During some annual inventory activity, John Hoffman and I turned up two cases of books we don’t sell anymore at Lost Art Press. These books aren’t doing anyone any good sitting in a warehouse, so we’re offering them at 50 percent off retail until they are gone.

We don’t have a lot of these, so they likely won’t be around for long. Here’s what we found:

“Workbenches: From Design & Theory to Construction & Use” (19 copies). This is my first book and covers the principles of bench design and construction that I still follow today. We stopped carrying this book because it’s suicide to compete with Amazon.com, and I’ve never been happy that F+W chose to print the title in China. We’re selling it for $15 plus domestic shipping. All the copies are signed.

You can buy “Workbenches” via this link.

First edition of “The Anarchist’s Tool Chest” – the tan cover edition. The first edition has a few typos and doesn’t have an index. But you can download the index for free here. And at $17.50 plus domestic shipping, it’s a solid deal. These are signed via either bookplate or directly.

You can buy the first edition of “The Anarchist’s Tool Chest” via this link.

— Christopher Schwarz

I woke at 4 a.m. this morning, my brain boiling with some thoughts on beds and coffins to build for the “Furniture of Necessity” book. And while barfing these notes into my laptop, I received an e-mail from David Savage.

Yes, that David Savage.

He wrote a review of “The Anarchist’s Tool Chest” for his blog. Read the whole amazing thing here. Or if you are incapable of clicking things, here’s an excerpt.

A real quality book, nice binding, good paper and a typeset that look good. I have had your book on my night stand for several months now remaining to be read. I have been a professional woodworker now for over 35 years and wood work books tend to hit the wall before I get past chapter one. Amateurs writing with utter conviction about something they don’t really know tend to get me cross. Schwarz is an amateur but somehow through a lifetime of woodieness he avoids the wall. Since starting this wonderful tome I have come to carry it about with me, almost closer than a good friend.

If Savage had thrashed me, I would have been just as honored. His woodwork is mind-blowing, and his writing is like getting bludgeoned by a hardbound copy of “The Sun Also Rises.” (That is a compliment.) He’s a regular contributor to many magazines that I read. For a sample of his prose, start here.

So, it’s a good day.

— Christopher Schwarz

From where you are sitting, I am sure there are times I look like a media harlot. Sweet mother of mystery, I get tired of seeing my name, image and videos spread all over the Internet. So I can only imagine how you feel about it.

Ask my mom if this is true: Though I’m a total goofball, I really am too shy to look strangers in the eye. Somehow, I have ended up where we are today – featured on “The Highland Woodworker.”

When I get phone calls to do a video, class or presentation, my first response is always “no.” I’d rather dig through old books and build things in the shop. Period.

But Charles Brock has always been a helpful and genuine guy; plus, I owe so much to Highland Woodworking in Atlanta, which is the sponsor of the show. So I agreed to have Charles and Stephen Price in my home to chat about Lost Art Press.

I think they did a great job. And they used some photos of the farm house my mom and dad built outside Hackett, Ark., so it was a nostalgia trip as well.

Check it out. As always, it’s a great episode with high production values and a little bit for everyone.

— Christopher Schwarz

To build an English-style tool chest, you don’t need a chest full of hand tools. Here is what I consider the minimum tool kit necessary to build this chest during a class or in your shop (as soon as you have your stock dimensioned).

Handplanes
Block plane: for smoothing surfaces and trimming joints flush
Jack plane: for gross removal of material
Moving fillister, skew rabbet or large shoulder plane: for cutting rabbets
Plow plane: for plowing the groove in the lid
Beading plane: 1/8” or 3/16” (optional)

Saws
Dovetail saw
Tenon saw
Coping saw, such as the Olson, and extra blades (10 or 12 tpi)

Chisels
1/2” bevel-edge chisel
1/4” or 5/16” mortising chisel
Chisel mallet

Marking & Measuring
Cutting gauge, such as the Tite-Mark
Dividers (one or two pair)
Marking knife
Mechanical pencil
Dovetail gauge or sliding T-bevel
Tape measure
Combination square: 6” or 12”

Miscellaneous
16 oz. claw hammer
Nail sets
Hand drill with a set of bits up to 1/4”
Sharpening equipment

Depending on how you cut your dovetails, you can skip some of the equipment. If you cut pins first, you can get away without a marking knife. If you like your dovetails a little irregular looking, you can dispense with the dovetail marking gauge and the dividers. If you truly cut your dovetails “by hand” then you don’t need a dovetail saw (you ninja).

