Hardwood floors are part of an established home?s heritage. The look of the wood is what draws a guest in and what adds warmth even on the coldest of days. When you decide to install solid wood flooring in your home or office you are not only going for that old familiar aesthetic, but you are also acknowledging that wood flooring is extremely sensible. There is a treasured stability with hard wood flooring, something that immediately elevates the value of your property. With wood flooring you give a nod to the baroque.

In addition to looking beautiful and lush, wood floors are also unquestionably good for the environment. The flooring is, in a sense, insulation between your home and the elements. This insulation is said to be sixteen times as powerful as steel and four hundred fifteen times more productive than steel. Most solid wood flooring is made in America and therefore must adhere to the nation?s strict environmental codes and ordinances.

What grain of wood you select will determine the overall character of your floor. Nothing exudes dependability like oak solid wood flooring. Within each plank you see the life of the tree: the knots and burrs. Another benefit to choosing solid oak flooring is that it does not scratch easily. With proper care, the warmth of the color will last a very long time.

Engineered oak wood flooring is a less expensive option. You get the same look and character, but the installation is much easier. In most cases nails or screws are not necessary, all that you need is a foam underlay. Since most of the engineered oak wood flooring is made in China some may argue that the quality is lower.

While some of the heartiness of solid oak wood flooring may be lost, and the value of your home or business may not increase as much, the appearance is not sacrificed and most people rarely can detect the difference. The greatest difference is in the cost and the installation. A professional with elaborate and specialized tools must install solid oak wood flooring.

A benefit for choosing engineered oak wood flooring is that you have the option of putting in the floor yourself. With the do it yourself craze at full tilt many new and established homeowners are getting excited about improvement projects that can be accomplished within a weekend.

Most major chain home improvement centers not only offer a large variety of engineered oak wood flooring, but they are now offering workshops that will guide you through the step by step process. An added bonus to doing it yourself is that now under floor heating is becoming mainstream. In the same workshop where you learn about wood flooring you can learn about the under floor heat process and how energy efficient a row of heating coils can be.

Choosing to upgrade your home or business flooring is simple, and in most cases, affordable. Going with solid oak flooring or engineered oak wood flooring is up to your taste and your wallet.

Natalie Aranda writes on home improvement. Hardwood floors are part of an established home?s heritage. The look of the wood is what draws a guest in and what adds warmth even on the coldest of days. When you decide to install solid wood flooring in your home or office you are not only going for that old familiar aesthetic, but you are also acknowledging that wood flooring is extremely sensible. What grain of wood you select will determine the overall character of your floor. Nothing exudes dependability like oak solid wood flooring.

Its been a busy month. Too much to type so here is a quick video update. Topics include: Festool grand opening, visit to the offices of Popular Woodworking, The Woodwerks Store, our new DVD cover (designed by our friend Langly, the FesCool Giveaway, safety week, new project with Fine Woodworking, a Live WTO experiment, new coffee table project, the new Festool routers, and birthday wishes for Nicole.

The club, which was started a year and a half ago, has grown to over 20 members. 8 to 10 usually show up for our monthly meetings, where we do as many hands-on projects as possible.

Most of these women are brand new to woodworking?some are retired, with grown children?and all are enthusiastic to learn. The enthusiasm can be gauged in the sheer volume of exhuberant chatter that goes on during our meetings.

Regarding woodworking (and probably most things), all that women seem to need is a little encouragement & patience, and they will dive right in. Tonight, we worked on part 2 of our current project?cutting boards?in the Woodcraft Store shop where we meet. During the course of the 3-part project, they are learning how to use the jointer, planer, and miter saw. Next time, we'll have a router workshop, when we'll round over all the cutting boards and test drive different types of routers and bits.

We decide at each meeting, as a group, what the next topic will be. There are no dues, no officers, no business to attend to. We sit at a table, facing one another. All of the women have ownership. It's very different from what I call the "boys' club"?the other woodworking club to which I belong. Up until last year, I was the only female member.

In the boys' club, the guys seem to prefer hierarchy and structured meetings. We have officers, dues, and an annual business meeting. There are too many guys in that club (and too small a space) to do much hands-on stuff, so we mainly have a demo or lecture. Members sit in rows of chairs and face the presenter. The volume of these meetings is also different. Pretty quiet, except for the speaker, and the occasional wisecrack. The guys chat with one another prior to and after the meeting, but not so much during.

