One of the things I had to get my head around (and I'm going to post this here in public for 2 reasons. 1, my wife makes MEAN rum and cokes and 2, it might be a little teency bit helpful to someone else) was whether I was going to head in the "pipes as art" direction, or just the "pipes" direction, and while both require some seriously tuned-in skills, pipes-as-art have never appealed to me, especially. I mean, I really dig Bo Nordh and TJ and all the crazy, intricate, wonderful stuff like that. The moreso because I now understand just how hard it is to get "right" (and getting it wrong is ... to be avoided). But I just smoke "pipes".
I could do a blowfish. And it would be an ugly piece of shit because it would be my first blowfish. I've advised the start-up carvers here to work on classic shapes because you can dial them in fairly fast and learn how to make a decent looking pipe. I got better faster doing that, and getting advice on those shapes. Advice which I now repeat ad nauseum.
So being told "that's not art, but it's sure a nice pipe" is the biggest compliment I could ever ask for. I'm a mid-grade pipe maker, which is more than I ever dreamed of being. But I still like Lucite and I still like rusticated pipes, so the high-grade Kool-aid hasn't quite got to me yet!
![Laughing :lol:](./images/smilies/icon_lol.gif)