For a time, I worked with a young man who sang at work. It wasn’t “Old Man River” or railroad work songs, but simpler, more repetitive phrases: “Up the stairs, down the stairs” while moving around the house, or “broccoli, broccoli; broccoli, broccoli” making his lunch. The habit had its charms and its hilarity, but now the little sing-song phrases get stuck in my head, like today’s “try not scream, try not to scream.”

Buttonholes!! Board decisions! Bad fit! The last two are only hypothetical, I must remember. There’s been no real board meeting to cut that $100K from next year’s budget, and I haven’t laced into my stays and tried on the new dress yet.

I have been working on buttonholes, and have a new favorite sewing tool: a sharp chisel. It would be ideal to get one that could pass for period, and a mallet as well, because hammering a sharp blade through overalls has proven oddly satisfying. I might take on fancy waistcoats for the sheer pleasure of mallet use.

The dress is basted and hemmed and ready to be tried on and tested. there’s a little bit of minor finish work I can do at lunch today, but the big push this evening will have to be gathering up the gear and loading the car, fitting the ankles of the overalls to the wearer so those buttons and buttonholes, and the evil tongue, can be sewn.

That leaves Friday for finish work, which seems like a reasonable plan. I can always work on the shift during What Cheer! Day, as long as there is not too much running back and forth to do.