that. Lenny http://www.geocities.com/lenny_mchugh/ [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
