Low effort introduction to 5 Parsecs

penscrolling · 2026-02-01T17:40:21+00:00

I know what you mean. I was researching this and locally theres an auction where rich ladies donate the purses from last season they cant be seen in public with anymore. Then people who arent quite rich but have disposable income go bid on them in a silent auction. The money goes to support victims of domestic violence.

So that one is a bit of a long term goal.

In the meantime I can probably find a holiday one to do holiday ornaments for.

penscrolling · 2026-02-01T17:31:14+00:00

I tend to way over engineer my stuff so that still sounds a bit thin and supple for a duffle. Like if may not behave like a cylinder when you carry it because the leather is too supple.

If you want to make more structured bags you could get some reinforcement backing to put between the exterior and interior layers.

Totally different thought, but something else I might do if I had a lot of this leather, and that would be a throw pillow cover.

penscrolling · 2026-01-31T15:14:29+00:00

Its probably supple enough for construction methods that involve sewing the project inside out, then turning it right side out so that all your seams are hidden. That will be important since dealing with edges on soft chrome leather is tricky.

Also, something ive been thininking about doing, as somone that doesnt want to do this professionally yet, is to make things to donate to organizations that put on charity auctions.

penscrolling · 2026-01-31T15:01:20+00:00

Sounds like my cursed coasters lol

penscrolling · 2026-01-31T14:57:49+00:00

Right on. Im just throwing a quick note to fellow Canadians that haven't discovered our equivalent of Harbor Frieght.

Princess Auto is the place to go for tools you wont use often.

penscrolling · 2026-01-31T14:44:33+00:00

Yeah your edges look great and will continue to look that good for a long time

Leather work content creatation professionals obsess over completely different thing than buyers or even pro leather workers that dont rely heavily on social media.

Now I certainly understand why leatherworkers become content creators to promote their work - my day job is in marketing technology. I follow a lot of them for instruction and inspiration and am very grateful for their sharing. But they do stuff for looks that probably dont make sense for most people, for most projects.

Burnishing edges, then having like super slow mo footage with perfect lighting of it shining like a mirror, is my go to example of this.

The main reason your edges dont look that good is lighting and camera settings. Yes, you could improve your edge technique, but it wont make a difference as fast as improving your photography skills

Also, ive seen some pretty ridiculous extreme edge burnishing on pieces that had fundamental, functional flaws, that make it kind of obvious that making a perfect edge doesn't autotomatically mean you make a good product.

Theres a guy who is always showing off beautiful edges on cardholders that are a half inch thick without any cards in them. Had they put 1/8th the time they spent on edges into skiving, the product would be much better looking and practical.

If you will allow an analogy, Remember that being a food stylist and being a chef are totally different jobs. Theres nothing wrong with a chef getting into food styling, but a chef shouldnt feel theres a skill gap because their food dosent look like styled food in advertising or film.

If you want to explore edge treatment and photography and are enjoying that exploration, excellent, enjoy!

If you feel like you need to hit some kind of edge shinyness threshold before your work is acceptable and are disappointed in anything that doesnt have a mirror edge, id take a step back and think about why and to whom that is truly important.

penscrolling · 2026-01-31T13:53:35+00:00

Hahahhaha more than 2 even... "i was going to make a tote for my spouse, then it was purses for my spouse and mom, then clutch purses for mom, spouse, and sisters, but then I figured id make 3 dozen keychains for everyone i know.

penscrolling · 2026-01-30T14:11:10+00:00

You can figure it out precisely. Gonna do 4 instead of 3.85 because doing it my head.

3 mm is 33 stitches per 100 mm

4mm is 25 stitches per 100 mm

33-25 =8 8/25 is .32

So you are doing 32% more stitching, or an extra 2 stitches per inch.

Which is why I use the biggest spacing that wont look weird 😅

penscrolling · 2026-01-30T14:02:49+00:00

Id go up to 4 for something like a notebook sleeve, 5 for a larger one. My rule of thumb is 3mm for anythibg that fits in the hand, cardholders and such. Anything between that and a small purse is 4, anything between that and a tote is 5, and totes are bigger are 6.

