My customer's 3 inch measurement mistake still makes me smile

Last spring at my booth in Portland, a young guy brought in an old family Bible that was falling apart. He watched me measure the spine and said, "My grandpa always said a tape measure is just a suggestion." I laughed so hard I almost dropped my bone folder, because his grandpa was clearly right, the text block was 3 inches off from the cover. He ended up telling me the whole story about how his grandfather rebinding books in the 1970s never used rulers, just eyeballed everything. We spent 20 minutes comparing our war stories about misaligned pages and crooked hinges. Has anyone else had a customer who turned a stressful job into a great memory like that?

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taylorshah1mo ago

That old guy at my booth in Austin last year told me his grandfather repaired clocks the same way, just eyeballed every gear and spring, and somehow they all ran perfect. It made me realize most of the old timers learned by feel because rulers and calipers were for the factory guys, not the fixers. Now I keep a cheap tape measure on my bench just to mess with people and tell them it's a suggestion, every single time.