I don't mean to be preachy, but those of us who have been here awhile know that sometimes newbies don't always receive much in the way of patience and understanding. Sometimes it's easy to jump on those who are new to knives, know less than we do, or simply have different tastes in knives. Sometimes criticism comes a little too easy on internet forums.
Remember that we were all new to knives once, we didn't know anything. And if we were lucky someone with a generous amount of patience and understanding was willing to take the time to teach us, even if it meant pushing their patience and understanding to the limit.
How many of us can say that every knife purchase we made was a smart one. How many of us at some point have bought a knife simply because we thought it was "cool", or "tactical", etc. How many of us have bought knives from questionable companies with silly marketing. I doubt that any here are perfect.
In my humble opinion, this forum should be about more than personal entertainment, it should also be a place to provide guidance to those who are new to this "hobby", even if that means exerting a bit more patience and understanding. After all, how would we want to be treated if we were new here? In the end, we can teach newbies a lot more with patience and understanding than with insults and criticism.
Of course, if you've been here a while then you better have thick skin, because you're fair game.
Just my thoughts.
I have two Bowies. I think they are both Case, but I'm not sure. I bought one during my Case collecting phase, my 2nd collecting phase. One has a straight handle and the other has a sort of sword loop on it. I was showing a Case Bowie to a cousin and wasn't paying close attention as I attempted to re-sheath the beautiful blade which I hadn't used. It wouldn't go in, so I exerted some pressure on the handle and discovered just how stupid it is to do anything with a knife without adequate attention: the knife went right through the heavy stitching and and the wrong part of the sheath (as I discovered that I tried to put the thing in backwards) and then it found one of my index fingers and I hit a small artery as well. It bled for quite a while and kind of hurt a bit. I put lots of pressure on it and cleaned it and alcohol and Neosporin, etc. and the blood flow slowed little by little. I think it took about three weeks to mostly heal. Now, a couple of months later, I can't really tell where the cut was exactly, so I am blessed and fortunate. Man did I learn a lesson there. That was inadvertent, sort of. A couple of days ago I tried to coax close (drop close with hand assist) a Benchmade Mini Crooked River with Rosewod scales (impregnated) and it wasn't moving so I gave it a good shake and nice cut line developed right behind the nail of my right ring finger. I'll have to get the Bowie's out and actually talk to you about them a bit. Thanks. AF
You say you're from Tulsa? I'm in Inola just east of ya. I found BladeForums a few months ago when I decided I needed a 2x72 grinder to help with bit and spur makin. I'm starting to realize blademaking just kinda fits right in with the tools and some steel I already have. I've got my grinder now and I've been practicing grinding some bevels on mild steel trying to learn how things feel.
