Good post....
I might add that a light smear of white toothpaste (not green or blue gel)
on a barber hone works nicely.
A very light touch of very fine carborundum powder on
an Arkansas can wake an Arkie up. The only place
I ever found to get the "fine enough" stuff was from
a telescope grinding kit and is hard to find in small
quantities today (I ground my mirror in the early '60s
and the extra lasted a long time).