So many tedious recommendations when the answer is obviously heaven’s vault.

It’s dogshit in almost every way. Even moving around the world feels like pouring salt into your eyes. I hate almost every single thing, the protagonist, the pace, the awful vehicle sections to travel. But it’s something you should play, or perhaps experience.

It’s an archeological translation game and there are multiple moments of “Ok so maybe that actually means font of life not mother goddess, but that would mean this means artificial god which would mean that the extinction event was actually transcendence and holy shit…”

There is no magic to it. You can sharpen a knife with a brick if you’re careful.

The result and rate are determined by a few things:

• Harder, more jagged grits will cut the steel of the knife away faster
• The final edge can’t be (much) smoother than the grit used on it last.

It’s just like sanding wood or filing your nails. Usually we start course because it would take ages to wear in the approximate shape using finer materials, then we go progressively finer to smooth out the scratches left by the step prior.

Finer media is typically more expensive too, as fine stuff contaminating course stuff isn’t a huge issue but the opposite isn’t true. So we want to not blow our budget wearing away all nice stones.

Personally I would not try removing chips with anything finer than 1k, and depending on the size and the hardness of the steel might drop to 300 or so. you can, but it will take hours instead of minutes.

Not a command but bang expansions. For example !? is the args of last command useful for stuff like mkdir foo ; cd !?

https://www.redhat.com/sysadmin/bash-bang-commands learn these. you suck at using your computer if you don’t know them.

you usually work up grits. In general for edges that should end shaving sharp (e.g. kitchen, whirling) below 1k is rough work, profiling work, 1k or so is basic small chip repair etc, 3k is standard sharpen, and higher is polishing wank. You get what you pay for in general: cheap stones need soaking, the wear out fast (needing truing). Shapton makes some great splash and go stones.

However, there is one cheap 2 sided diamond stone that is actually quality. The sharpal one. Be aware diamond cuts extremely fast (good and bad), it doesn’t need truing or soaking. I recommend if you’re getting one stone get that. Learn proper bur minimisation technique and that’ll cover chip repair and get your knives sharp enough to cut seethrough sheets of tomato.

If you feel fancy add 1 micron stropping compound and a sheet of balsa wood to strop on.

I’m not them but tying loads/things down during fierce winds, temp gardening structures, carrying stuff (weaving nets is useful knowledge), lifting stuff/holding suspended.

Idk even stuff like if crossing a stream it’s handy to have one person go first and make a temp hand rail by hanging a rope across so people slip less.

Sharpening stones.

you need an edge so many times in your life. When you’re using scissors, slicing veggies, pruning trees, harvesting mushrooms, posting online, mowing grass, carving wood, cutting roots, trimming nails, scraping stoves/ovens, shaving, digging, trimming, pealing whatever.

There are so many dumb fancy arse awful tools that butcher edges and work in one specific case. No! For millenia people have been grinding edges, it is not difficult to learn it just takes practice.

Modern manufacturing means we can enjoy extremely consistent stones in well characterised grades. Go use some, and enjoy how much less effort life requires when everything that cuts, cuts easily.

100% read it. I think most things aren’t “must reads” even my favourite stories, but some have such unique ideas or skillful execution that if you enjoy literature you owe it to yourself to read them.

There’s obviously a very large list, I suggested some I didn’t think would be represented here. The dispossessed is a short read and uncomplex in its construction and pros so it’s easy to squeeze in a chapter here and there or before bed.

Idk if you will agree it’s a must read, that’s obviously quite subjective, but I highly doubt you’ll find the time you spent with it unsatisfying.

Ursula Le Guin’s the dispossessed is pretty impactfull. Very confronting anarchist utopia that is not a Paradise.

The lions of al rassan by guy gavriel Kay (worked on the silmarillion). A deeply melencholic fictional reflection on the reconquista of the Iberian peninsula.

The liveship traders by Robin Hobb has the best realised characters in fiction I’ve ever seen. Jaw dropping craft.

And finally, an entire shelf of book: The malazan book of the fallen. you will laugh, you will cry, and in the end you will love compassion.