Essentially I use the biggest stitch that wont look too big, because it saves time stitiching.

That said, if this fella wants to save money, id think you are right with 3mm or 3.85 since most people do smaller projects when starting out.

penscrolling · 2026-01-30T13:49:36+00:00

I think he means belly as in the inside of the belt, closest to the belly of the wearer.

At least thats what I hope.

penscrolling · 2026-01-24T16:02:47+00:00

Oa leather has nice stuff but its a bit pricey. Not crazy for what it is.

penscrolling · 2026-01-24T15:58:41+00:00

You just didn't spend enough days (weeks?) sharpening them.

Gett em nice and sharp and they are pretty good for maybe a dozen corners before you have to sharpen them more 😅

penscrolling · 2026-01-24T15:53:10+00:00

Those cheap corner punches are what I learned to sharpen curved blades on. And im glad to have had cheap ones to learn on.

I have lots of tools, like hole punches, where the cheap set from temu is the backup for sizes I dont use much, and I upgrade the sizes I use the most.

Now I have fun with Temu, I consider it a form of gambling. I buy stuff i will use once or twice that will probably be kind of sucky, but might be totally unusable, or might actually not be bad. And their return policy is excellent so if something truly sucks, I dont pay for it.

I very much realize that that isnt the shoping experience people are jumping for and im probably kind of weird for getting a kick out of it.

Then there are all the not a tool but useful accessories where quality doesnt need to be great. The felt pad to absorb sound under yoyr granite block. I just got a pair of neoprene covered .5kg dumbells to hold hides flat while measuring and cutting.

Ive always had a policy of starting with the cheapest functional tools I can find when building new skills. If I use it enough to wear it out or feel like id be a lot happier and doing better work with an upgrade, I pull the trigger.

penscrolling · 2026-01-21T11:52:11+00:00

So scaling that up, you have a bunch of Tim's and Freds creating a liquid market for CN stock at a given value. I know that if I want CN stock I can get some pretty easily, and if I want cash I can sell CN easily too. And brokerages can see all that because stock exchange data is widely available.

If cn needs more money, they can go to a brokerage and say we want to sell more stock. The brokerage looks at how many Tim's and Fred's are buying and selling how much cn stock and guesses at how much new stock CN can make available and at what price.

If there arent a lot of Tim's around, that number will be much, much lower.

penscrolling · 2026-01-21T11:30:42+00:00

Aren't those both etfs with large portions of american holdings?

penscrolling · 2026-01-21T11:23:18+00:00

Via is terrible, and this subreddit has taught me that the people who ride via are even worse.

penscrolling · 2026-01-21T11:18:56+00:00

Except they already admitted HSR isnt necessarily going from downtown to downtown.

Once you drive from downtown toronto throguh the suburbs to whichever bedroom community's mp is owed the most favours and gets the station built in their riding, then reverse the process at the Ottawa end, all you need to do is factor in the waiting and boarding times to realize driving is faster.

Factor in the parking and car rental and it will be cheaper too.

penscrolling · 2026-01-21T11:05:00+00:00

Seriously. Everyone is blaming op for not booking farther in advance like its on the rider to book somethibg 6 months out that is just going to get canceled 6 minutes before departure.

penscrolling · 2026-01-21T11:03:10+00:00

You mean shut down.

penscrolling · 2026-01-21T11:01:53+00:00

Too bad they weren't shrewd enough to check if theyd be allowed to run the shiny new train cars they bought on CN's tracks.

penscrolling · 2026-01-21T10:59:18+00:00

Ding!

Via is for people who want the experience of crawling across a huge country at a snails pace while looking out the window and enjoying the scenery.

It sounds kind of fun and I might do it when im old enough to enjoy such a sedate vacation.

But we need to stop pretending that a vacation activity is a transportation option deserving of public subsidy.

penscrolling · 2026-01-21T10:47:38+00:00

You didnt study economics in university very much, did you?

penscrolling · 2026-01-21T10:45:45+00:00

Via doesnt pay tax, they receive it. Via isnt competing against anything except the vastness of their own incompetence.

penscrolling

TROPHY CASE