Ah My Dear Story and AE -
The short story is I was unable to find a courrier for AE's generous offers, but did find used a doner barrel and shoulder stock
(and heaven help me, another dirt cheap 1860 army!) elsewhere, so the project will slowly move forward.
Pics will follow, eventually...
I appologise for my tardiness, as I have been overcome by family issues, simply put, the long-distance liquidation of assets and settling of the estate of my Lovely Spousal Unit's recently departed mother.
I am recently returned from the latest, and hopefully last airtrip devoted to the "clearing out" of the Inlaw's home of well over 30 years. They, like us, loved their books and were also, like us, devoted packrats :-)
The good news - FIL (departed 2 years ago) and I had discussed the folly of various hidey-holes and thus I knew without doubt that I did not need to riffle the leaves of every book looking for cash, nor examine the frozen food or ice cube trays for disguised valuables.
The Bad News - while not hoarders, they lived thru the Great Depression as city teenagers, ( FIL regularly supplemented the meat on the family table with home raised Squab) so there was a LOT of junk (but's it's really good junk!)
FIL kept every piece of paper or receipt that passed his desk, including all his Ford work papers, the notebook paper rcpt of the 1939 chevy he purchased from his brother, and his (and my wife's) gradeschool report cards... :-( ...
So, after several rounds disposing of of 20 Contractor grade garby bags of crap stuff each time, I arranged to have 10 cu yard dumpsters delivered, and filled 3 ... ( and yes there is still more).
This whilst still keeping my day job ...
Better News - the realtor we selected put us in contact with a Service that handles this stuff - House cleaning, Estate Sales, disposal of what's left, and fixup/cleanup to make it ready for sale.
Thus after winnowing out "the good stuff" and shredding the "private stuff" we are "hiring it done" and just literally putting it in the Lord's hands ...
yhs
prof marvel