— Christopher Schwarz

If you have ever wanted to build a full-on dovetailed Anarchist’s Tool Chest and want it done quick, here is your chance.

Due to a slight mix-up, we have two openings in my Anarchist’s Tool Chest at The Woodworker’s Club in Rockville, Md. They are prepping the poplar for the build today and tomorrow, so if you sign up now, you can be cutting dovetails on Monday morning and your chest will be done by Friday (except the easy innards. Hmmm “Easy Innards” would be a good band name…).

Sign up here. Or call 301-984-9033.

These classes are brutally fun. We work like dogs and then are mean to our livers.

— Christopher Schwarz

While I think tool storage is a fascinating topic, I don’t expect you to feel the same way. During the last several years, Jeff Burks and I have amassed an image library of workshops from the Middle Ages to the present. After looking at hundreds (perhaps more than a thousand) images, definite patterns emerge.

Here is a question that gets to the heart of the issue.

Chris Thompson writes: “I have read many books of yours on workbenches, furniture styles and hand tools, and I have enjoyed every one. I have started acquiring hand tools over the last year or so. I started researching hand tools after I made a bed for my son. I had 22 mortise-and-tenon joints to cut for the bed. However, I could never get the joints to sit perfectly flush due to the lack of minor adjustments using the table saw to cut the tenons. The shoulders were a tad off on most the the tenons.  Needless to say, that’s when the hand-tool bug got me.

“Anyways, I am curious about hand tool storage. In one of your workbench books you describe how to build a rack that mounts on wall or over a window to store them. Then I read ‘The Anarchist’s Tool Chest.’ So…I guess what I am trying to ask is, open rack or chest? Thanks for your time in listening to my long-winded question.”

Me: “Anyone who tells you there is one way to do something is selling something.

“Racks are more common in European workshops. Chests are more common in England and the United States (though racks are common in the States, too). Both approaches are totally valid, and the choice depends on your shop. If rust or theft is a problem, chests are a better way to go. If you have a lot of wall space, racks are ideal.

“I have worked out of a floor chest since 1997, both to deter rust and ‘theft’ in a common shop.

“When I wrote ‘The Anarchist’s Tool Chest,’ the chest was a literary conceit. It was an idea – a way to limit the tool-acquisition problem common to many woodworkers. I actually didn’t think anyone would build one — though I love mine dearly.

“So do whatever suits your personality.”

— Christopher Schwarz

One of the interesting aspects of the book “The Anarchist’s Tool Chest” is how many of the readers are active members of the military, government officials or managers in huge internet corporations.

I have lost count of the number of e-mails that begin like this: “I would like to order this book, but I don’t think it can be mailed to me on base, and I can’t have it show up on my credit card.”

We are happy to oblige and always ship our books in a plain brown wrapper.

This last week I’ve been teaching a class in building The Anarchist’s Toolchest at The Woodworker’s Club in Rockville, Md. The club is an interesting place – you don’t see many clubs like this except on the East or West coasts of the United States or in Europe.

Essentially, The Woodworker’s Club is, first of all, a place where you can pay a monthly fee to use a fully equipped and impeccably maintained workshop. There are lots of workbenches and an impressively equipped machine shop (a 16” SCMI joiner with a Shelix head?).

There is a lot of staff support, and the Maryland club also has an entire Woodcraft store up front.

As we were building a dozen tool chests this week, I got to watch the club’s members work among us, both in the bench rooms and in the machine room. I have to say this: Without a doubt, I have never seen a more diverse group of woodworkers. There was a healthy mix of men and women of all ages, races and ethnicities, working away at their personal projects.

It was very cool and quite heartening. If you live in the D.C. area and cannot set up shop in your apartment or condo, stop by the club and talk to Chris, Matt or Amy. They will be happy to help you get started in the craft without having to invest a year of your salary in machines alone.

