re: First butcher block

If I were making a long grain cutting board I would not butt joint anywhere, but instead use long enough pieces to run straight through the length of the board. I also do not think your oil will saturate the long grain very deeply at all. It would for end grain of course. One advantage with long grain is that it is easy to plane fresh again after it gets a lot of knife cuts, which will in practice be pretty shallow. It is much more difficult to renew an end grain board as they tend to get a bit saturated with grease if you are cutting meat on it. chefs usually use coarse salt and lemon to clean those with. I have renewed some end grain boards for my son and it was quite a lot of work.