Uncategorized

Each One, Teach One

Yesterday morning I had the pleasure of speaking to a class of second graders about my pencil-sharpening business. These kids GOT IT. They UNDERSTAND what I am DOING.

I showed them photos of antique pencil sharpeners in my book:

We reviewed the parts of a pencil:

I even let them look at some of the sharpeners in my toolkit!

Overall it was a very nice visit. The only thing that made me mad was when one of the kids asked how much I charge per pencil; I said, “How much do you think I charge?” and one kid yelled, “Five dollars” and I made a pained noise. Then another kid said “One dollar?” and then some wiseacre said “twenty-five cents?” I raised my voice over the din and said, “FIFTEEN DOLLARS PER PENCIL!”

I sharpened a pencil for the class and bagged the shavings and told them to charge other classes a quarter to look at it and to send me the money every Friday.

Review Of HOW TO SHARPEN PENCILS

One of America’s top pencil bloggers has written a comprehensive review of HOW TO SHARPEN PENCILS:

There are great illustrations that are genuinely useful, if you wanted to understand your pencil and your sharpener down to a science. Graphics like “Irregular pencil points — a taxonomy” shows you five results of an improperly sharpened pencil. He goes into some detail to explain how to avoid pitfalls that result in these types — this is actually useful, people!

I’m getting very excited for my nationwide pencil-sharpening tour.

Talk to you soon — on my internet blog!

HOW TO SHARPEN PENCILS!!!

Hello, blog readers!

I’m happy to say that my new book HOW TO SHARPEN PENCILS will be published on April 10! Can you believe it? I almost can’t.

Friends, this exhaustive pencil-sharpening manual is a valuable addition to the craftsman’s home library and will be the definitive guide for generations of pencil enthusiasts. It features a foreword by John Hodgman, lovely photographs by Meredith Heuer, and 18 chapters, including:

– SHARPENING A PENCIL WITH A POCKETKNIFE
– PSYCHOLOGICAL RISKS ASSOCIATED WITH PENCIL SHARPENING
– MASTERING CELEBRITY IMPRESSION PENCIL SHARPENING (CIPS)

The book is based on my experiences running ArtisanalPencilSharpening.com for the past two years, in which time I have sharpened more than 475 pencils for clients around the world! (If you’re one of those clients, thank you for your business!)

Here are some computer links for pre-ordering the book from robot bookstores:

ORDER ON AMAZON!
or …
ORDER ON BARNES & NOBLE!
or …
ORDER ON POWELLS!

(Of course, it is my preference as an artisan that you buy the book from your locally sourced bookseller.)

To promote the book, I am embarking on a NATIONWIDE PENCIL-SHARPENING TOUR. More information about this tour will be forthcoming.

For now, I hope you will consider ordering the book! Need I say it makes a lovely gift?

Many thanks for your interest,
From your friend with the blog,
David Rees
http://www.mnftiu.cc
http://www.artisanalpencilsharpening.com

My Latest Blog Post

Hi everybody! I’m sorry I haven’t bloggered much lately. I just got back from JoCoCruiseCrazy II, a Caribbean nerd cruise organized by Jonathan Coulton. It was really fun! (I will try to find photos on the internet to share with you.)

I have a bunch of shows coming up this spring, most of which are devoted to promoting my pencil-sharpening book, which will be published on April 10!!!

Hmm. I can’t really think of anything else to mention right now. But I’ll be back soon, blogging harder than ever.

Sincerely,
David

Lollygaggingoggery!

We’ve put together a fun show for Thursday’s installment of LOLLYGAGGIN’. Please join me (David) as I host Max Silvestri, Jacqueline Novak, and other funny guests. We will join forces in laughter or my name isn’t Buster Brown, aka “The Cell-Phone Communicator.”