The other very important difference in the two clubs: the women's club usually has snacks. This past year in the boys' club, when the Christmas party was discussed, the guys opted to not have one. Conversely, the women all but leapt out of their seats with a resounding "YES!" when I asked if we wanted to have a club Christmas dinner.

And you wouldn't believe what they brought. Crab cakes, homemade lasagna, homemade meatballs (made by one woman's husband, which cracked us up), salads, and desserts like you'd find at Wegman's.

It's great fun to be an observer in both clubs. Despite their differences, there is one common thread between the two clubs: they both consist of people who want to create something?something useful, something artistic, something challenging. Something that will leave a lasting mark.

Part IV 

All right then! Here it was, around the beginning of April, and I had a plan for the new shop (more or less) in hand. It was time to go ahead with the construction... or so I had thought, anyway.

I got a contractor lined up to do the concrete. I had decided that work was simply too much for me to handle on my own, and that it would probably serve me better to have it done by somebody else. I didn't have the equipment, nor did I have the help (or the back) to put down the concrete by myself. I might have mentioned that North Idaho was undergoing an unprecedented building boom at the time. What that meant for me was a wait for the permit. Permits usually take just a couple weeks. Usually, this might not be an issue, but the concrete guy I had lined up had a very tight schedule. Well, it turned out I had a couple of issues that permitting wouldn't allow, mainly the bathroom I had discussed previously. With that, I took the plan home and removed it entirely from the design (which actually helped me out budget-wise), but as it would have it I couldn't take the time off of work to get back to the permit office for two week. When I did finally, it was two more weeks before I got the plan reviewed and approved. I called the concrete guy up, and turns out I was past his window of availability. I would have to find another.

That delay led to a two week long search for another concrete contractor. The only one I could find available was still three weeks out before he could start, but he didn't do excavating - though he knew someone who did. So, I contacted him, and he was three weeks out too. So - what I thought might be a two to three week period of getting the permit reviewed and groundbreaking turned out to be entirely too optimistic. By the time I got the excavator there it was the end of May, a full 5 weeks later than I'd hoped.

Being an architect, I'm familiar with the whole process so didn't let it get me down, and just chalking it up to the way things work. But - when this showed up out front of the house early one morning, I started getting a little excited:

It's not really the machine I would have chosen for the task, but as long as the hole got dug, I wasn't going to worry. I had considered doing it myself... had I done it; I would have rented a loader with a backhoe mounted on the back. A track-hoe (like above) tends to rip up the lawn too much when you turn on it... It's also a very small bucket - which can be a good thing, both for digging utility trenches and when you have a plan with a lot of little corners... But I don't have a great deal of experience in digging foundations, and what little I had done was over 20 years ago... I figured it best to leave it to someone who knew more. Besides, the cost of renting a backhoe for myself would have been 2/3rds of the price of paying someone else to do it, so I figured it was better hired out.

It was finally time to break ground. Here's where the shop was to go shown in the site plan again:

Here is a photo of the yard, talen looking north from the end of the patio:

The scarring you see in the center of the yard was from an old willow tree that had to come down a few years prior when a windstorm had knocked the main portion of it's trunk down. The scarring was from the year previously when I finally got the stump out of the ground using a skid-steer I had rented when putting in the pavers for the patio, which you can see in the lower left. Within an hour or two, the trench for the main footings were dug:

Finally, something was happening. I was still worried about the excavation, though - I thought it odd that he would only dig the trench and not strip the topsoil within the footprint of the building first. In the end, it turned out I didn't need to worry about it. The fellow was a young guy, for whom renting himself and his track-hoe out was his main method of income in the warmer months. While young, in the end it turned out he was hard working, honest, and truly concerned with doing a good job - and for not really all that much money, either. But I didn't know that yet at this point, so was concerned. Even though it was taken care of later and I was satisfied with his work, I do wish it had been done properly. But with the building environment the way it was, I was just happy to have somebody to do the job.

Up next, the foundation!

Kudus is a city in the Central Java, Indonesia, located among Jepara, Demak, Pati, and Purwodadi districts and in the route of Semarang the capital city of Central Java to Surabaya (please see location map). Based on story, Kudus name was from Al-Quds, which mean holy.

The history of Kudus cannot be separate from the name of Sunan Kudus as the founder and one of the Wali sanga (nine Wali) spreader of Islam in Java at that moment. As his inheritance, Kudus has a famous artefact called Menara of Kudus which form like a temple, placed in one complex with mosque of Menara Kudus that build by Sunan Kudus around 1685 M.

