I heard that there's a 18 yr + vetern wandering around your area looking for some work........
It is very hard to teach someone something when they already know that they know more than you do about one part of what you are doing. It seems they will focus on what they know that you don't and always be wanting to teach you something. Of course I was on the other end of this once and drove a machinist and inlay master crazy when he was trying to teach me some stuff. He worked for me for a whole summer and we finally agreed that I would do all the work to my cues except the inlay work and pattern making and he would take care of that end of things. I had already been building cues for years, but was pretty basic in inlay work skills. I really feel to this day that my construction techniques were far superior as far as playability goes, compared to the way he wanted to do them. But as far as machinist skills and inlays and pattern making abilities he was far beyond me. But he wanted to over build every thing. He wanted 4 to 5 inch tenons going into the forearms with 6 to 8 inch screws connecting the wrap joint. Yes they were solid, but weighed too much and buzzed like a bumble bee. I think sometimes engineers approach cues like building bridges and fail to think about the feel and playing characteristics of a cue.
Yeah another time a cuemaker told me he did not think I had what it takes to build a cue. I took it as an insult and went and built a cue. Later I thought about it and realized he may have meant I did not have the right equipment in my shop. But either way he gets the credit for starting my cuemaking career.
