No, I really need to get going

I haven't done much on the violin. I have everything planned out. I know exactly how I want it. I have the pegs halfway done, but kept breaking one fake ivory collar, and made two for the last violin. I think I'd rather do those things up in batches of 12 or more, do it production line and be done with it. So I have a fingerboard, minus the radius on the underside, the pegs, and the tailpiece roughed out. 2 hours for the pegs, and 2 for the fingerboard.

It's cold in the basement, and for some reason my fingers turn white and numb. So I don't like spending a lot of time down there. That's why I've been figuring. I do figuring real well. It's easy to figure. And the more you do it, the more you should be ready to know what you're doing. At least that's what I figure.

The other day I cut out my neck block. It wasn't perfectly set on the stock. I lined it up square with the medularies and sawed it out, and planed it square (well retangular) just like it says in the Johnson and Courtnall book. That took an hour to saw and half an hour to plane. I need a new sawblade. I like my little (model making saw they call it) ryoba that doesn't have the replaceable blade. It seems to be extremely sharp, and stays that way. The last replaceable one I have on now never did seem sharp, or hard. I'll pick the next one up right from the Woodcraft store so I can check for the blue edges. This one hardly has any (ah, quality control?).

Today I sawed, rasped and smoothed up the top cuts on the neck, the top of the pegbox and the front of the scroll. I read on maestronet that Melvin Goldsmith cuts the slot for the strings out before anything else (the mortice he called it). Melvin is one of the many well known (for good reason) luthiers on maestronet and I figured it was worth a try. He said, iirc, that he could finish one up in 15 minutes, and then go on to the rest. It took me 30 minutes. I put the holes back quite a ways. Michael Darnton, another maestronet guru, says he puts top hole back as far as he dares. I may have dared too much. I did get it relieved around the hole, and I can go deeper if need be, but putting the string in will be a bear. Reminds me of a photo of a Jaguar with the skinny hood, and the double overhead cam six jammed in every last square inch of space. Cool to look at, but maintanence? At least the plugs are on the top! I don't think it's too far back, where I might get it in the mail one day with a note from a shop saying, "You think it looks cool? You change the string hot shot."