During this class, I lost track of how many of the students were connected to the military or the government. And after a Thursday-night open house at the club, I was overwhelmed by the response of people to the anti-establishment ideas I write.

So now I think it’s a good idea if I sneak out of town before anyone notices what I’ve been teaching.

Yeah, we all built rectangular boxes this week, but what is radical is what goes inside.

— Christopher Schwarz

Students David, Rebecka and Pete showing off the results of their work.

When it comes to the issue of transporting a fully constructed Anarchist’s Tool Chest home, not every woodworker owns a truck. And even though the finished dimensions of the chest are easy to calculate, some people’s eyes are bigger than their Impalas.

I have had to do some wacky things to chests to get them into cars. On a few of the weirder ones, I am sworn to secrecy. Among the less weird:

• Shrink-wrapping it to the top of a Honda, “Beverly Hillbillies” style.
• Building it completely without glue so it can be flat-packed like Ikea stuff.
• Abandoning it at the school!

This week student David Eads pulled another common trick: Taking the car door off the hinges to get just enough space to sneak the chest into the back seat of a sedan. The whole process took 10 minutes. Tips: Have a box below the door and helpers so you can remove the door gently without destroying the wiring or dropping the door on the ground (this has happened.)

I head home on Sunday with this tool chest on my mind. We are getting the electronic files ready for our sixth printing of “The Anarchist’s Tool Chest.” Love it or hate it, this is the book that let me quit my job. So thank you for buying it.

— Christopher Schwarz

Woodworker Aaron Marshall took my Dutch Tool Chest class at The Woodwright’s School this week and added a slot in the shelf to hold his English Square, which is featured on the cover of “The Anarchist’s Tool Chest.”

The slot is a cool idea. And several other woodworkers I know have added slots in the back of the shelf to hold longer tools such as backsaws and framing squares.

I cannot recall any vintage Dutch tool chests with this feature, but it’s quite smart.

— Christopher Schwarz

If you’d like to see what I built during the class – a rolling campaign-style unit that goes below the Dutch chest – check out my blog entries here and here at Popular Woodworking Magazine.

The following is a list I should have made four years ago when I first started teaching people how to build the full-size tool chest in “The Anarchist’s Tool Chest.”

Apologies for the delay.

Here are the tools you need.

Dovetailing Equipment
Dovetail saw (15 point or coarser)
Cutting gauge, such as the Tite-Mark
Mechanical pencil
Dovetail layout square (Or a bevel gauge and smallish try square)
Coping saw with several blades (coarse blades, 12 tpi or so)
1/2” bevel-edge chisel
Mallet (I like a 16 oz. model)
Two pair of small dividers

Planes
One bench plane, such as a jack, jointer or smoother
Block plane
Rabbet plane or shoulder plane (if you have one)
If you have a tongue-and-groove plane (or match planes), use them
Beading plane (1/8”, 3/16” or 1/4”)
Plow plane with 1/4” cutter

Nailing equipment
Hand drill
Variety of small bits (1/16” up to 1/8”)
16 oz. hammer
Nail set
Nippers (if you have them)

General Marking/Measuring
12” combination square
12’ tape measure
Spear-point marking knife

Additional Tools
Mortise chisel (1/4″, 5/16″ or a close metric equivalent)
Crosscut handsaw (7 or 8 ppi)
Rip saw (4 to 7 ppi)
Your personal sharpening kit
Clamps (48” bars)

Hardware Installation Tools
Small router plane
Centerpunch
Birdcage awl
Screwdrivers

— Christopher Schwarz

Stuart Deutsch wrote a short review of “The Anarchist’s Tool Chest” for the August/September 2014 issue of Make magazine, which is usually about building projects involving high technology.

In the review, Deutsch writes:

“The Anarchist’s Tool Chest” is not your average beginner’s book, and its author is not your average seasoned woodworker…. Schwarz’s writing style is unlike what you’ll find in any other woodworking reference. He speaks to you in a friendly and frank nature. It’s as if this book is his diary or a long correspondence to a personal friend.

While I don’t always agree with Schwarz’s approach, I feel this book should be standard reading for anyone who hopes to one day to call themselves a woodworker.

