While we’re keeping things light, it would seem a good time to mention something of the sort that normally ought to be ignored, but which, in this case, is so absurdly humorous that I can’t resist response. While indulging curiosity related to my recent registration with the state as a carpentry contractor, I happened upon this:

One night while Mr. Katz was tapping away on his laptop I asked him, ” What do you do for living”? Mr. Katz responds, ” I’m a carpenter “. I thought, that’s odd his hands seemed Jergen smooth for a trades guy. Does he swing a hammer and blog at the same time ? Does the saw dust srew up his lap top ? Does he have a special carrying case for those jaunts up the ladder ? Does the scent of carpenters glue cloud his thoughts as he blogs ? Does his boss allow blog time during the work day ?

The author, not surprisingly, is the same fellow who expressed pro-union sentiments in the Tiverton High School men’s room, called me a loser at the infamous East Providence School Committee meeting, attempted to derail the Q&A session at a recent Ed Achorn talk, and made nicey-nice at the Ocean State Follies.
With regard to the texture of my hands, I can only opine that Louis either has deficient powers of observation or is relying on the fact that most people who might come across his post have no basis for disputing his characterization. This is not to deny that I regularly use moisturizer, but I’m afraid that my skin is damaged beyond repair and that the cuts and scrapes from wood, metal, and masonry heal at their own pace regardless.
As for proof, well, when we workin’ folks take out cameras on the jobsite, pictures of ourselves are of very low priority. However, I do have one photo in which the architect captured me doing my carpenter/foreman/project manager thing last spring:

Here’s the (almost) finished room last summer, for those who are curious, and yes, those are my tools in the foreground:

To answer the unionist’s questions, though, we get a fifteen minute break in the morning and an unpaid half-hour lunch. For most of the last year, I’ve been using that time for blog-related activities — with enhanced efficiency, of late, owing to the mini laptop and cellular Internet service that your donations enabled. The rest of the day, politics is relegated to my mind, but only when the task at hand requires little thought.