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Thursday, January 22, 2009

About the Scale

This is an older photo. The crock is now full of heavy stuff.....

I have posted about the big scale in the dining room before....Here is a post about it. People look at us funny the first time they see it. But when Johnstown Knit went out of business due to GATT and NAFTA, they sold a number of them, which must have been used to weigh fabric. We only paid $125 for it...but it only goes to 125 pounds....so we just look at it rather than use it for anything.
I love having it though. Sort of a monument to the days when there was manufacturing around here....the days when you could buy work clothes at the outlet store for a reasonable price...clothes that were made right there in Johnstown. By folks who lived in Johnstown.

When the outlet sold out we bought the boss dozens of red tee shirts for about a dime a piece. (People think he is just fond of the same old red shirt, but really he still has lots of them.) Sadly though, all the heavy, thick, very warm sweatshirts that were long enough to go about to your knees are full of holes and becoming dog bedding one by one. There isn't anywhere that I can find to buy such clothes any more especially for such low prices.....alas.




Anyhow, we love our scale and it was so neat the other day the way the sun shone right into its workings and spotlighted everything that I couldn't resist a picture.



Tracks of a rather large canid that rummaged through the yard the other night. It came almost up on the front porch. If you follow tracks, not pictured, down where the kids and I had to dig Alan's truck out of the snow bank (just before the boss finally plowed our driveway for the second time this winter) you can see he was mousing...or perhaps voling. However, our poor kitty Teak vanished....probably in the same direction as the mice. She was a fat, pretty little calico Schaufelcat and we miss her. Can we say that cats and coyotes don't exactly live in harmony?

22 comments:

Dani said...

I have a crock just like yours, but mine is on the front porch.

Anonymous said...

i also loved that store...always found a good bargain or two...i really loved their "iron-on" selections, at the check out wall....didn't always get one, but loved to wish and dream....now a days the favorite store is sal's boutique for bargains! :)

Anonymous said...

My aunt and uncle had one of those big scales in their basement. We had great fun as kids trying to get as many of us on the scale as we could to see what we would weigh. The mirror picture is simply amazing.

(Knocking on wood here!)We have not lost any cats to the coyotes this winter. I keep counting and keep coming up with 11 every morning. Even our 2 older tom cats reappear nearly every morning for breakfast.

Anonymous said...

Love the scale-and the snow. The coyotes-I can't stand- we have way to many of them here.

Tina Marie the Willow Witch said...

Sorry about your kitty, coyotes are such a pain... I don't like it when I hear them yipping behind the house, but our kittys stay close to the house and can get in the outside furnace room away from harm.. Love the scale

Throwback at Trapper Creek said...

Love the scale pics. It is so hard to see the local business getting pushed out. Now we have more stores, and less selection and quality. I can't even find the fabric for DH's shirts. Seems the mill that made it in the south went out of business. Makes me angry.

Sorry about the kitty :(

Jan said...

I have a big crock like that. I use it to make lots of pickles in the summer. After two weeks we start sampling to see if they are ready to put up. After a month they are all "sampled" up and we never have any to put up.

Anonymous said...

ha ha, that's sooooo funny jan...liked that!

Ed said...

cool scale, my condolences on the cat, my mom lost two cats in one year to either the neighbors Pitbull or coyotes. Either way she has given up on getting another cat and is happy with Maggie Mae.

Anonymous said...

I love the scale, I'd have brought it home too if given the chance. I couldn't begin to count the cats that have "disappear" while out hunting around here.

Charley "Apple" Grabowski said...

It's a beautiful piece of local history! A shame that it is history. Lots of bad jobs news in the north country today. I'm very sorry to hear about your cat.

The Wife said...

I love the old scale! Hate the coyotes! They killed a young dog of mine a couple years ago.

Jeffro said...

I'm pretty envious of you and your scale. You can see the attention to detail and the little "extra" in making it - not only just to work, but look good. That sort of thing is a lost art anymore. Plus, it still works - planned obsolescence was an unexplored concept when it was made.

But, I'm a geek and get into stuff like that.

Anonymous said...

The silver fox that you took pictures of last summer eating blackberries also likes to lunch on cats. There was a family of them here for several years, and as recently as last spring. They cleaned out most of the cats in Glen.
I haven't seen any signs of them this winter. They are nice to look at, but I hope they go away.

Anonymous said...

Well, we could wish that coyotes and cats loved each other.

Anonymous said...

love the scale, i admire it everytime i see it,

lisa said...

i always admire that scale when i see it. nice conversation piece.

threecollie said...

Dani, we have several of them...but sadly most of them are cracked...

Anon, we miss it so much! Haven't seen Sal's Boutique...could you tell me where it is?

Ang, thanks! When the sun comes in just right it is a golden opportunity to get nice shots. I was surprised Teak got taken as she stayed right by the house.

Tipper, thanks
We are not so fond of them either...

WW, thanks, ours are getting so bold! They come right in the house yard at night.

Nita, they are so missed. We bought all our work shirts there for bargain prices...and thanks

Jan, oh, wow, homemade crock pickles! They would never make it to the jar here either.

Anon, garden peas are like that here...they NEVER make it to the house. lol

ED, thanks....we used to have a lot of cats, now we are lucky to keep six or eight of them.

Linda, she was a sweetie, always rolling on the ground and purping at us when we walked by. We have her sister, Sinopa, the wild one still...

Apple, the news is pretty scary these days isn't it...but thanks for your kind words

The Wife, danged things! We have yet to lose a dog, but many, many barn cats and calves!

Jeffro, I absolutely understand. We bought it just for its beauty. We have no use for it, but when we saw it, we exclaimed, "That will look perfect in the old house!" We didn't even live here then, as the Boss's mom was still with us...

Lee, you could very well be right as she is still around. The coyotes are incredibly bold too. They sleep right in the buildings sometimes. Our poor remaining sheep has to be careful to stay with the big animals.

Teri, well, we get half of it anyhow...the coyotes sure love cats. Lol

Lisa, thanks so much!

DayPhoto said...

I HATE coyotes! They invade our property all the time. Can't stand them...Cats are so much better than those nasty predators!

Linda
http://coloradofarmlife.wordpress.com

threecollie said...

Linda, I was thrilled when they first showed up here about 30 years ago. Believe it or not they were unknown in the area until then. It seemed cool to hear them howl. These days I shudder when I hear them near the house, wondering what they are after. These days it is a sort of love/ hate affair. they kill cats, calves, chickens and anything they can get including a down cow once. On the other hand they keep the woodchucks down and eat the mice around the ag bags. And they do funny things like take old gloves and soda bottles up to the pups as toys. So...some days I hate them with a passion and some days I tolerate them and some days they are even kinda funny....

Anonymous said...

It is a beautiful scale, I don't see whay anyone would look at you funny for having it, we had an old crank phone up on our wall for years that no longer worked, just because we liked it.

threecollie said...

MML, the phone sounds cool...like something we would do....the scale is quite a conversation starter anyhow. lol