— Christopher Schwarz

The No. 1 question I get from students in my tool chest classes: “Aren’t you tired of building tool chests?”

That’s like asking a delivery-room doctor: “Aren’t you tired of delivering babies?”

Helping woodworkers build a tool chest and workbench that will set them on a life of making things never gets old. Building a chest or a workbench in a classroom with 18 other people is a sometimes-grueling way to learn the basic joints of the craft and make mistakes in a place where they can easily be fixed.

And in only five days, it’s all over. You have a place for your tools and you know how to use them.

This week I’m teaching a particularly special Anarchist’s Tool Chest class at Warwickshire College in England. It’s a big deal for me for two reasons. First, it’s the first time I’ve ever taught in England. Second, I am the first instructor hired by The New English Workshop, a small company that has a lot of the same fundamental principles as Lost Art Press.

The two founders, Paul Mayon and Derek Jones, are committed to growing the hand-tool craft in England and supporting the existing structure of craft education in this country (more on that later in the week). They have a lot of interesting classes and events planned for 2015, so do sign up updates from their their blog.

We are three days into the class right now, and things are going well. Except for the fact that I am having the occasional and strange attack of deja-vu. Here’s why: We are building these chests from yellow pine, which is almost certainly from the United States. So as I am surrounded by these tea-sipping, warm-beer-loving English woodworkers, I am occasionally overwhelmed by the familiar turpentine odor of yellow pine. It makes me feel like I’m back in Arkansas and in one of our unfinished houses on the farm. And all the turkeys and armadillos have English accents.

So yeah, it’s a bit weird.

But I love the weird, and so I’m off to a sports bar with the students in a few minutes. I wonder if Bud Light sponsors the local cricket league. I hope not.

— Christopher Schwarz

People gripe about traveling abroad, especially for work. I don’t get it. Here is how it’s done.

1. Take yourself on a “date.” Jet lag is easy to conquer with modern chemistry. I tell people that I give myself a “roofie” before I fly across the globe. First I take myself out for a nice dinner – in this case an overheated Mexican craphole in a New Jersey airport. And I order extra salsa – in this case they brought ketchup.

Then I get myself a nice girlie drink, the ones that come with either a paper umbrella or a glittery tube top. And, after telling myself how irresistible I am, I slip myself a few pills while I’m not looking. Two ibuprofen and two Benadryl.

With the help of this concoction I can sleep all the way across the Atlantic while a 6-year-old ninja goes all Donatello on the back of my seat.

2. Don’t nap. When I land I behave like I’m on local time. I stay up as late as I can the first day I am there and crash hard. After that, the trick is to never stop swimming.

3. Embrace everything. When I teach, I always round up the students to go out in the evenings to get dinner and a couple of drinks. We usually enlist a local to help us find a cheap dive with good food, good beer and a goodly amount of patience with loud-mouthed woodworkers. Tell bad jokes. Stay up too late. Crash hard. Repeat.

And never say “no” when you are invited to do something with the locals. The best way to see a new place is through the eyes of a resident. The worst way to see it is from the seat of a tour bus.

The week I’ve been at Warwickshire College, teaching a class in building “The Anarchist’s Tool Chest” for the New English Workshop. We’re in a nice little town called Leamington Spa outside Birmingham. The place is awash in Georgian architecture, quaint little shops and just enough pubs to get us into trouble.

It has been a remarkable week for many reasons.

This is my first course in England and the first course for New English Workshop. It’s a great little company run by Derek Jones and Paul Mayon that seeks to really honestly and truly prop up the craft.

Here’s one example: The tool chest I’ve built for the course will be auctioned off by David Stanley Auctions while it is full of incredible tools donated by toolmakers all over the world (Karl Holtey, Veritas, Bad Axe Toolworks and many others – a complete list to come). All the proceeds from that auction will go back to Warwickshire College to support its furniture-making program.

I’ll have more details on the auction as we get closer to the date.

As a nice gesture, I had all 18 students sign the underside of the tool chest. That should confuse some future tool collector.

The other great thing about the course has been getting to know the students, many of whom I’ve corresponded with via e-mail. One of the highest of the highlights was getting to meet Kieran Binnie, a luthier, woodworker, music lover and history nut.

