My first Swiss Army knife was made entirely of low grade plastic – the blades were dull grey and bendy. but the red handle looked nifty. I was about nine, in the paper shop, staring into a glass-fronted cabinet of pocket money toys, and it was a few years before I could afford the real thing. A Victorinox – most peoples’ gateway drug to the Swiss Amy knife. A fantastic piece of kit. As with many bloke things, the bigger, the better, so I upgraded whenever I could. Then I discovered Wenger, the “other” Swiss Army knife, and I was a convert. Here’s a nice picture of the one I have, except that mine also features a magnifying glass and a Mysterious Hook, and a very clever spanner device, so this isn’t mine at all, but gives you a fair idea of its majesty:
Do you have a pocket knife? Is it as good as mine?
Oh look! I found a picture of the same exact knife I have!
Deep internet research tells me that Wenger was bought out by Victorinox after the post-9/11 sales slump, which seems a blow to independent cutlery.
Fascinatingly, you can now buy a fake version of the toy plastic knife I had lo these many years ago:
Mrs. Williams (U.K.) gushes: “This is really quite large, lol it’s a jumbo sized one for little fingers and is very fun to see children play with it. We gave this as a gift to some friends who love camping so while we imagine their little one probably will already have real tools they’ll be using, this one was fun for around the house. :)”
This thread reminds me of Twelve Angry Men.
Perhaps other readers are reminded of different movies? I was hoping for a Last Year At Marienbad kind of atmosphere.
There are no other readers.
A typical Afterword forum piece gets between three, and eight million views. I’m hoping this, with its clickbait title and well-researched content, will pull in maybe up to a dozen, and I reckon by the law of averages (or possibly thermodynamics) at least two of these will own pocket knives and have something interesting to say about them. So let’s just sit back and watch how this plays out. I’m going to have a beer, read some some more Ice Station Zebra – what a fantastic yarn that is! – and check back tomorrow, confident that there’ll be a robust debate to catch up with!
I saw the clickbait title, but being completely immune to the musical charms of Ms Swift I was on the verge of moving on. Thank goodness I didn’t. You may be unaware but being tooled up with a Swiss Army knife on UK streets these days is likely to land you with a police record. I’m even a bit wary of popping down to the paper shop with an apple corer in my pocket these days. You just can’t be too careful.
But … what would you be doing with an apple corer at the paper shop? I get the feeling that the police state laws are justified.
Do you have a pocket knife?
Yes
Is it as good as mine?
It’s better
Picture or it didn’t happen.
(I also have a hand-made Laguiole Le Fidele, so be careful.)
I’ve already shown one of mine – it has a hook and MikeTHEP’s pokey awl*.
Really useful tools, and because both open from the middle of the knife handle, you can really get some heft in, without the tool folding up and slicing half your finger off.
For really secure (and sharp) blades, you need either a Leatherman like what Leedsboy and I have (and VV lost), or an Opinel wood carving knife with a ring to keep the blade closed or open. Here’s a nice safe one that my daughter has – sharp as a cutthroat, but with a nice rounded end
*for removing stones from horses’ hooves – it’s the one with the hole in on his picture, but the Swiss Army equivalent is far sharper.
Your daughter is sharp as a cutthroat, with a nice rounded end?
Verbally, every single day, yes. She has an extraordinarily dry, laconic wit for a nine year old.
Absolutely the right age for a “safety knife”! Did you know it was originally known as the French Army Knife? It got renamed after a misunderstood remark by a WW1 Tommy: “you ain’t got an ‘ope in ‘ell winning a war with that, mate!”
I caught up with my friend on Saturday and asked him if he’d ever met Taylor Swift. “A few times” he said. I wish I’d asked him if he had a pocket knife now.
To show I can do running with a penknife that has a scissors attachment too, I haven’t heard the long player purported to be the remit of our man in the Mekong’s OP. But, having heard and bought Folklore, in that order, within the last month, I have swallowed my smirk and choked back my chortle at his humorous tromp-l’oreille, as I suspect it might have some good songs on it. Indeed, reading around, it sounds as if the shock 2nd disc might be right up the pipe of the Lana-phile members of this congregation. Others can establish that truth, if so, as, yes, I am a teensy bit surprised that I find myself skirting on the fringe of being a Swiftie, but, hey, its all music, innit? I look forward to Lodey confirming my suspicion being correct.
What a strange comment.
It’s too long, only so much Swift a Swiftie can take. As for the record ..
Swiss army knives are good. Leatherman tools are even better. Pliers always beat a magnifiying glass and mystery hook thing. Although my Swiss army knfe has a tooth pick and tiny tweezers.
I once, quite accidentally, threw a mate’s Swiss Army knife toothpick out. I dont think the friendship ever recovered.
I have this. Don’t suppose it’s ever troubled the Swiss Army, but it does the job, including a few jobs I haven’t identified yet. That’s because the bloody things are to hard to get out – I broke a nail. Not sure if there’s anything for getting stones out of a horse’s hoof though. No idea where it came from – out of a cracker possibly.
