Deja Vu, Too...

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I was going to post a brief update on the progress of the wheel guard for the lathe mini-project, but thumbing through the [very] extensive collection of old Model Engineer magazines that used to belong to my Dad, a couple of things stood out from their pages. Firstly, as a product of the 'hippy' [we preferred 'freak'] generation, I have always assumed the phrase 'Nuff said!' to be of our coining, or at least the invention of some cartoonist of the Alternative Press we so avidly consumed at the time.

Not so, I discover. In the issue of Model Engineer of May 12th 1955 (I being a mere six months old at the time), the following is written as the sign-off to a piece on the construction of a portable workshop [I know]: '...and now I feel it calls for one of L.B.S.C.'s well known comments: "Nuff sed."' 'Nuff said - there ain't nothing new under the Sun.

The second thing alludes to my Safety First, at Last (a paraphrase itself of the HSE mantra at work): an article in the Jan 6th. 1955 issue entitled: 'Modifying an Electric Switch'; the subject of which brings shivers of remembrance of near-disasters-past-from-youth. Without boring you with the detail, it consists of having male pins carrying mains electricity to a female 'plug'. A good friend of mine back in the late sixties created a near identical arrangement through the use of an inline plug & socket fitted backwards. 

The inevitable happened and a near-fatal event transpired, mediated only by a short current-path, dry hands and the expedient presence of an earth pin. What should have safely been a live socket was a live plug, which duly welded itself to my friend's palm - I turned the juice off at the main socket before he had too much damage, but the thing left three circular scars of slightly melted flesh in its wake. I've always had a very healthy respect for electricity, rather than fear; but I've come close to terminal beach on a number of occasions, saved largely due to very dry palms myself and the rigid application of the 'Left Hand in Back Pocket Rule'.

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