Kieran runs the Over the Wireless blog, where he discusses woodworking, building guitars and martial arts and somehow blends them all into a very interesting and readable mix. Oh, and his guitars are gorgeous. Do subscribe to his blog. And read more about Kieran on Chris Hughes’ blog at Artifact Bag. And check out this Telecaster he built. Must. Resist.

A dozen of the 19 chests we built in five days.

As we loaded up the 18 students’ chests today, I marveled that we got so much work done in only five days (and without a single stomach pumping and only one instance of barfing). When woodworkers build a serious tool chest it is usually the point where they give themselves over to the craft. You can see that after five hard (nay, brutal) days of dovetailing under extreme time pressure, that each person has become a little different. And it’s not just the odd smell.

Building such a difficult piece in a short period of time gives them the confidence they can do a lot of other things in the craft. And it can be done quickly and precisely.

So this blog entry has gone on far too long. I’ve got another date tonight. This time with a pillow and an unplugged alarm clock.

— Christopher Schwarz

And so she asks: “What does it mean? ‘The Anarchist’s Tool Chest?’”

I take a deep breath and purse my lips a bit. I get asked this question a lot, especially by non-woodworkers, people who haven’t read “The Anarchist’s Tool Chest” and complete wankers.

The truth is, I eschew labels such as “libertarian,” “liberal” and “lemming.” While I am happy to explain my outlook on life, I do it without a whiff of political language. Instead of talking about the political landscape, I’d rather live in the real one.

So my basic response to the question goes like this: I dislike large organizations – governments, corporations, churches. When organizations get enormous, the humans in them tend to do inhumane things, such as start wars, burn each other at the stake or enslave people in factories.

I refuse to participate in those organizations as much as possible. I don’t vote. I don’t give money to churches. I don’t shop at Wal-Mart, or really any other chain store. I admit it’s difficult to be Puritanical about this. Buying a car or a computer is difficult without somehow engaging with a large organization, but I do my best.

Most of all, I try to consume less and make more – and not be an a-hole about everything I’ve said above. The world has enough of those, and I’m surprised they don’t have their own organizing body.

If you are interested in American anarchism, or the particular branch that applies to woodworkers – aesthetic anarchism – I encourage you to read the following short bits.

1. The Wikipedia entry on Josiah Warren, the first American anarchist and the founder of the Cincinnati Time Store.

2. The 1906 book on Josiah Warren by William Bailie. It’s available for free here from archive.org.

3. Buy a copy of “Native American Anarchism” by Eunice Minette. Many libraries have the book. You can buy one from AbeBooks.com as well. The book is a bit mistitled. It has nothing to do with Native Americans. It is about anarchism that took root in America.

Most of all, if you think you are an anarchist, refuse to listen to the non-anarchists who dismiss your approach to life. That’s like listening to the factory owners who laugh at hand-tool woodworking as quaint.

The best response to the criticism is to close the laptop, sharpen a chisel and chop some dovetails. As George R.R. Martin writes over and over in his books, “Words are wind.”

— Christopher Schwarz

Asking a newly minted woodworker to build an Anarchist Tool Chest in five days is about like asking them to grow a tail.

During a five-day class, most students are working on the lid when we run out of time. This is somewhat frustrating for the students and myself because we both want the sucker done and ready to use.

One solution would be to add extra days to the course. But most students are so worn out after five days of high-pressure woodworking that the sixth day would be mostly nap time (we’ve tried it). There are other solutions I’ve pondered, all of which add time or cost or whatever. (This is my polite way of saying that I’m not looking for your suggestion to hold the class on Saturn, where the days are much longer.)

So this summer I have designed some different chests to build in 2015. One of the chests isn’t ready to unveil because it is part of a kooky-go-nuts low-cost new class I’m developing for 2015 (Hint: I hope you like the smell of B.O.).

The other chest is designed and ready to discuss. This chest is basically the same size as the Traveling Anarchist Tool Chest, but it has some simpler joinery and an additional cool feature.

1. Fewer dovetails. Students have dubbed my Anarchist Tool Chest classes as a dovetail death march. I don’t disagree. This new chest replaces the dovetails on both the lower and upper skirts with miters.