That’s why they come complete with nail clippers and a nail file for those times you break a nail opening them.
And pliers for tooth extraction.
Possibly one of the unidentified pieces is to attach a right-angle valve adaptor to a wheelbarrow wheel.
Of course!
My Leatherman went the way of all contraband. Heading for Amsterdam via Bristol airport, I’d fogotten that it was packed in the same bag as my laptop. The bloke on the X-Ray machine at the airport had a smirk like a Taylor Swift fan who thinks they’ve made a convert. I never saw it again, the Leatherman, that is.
Ironically, my first Leatherman, a rather splendid Micra which I used as a key ring, was confiscated at an airport. Why ironically? Because it was given to me as a gift by Swissair. and I flew with it for years without it being an issue. I also bought my Swiss Army knife on a Swissair flight from Zurich. How times have changed…
Here’s my Swiss card
which contains, a knife, nail file, toothpick, tweezers, pen and a four-headed screwdriver thingummy.
Our Swiss uncle had one confiscated at the airport because of the knife.
I’ll have to adopt a neutral stance on the rights and wrongs
Of that particular course of action
I have a Victorinox that Mrs D bought me when we were in Bowness in 1996. Has its own leather case that they still make (4.0521.3 Z if you care for some reason or even if you don’t). Just the case costs £26 these days.
I lost the tweezers about 10 years ago when I was using them to feed a baby jay that I rescued from next door’s cat. Anyway it survived and repaid me by making a terrible racket in the back garden that summer.
These birds just can’t be trusted to construct reliable tennis-playing equipment.
They’re too highly strung.
Birds are bats.
And croquet mallets.
On holiday in the Austrian Alps in 2001, I bought a pair of nails scissors from the village pharmacy, having forgottent to pack any. They were really posh, with curved blades and everything.
I flew home with them in my hand luggage on 12th Sep 2001, when security was so tight that Mrs F had to put her handbag in the hold, and flew around with them in the same bag as my toothbrush for years. In 2007, they were confiscated in the departure terminal of Hong Kong airport. I was told I’d have to fill out a form, pay about 20 quid, and catch the flight tomorrow if I wanted them back. The thieving gits.
Someone at HK airport has really nicely trimmed toenails.
I have a Victorinox knife, but never use it. Did you know they also make clothing?Their orange check short-sleeve shirt I own is one of my favourites.
It’s useless for stoning horses, though.
I do hope you mean destoning horses.
Horses: Just Say No!
Horses: Just say Neigh.
Neigh, neigh and thrice neigh!
You’ll make yourself horse.
So how is the album? I heard that with the extra tracks it is her “White Album”, but I doubt she goes through as many different styles as the Fabs.
You’ll be deemed odd, Dai, don’t go there. Wait until Lodey puts up a dedicated thread about pen knives, and that’ll be the time and place.
It’s sprawling and messy (in a good way). It’s emotionally raw, cathartic in a personal sense and definitely not fan-serving. It’s very lyric-focused, the musical frameworks referencing her country beginnings at times but mainly heavily Midnights/folkmore-coded (soft synth beds, delicate piano and acoustic guitar structures purposely placing the lyrical unburdening front and centre). Some of the lyrics are overwrought and over-written (a common critique of this album is that she could/should have used an editor). My take is that it’s just a purge, her way of trying to process, and manage, an incredibly complex and surreal period of her personal and public life. There’s nothing dramatically new here in terms of the soundscape; she is working in a familiar and safe collaborative environment, which is understandable in the context of the album’s themes and tone. It makes for an unequivocally gorgeous listen, if not an entirely thrilling one. I’m pretty sure that like most of Taylor’s recent work, it will reveal and satisfy more with time. And time is necessary to experience and absorb this album…it is A LOT.
I played the first half or so, and the ones that trended on Twitter a couple of times. Single word review: Indistinguishable.
The only thought I came away with was to wonder if the missing apostrophe is deliberate, perhaps a sly reference to Finnegans Wake, or carelessness.
Or perhaps she has more than one poet locked in her dungeon?
Dylan Thomas and Patti Smith are referenced. 😉
A boy can dream… talking of which, where is Moosey?
You dream of Moose?
That’s not dull.
That’s not dull at all.
Or Lifes Rich Pageant… 🤔
Pitchfork is a bit sniffy
https://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/taylor-swift-the-tortured-poets-department-the-anthology/
As is the NME. But there are plenty of positive reviews; overall it currently has a rating of 77% on Metacritic.
You guys.
