Post inspired by
@Fiesta Red red and his fantastic Luckenbach Texas story - inspiring moment.
So, I was in a pawn shop the other day, wandering around. It's one of those that keeps digital radio on, pretty loud because the owner digs his music
and he don't get much traffic in there, he can do what he wants. Anyway, a couple things about Wednesday are memorable.
One of them, this song by Tim Hicks came on the sound system, just remembered it again after fiestas post.
The song is five damn years old now, I'd never heard it before. Stopped me in my tracks, it did.
I marveled at the simple idea, and how it all came together. One of those "I wish I'd've" songs.
How come I never thought of this? Damn thing, listening to it gets me angry and misty all at the same time.
Anyway, back to the store.
On my way in I had noticed this reclining leather sofa sitting out front, outside in the elements. Seemed to be in ok condition.
I had drove by it a few times, saw it sittin' there for a maybe ten days. Anyway I looked at it. "Palliser" is a higher quality name brand up here.
It had been snowed on lightly once, maybe a bit of light rain to, but leather had been treated, yeah the seating areas got a bit damp.
So back in the store I asked Dale about it, what's the story? He said somebody just dumped it off, and he had no room for it inside, and no help to move it.
Those reclining sofas have a lot of gear inside, and can be pretty darn heavy. He says " You want it? Sell it to ya cheap!"
I say, "Man it's sittin' outside already, and you paid nothing for it - Like HOW cheap?" He says, "Bring a truck, I'll help you load it up, cheap."
I got my dad's truck, he was busy so I just loaded it up myself by standing it on it's end then just flopping it in.
Ducked my head into the store, gave him a twenty. He was grateful to have it gone.
So I drove it home, took me forty minutes to salvage all the leather, then lay the damper pieces out that needed to dry
This was about 3/4s of it. Probably about $170 of pretty nice quality leather here.
I did have to pay $10 dollars more to dispose of the sofa guts and reclining mechanism at the landfill.
Used to use a quite a bit of upcycled leather for my straps until about seven years ago. Then I found it more economical to just buy new hides, and get what exactly I wanted. But sometimes it's nice to have some spare scrap hide around the shop to use for layering, reinforcement and the like. This is the tan finished side which I probably wont use... but the suede side (one piece turned over), is great! I'll use to line tail straps and such. Makes them stronger, more trusty.
Interesting week for sure!