For the upper skirt, I think this is an overdue change. The upper skirt is a component of the chest that doesn’t see a lot of wear; it’s rare to see damage to this part of an old chest. Also, the upper skirt is now a three-piece assembly instead of going all the way around the carcase. This speeds assembly up and allows me to add a built-in stop for the lid (more one that in a minute).

Alas, the lower skirt does take a heap of abuse, so I resisted using miters here. Sure, I’ve seen miters survive just fine, but I’ve also seen them fail on old chests. So I’m recommending students add steel corner brackets, another feature I’ve seen on surviving tool chests.

2. A different lid. I love the lid on my old tool chest, but it has a lot of joinery and takes more than a day to build by hand for most people.

So here I’m using a lid design shown both in chests designed by Charles Hayward and Paul Hasluck. The lid is a simple flat panel with the grain running left to right. It is surrounded on three sides by a dovetailed dust seal (just like on my old chest). The flat panel is glued to the front of the dust seal and rabbeted into the ends. Cut nails keep the ends attached to the flat panel and allow it to move, pushing the wood movement to the back of the chest.

The other feature I like is that I have extended the width of the flat panel so it will act as a stop, keeping the lid upright when open. In the current drawing I have it open at 90°, but I can lean it back by planing a bevel on the lid.

This simpler lid also provides a nice canvas for a marquetry panel.

I’m still drawing out the interior of the chest, but it will be much like the Traveling Anarchist Tool Chest. There will be two sliding trays, a rack and two sawtills – one for panel saws and one for backsaws.

3. And finally, I have thinned down some components of this chest to make it lighter in weight, but still plenty strong. The thinner components – the bottoms, skirts and dust seal – are all things I’ve seen on old chests. Nothing new here. I’ve also thinned down the thickness of the carcase so that we can use off-the-rack white pine to save expense and reduce weight.

I’ve loaded my SketchUp drawing into the 3D warehouse. Be warned. This is the metric version. I’m not switching to metric. But I’m just back from England and I’m trying to train my brain to work better in metric. When I finish the Imperial version, I’ll post that as well.

— Christopher Schwarz

I keep every Anarchist’s Tool Chest photograph that readers have sent me through the years. I’ve seen my tool chest designs painted with flowers. I’ve seen it painted electric purple. With a Kleenex dispenser in the front wall.

But that didn’t prepare me for the tool chest of Marco Terenzi.

The story begins one morning at a hotel breakfast in England. I’m teaching a class of 18 students how to build the Anarchist’s Tool Chest for the New English Workshop. Derek Jones and Paul Mayon, who run N.E.W., are eating their eggs and toast and chatting away when I sit down for coffee. It’s a scene we’ve repeated several times that week, but today something is different.

Behind Derek’s chair is an odd-shaped Pelican case, which doesn’t enter the conversation. We finish breakfast and prepare to head to Warwickshire College, which is where the tool chest class is being held. But then Derek and Paul take a detour into the hotel’s sitting room.

They put the Pelican case down on the coffee table and Derek starts telling a story about a guy in Detroit who spent 400 hours making the thing that is in the Pelican case. Then they let me open it.

It’s a perfect (and I don’t use that word often) quarter-scale version of The Anarchist’s Tool Chest. It is built exactly like mine. The same material, the same number and slope of dovetails, the same hinges with the same clocked screws. But it is the size of a small toaster.

All of it was made by Marco Terenzi, a 24-year-old artist and woodworker from outside Detroit. It seems like I spent a good 10 speechless minutes looking at the thing. Moving the three perfect trays, eyeballing the hardware, marveling at the perfection of it all.

And then they dropped the real bomb. Marco was coming to England that weekend and would be taking a class on building a Dutch tool chest the following week.

Now, before I carry this story any further, I urge you to check out Marco’s Instagram feed, which documents the construction of the tool chest in incredible detail. Also check out his web site. Yes, that’s a quarter-scale Roubo workbench. Yes, he made those tools to make the chest and the bench.

The rest of the story is that Marco and I got to hang out a bit during and after the class and he gave me a quarter-scale version of my Andrew Lunn saw. And it works. Incredible.