While I’d never criticise the lumpen utilitarianism of salwarpe’s folding butter knives (whose ability to rust is matched only by their artificial expense), this here is a gentleman’s pocket knife:
Note exquisite hand-crafted ornamentation of hardened steel. Note bone handle (endangered specie guarantee). Note elegant lines. This is made not for levering the lids off old paint tins (where salwarpe’s stout Opinel excels!) but for picnic lunches, such as the many I shared with my dog in the Bois de Boulogne lo these many years ago. Wafer-thin slices of salami, hunks of cheese, peeled apples, accompanied by fresh, crusty baguette, torn by hand (no gentleman puts a knife to a baguette, not even one as exquisite as this).
Hark at the sliver of thy deft complimenting, HP. I own the Benthamite practicality of my woodcarving blade, and disdain the Millsian vanity of thy metal twiglet.
Also, hunky cheese in France? You must have smuggled it in from Holland.
You are as clearly unfamiliar with Gallic dairy produce as you are with their cutlery. Cantal the difference?
Anyway, my victory (not nox) in the Afterword Pocket Knife Awards is assured. That Laguiole is not only an example of consummate craftsmanship, it also keeps a surgical edge.
Congratulations, HP. Quite the accomplishment.
Er – it was you what started the competition with your brag about having a *better* pocket knife. And nobody – but nobody – carves wood with a round-ended butter knife.
Never bring an Opinel to a knife fight!
Knife fight? All I want to do is carve wood. This is escalating in a scary direction. Listen to Celine, HP!
I’ve got nothing against your boney apple peeler. I’m sure nothing can pare like you with it in your hand.
If all you want to do is carve wood, why not get yourself a wood carving knife? You know, with a pointy blade? An image search for wood carving knife delivers hundreds of choices, including absolutely not even one that looks like a butter knife with a rounded end.
I have a wood carving knife. The rounded one is my daughter’s one. Here is what my one looks like
And here are some of the knife handles I have used it to carve – there’s a sort of self-reflexive AI iterative process going on here:
I was genuinely baffled, and now everything is clear. Thank you. Any chance of showing us the results of your carvery?
Cheers, HP. The handles of those three above were sticks I found in the woods. Serviceable, if not very aesthetic, but part of a general curiosity I’ve developed in finding interesting bits of wood and stone, then slowly carving and polishing them. There’s a real pleasure for me in taking something lying on the ground and ignored and trying to reveal its natural forms – it’s very meditative for the me, discovering the interplay of natural materials, some of which I’ve been working on patiently for weeks, months and even years.
I quite like the absurdity and pointlessness of it, but almost most of all, the connection I get from working with objects formed over decades or created centuries or millenia ago.
Can I just point out this post was originally titled “In Praise Of The Pocket Knife”? I suspected the mods’ impish sense of fun was responsible for the change, although they claim it’s a “technical issue brought about by Colin Harper’s blatant refusal to not post videos in the piece itself.” This will explain the baffling album reviews. I’ve asked the mods to re-instate the original title, but they’re too busy unboxing their latest air fryer to respond.
I knew something was up. Isn’t Taylor screaming in ALL CAPS on her new album, Trumpwise?
I have been moving house so I am late to this thread, but yes I have a pocket knife. It is a beautiful implement given to me by an American friend. It is just that- a pocket knife, nothing more. Slim, beautifully crafted, with an etched (?) casing and just one blade that gets released after pressing a spring thingy on the top edge of the casing. It is made by Remington.
No it hasnt got a spike for digging stones out of horses hooves or an adjustable spanner or whatever. It’s a pocket knife.
Beautiful.
Are Laguiole the ones with the bee motif? From the Auvergne? In that case we have a set of six knife/fork utensils, but no longer have the box. The knives are still razor sharp after 20-plus years. When I secretly use them to clean my toenails I have to be very careful indeed.
Those are they. Bee motif visible in my pics.
When I’m using a VPN to keep out of sight of the Deep State Illuminati I often can’t see the pics here…
(If you can’t beat ‘em etc)
Call that a knife? THIS is a knife….
My trusty Leatherman has been around the world with me, it’s tightened camera tripod legs, cut fingernails and spread jam & cream on scones among many other uses. It is hilariously referred to by myself and Mrs Tufnell as my “massive tool”. We’re mad at our house you know.
Just remembered I have one of these, a tiny Swiss Army knife with two blades. Size isn’t everything, you know. It comes is a pleasing little leather case.
I have a couple of these, but with scissors, ideal for fingernails (and toenails, after a struggle to get them within reach).
Ah, toenails…after a couple of lunging-at-toenails disasters I have given up the struggle (and the struggle to persuade Mrs thep to cut them) and go and get them cut by a couple of nice ladies (one in each country, not one on each foot). Only yesterday as it happens. Very relaxing.
Psst… Mike – that’s two knives. You have two knives. Has Sir been drinking again?
Very possibly, yes – but neither of those two knives is mine. Stole it from t’internet.
In fact, on reflection, that isn’t my little knife anyway. Mine’s even smaller…this (which isn’t mine either – mine’s in Oz). I’d forgotten it has a nail file.
Does yours have one of those poker like tools for getting Boy Scouts out of Girl Guides?
I just use a bucket of water, stops them every time.