The photos of the chest are amazing, but if you play your cards right, you will be able to see the chest in person. The New English Workshop boys will be displaying the chest at shows around England in the coming year. And they have promised me that I’ll be able to show it off as well.

I am hoping to get it here for Handworks in Amana, Iowa, in 2015. And I think I have Marco talked into coming to Amana, too.

So stay tuned. This story has just begun. Marco is starting to make all the tools that go in the chest – including casting the metal planes.

— Christopher Schwarz

In one word: Charlie.

We will let furniture maker Christopher Scott explain:

“This was the work of my workshop dog Charlie, a curly retriever x lab. I have to admit this book not only got read by Charlie, but it may have been thrown across the backyard toward him I after I found it sans cover. Not a page loose.”

— Christopher Schwarz

I avoid dealing with large organizations whenever possible, and that is because I am not Chinese.

Somewhere, somehow, some nutjob in the Cincinnati medical community put a note in my file years ago that my preferred language is “Chinese (Mandarin).” While that doesn’t seem like a big deal, it’s a never-ending source of inanity when I go in for a medical test and they hand me forms so they can hire a Chinese translator to be present during the procedure.

This has been going on for years. No matter how many times they delete the reference to Chinese, it keeps resurfacing, even after we switched health insurers.

Exhibit 2: A certain percentage of the times that I fly, I am questioned about why my name on my passport doesn’t match the name on the passenger manifest.

Here’s why the names don’t match: Some computers only allow you to enter 10 characters for your first name. “Christopher” is 11 characters. “Christophe” is 10 letters and is the French version of my given name. Que the cavity search.

So I’m French. Or Chinese.

After many years as passing for an English speaker, I ran into the Chinese problem again today while scheduling a medical test. After going through the whole “you don’t sound Chinese” conversation, she asked me if this test was related to a worker’s compensation claim.

“Yup,” I said. “I was in a rickshaw accident.”

I’ve filed this entry under “The Anarchist’s Tool Chest.”

— Christopher Schwarz

While some critics put my work on par with cat poo, few have ever considered that my work could actually contain and control feline fecal matter.

But reader John Notis of Portland, Ore., is a visionary.

While he prefers a wall cabinet for his woodworking tools, he took the basics from “The Anarchist’s Tool Chest” to make this litter box. It is impressive. (The only thing more impressive would be to get one’s cats to defecate in a wall cabinet.)

I hope my wife does not see this post or I know what I will be building next week.

— Christopher Schwarz

If I have only one complaint about my life, it is that with all the teaching, writing and building that I do, I have no time left to take woodworking courses for myself.

I don’t drool over tool catalogs. My personal pornographic publications are the brochures and web sites from woodworking schools that teach skills that I want to master.

So when I had dinner with David Savage last summer, you can imagine how long it took me to say “yes” to his following proposition: I teach a class in building a tool chest at his school in Rowden, then stay on for a second week to assist and take a class in sunburst veneering.

Savage has long been one of those woodworkers I wanted to learn from. He does amazing work. And, equally important to me, he is one of the most daring woodworking writers alive today. He is, simply put, nobody’s tool. He is fearless in exploring the craft and his own human failings. Check out some of his articles here.

So this summer I head to Rowden to lead a class in building a dead-nuts traditional tool chest, one I have specially designed for this course. During the first week, Aug. 24-28, we’ll build the chest using hand tools and traditional production methods and joints – dovetails, tongue-and-groove, miters, breadboards etc.

The second week (Aug. 31-Sept. 4) we will embellish the interior lid of the chest with a sunburst veneer pattern designed for the course, plus traditional veneer and crossbanding on the lid of the top till. The goal is for all of the students to walk away with a finished chest, a boatload of newfound skills and a slightly swollen liver.

When David announced the course last week, it filled up immediately. But the wait list is very short right now and these classes always have a certain amount of churn. If you’d like to read more details about Rowden, David’s crack team of instructors and the course, check out these pages here and here. You can sign up for the course’s wait list here.

I’ll be writing more about the chest design in the coming months. It is based off a number of historical examples that have survived quite well and has some features you might consider for your tool chest.

— Christopher Schwarz