Except famous as a Wali city, since in Kudus area there is wellknown also Sunan Muria, Kudus also known for a long time as a kretek city (city of clove cigarette) as there are many entrepreneurs in the cigarette field. Beside that, Kudus can also called as city of industry because of the long development of industry in the area such as industries in cigarettes, papers, printings, handycrafts, embroideries, foods, etc.

Kali Gelis (Gelis river) which lying in the midlle of the city separates Kudus into two areas, one is Kudus Kulon (west Kudus), the other is Kudus Wetan (east Kudus). Long time ago, according to history, citizen of Kudus Kulon area were entrepreneurs, traders, farmers and moslem theologians, while occupant of the Kudus Wetan area were government officers, intellectuals, teachers, nobles and noble relatives.

Within the growth and development of Kudus, physically Kudus Kulon area, where the majority of the citizens were entrepreneurs and traders, were a steph forward in wealthy compare with the other area Kudus Wetan. With their financial increasing, they build the traditional wooden houses of Kudus full with carved that make it different with the previous traditional houses. That is why, the amazing traditional house, which lately called as the traditional house of Kudus used to only placed in the Kudus Kulon area. At the beginning, the traditional house of Kudus only belong to the Islamic Chinese traders, but furthermore were copied and developed by the native wealthy traders.

The traditional house of Kudus that mostly build before year 1810 M, ever reach the glorious time and become a symbol of prosperity for the owners. The Kudus Kulon area environment was formed with the particular existency of the traditional house of Kudus.

The developing history of Kudus has many influences from foreign cultures like Hindu, Chinese, Persia (Islam) and Europe, which also influence the architectural field in made the traditional house in Kudus. From the research, it can be concluded that there are several motifs colouring the carving style of the traditional house. One is Chinese motif, which form as the dragon carved, Persia or Islam motif that form as jasmine flowers or the particular motif of Kudus that form as lotus flower and colonial motif that form as ropes, crown, and animals. All motifs have correlation with the incoming cultures to Kudus.

The carving art of Kudus dominate by lotus flower as the meaning of Hindu religion. Sunan Kudus introduced a carving dominated by jasmine flowers that described united one to another. The meaning of jasmine was to describe that Islam religion at that time was a small community but it like jasmine, even small, could give fragrance to the sorrounding area. Jasmine made united in one to another to describe that everybody in neighborhood were live in peace even there were differences in the religion.

Within development in making the traditional house of Kudus, influence of the elements of cultures were very viscous gave the meaning of form and function of every part, hence could be separate as follows:

1. Traditional house as the tools to spread religion (dakwah) *)

In the daily life, Kudus citizen are majority obedient muslem. Life of religious service is the social relations that have formed in the many aspects, such as in the house to live which full with the describing of the rukun Islam (Islamic obligation).

In the room inside, there is a place or room called gedongan which formed as mihrab, a place where imam (leader of praying) lead the pray that connected with the symbolic meaning as a holy place and sacral. Gedongan also has significance meaning used as the place of heirloom treasury and the wealth of the owners. Gedongan used also as the main honorables bedroom and at the particular time used as special bedroom for the wedding couple of the childrens of the owners.

Also in the room inside there are four main pillars, which called saka guru that desribe four essence of ideal life. At the top of the fourth pillars, putted tumpang sari where the roof was lying on. The sum of tumpang sari are always odd and always have a meaning, sum of five describe the amount of praying five times a day. The sum of three describe life in soul world, transitory (this world) and the world hereafter.

Front room that called Jaga Satru is provided for parish and separates into two part, left side for women jamaah (followers of imam) and right side for men jamaah (followers). Still in the Jaga Satru room at the incoming front door, there is one wood pillar in the midlle of the room which called balance pillar or soko geder, which has meaning except as the symbol of ownership of the house, it also has a symbol for reminding the resident about the One God, the only One who have to be homaged.

House as the tools to spread religion is represent through Islamic value that formed in the carved style at the partition between front room and inside room called gebyok. The strengthen element of gebyok are two stalk pillars where at its top made a carved that formed as palm of the hand of muslem when doing praying at the position of takbiratulihram (when start to pray) that always at the same time say the words Allahu Akbar which mean Allah The Mighty.

Carving in the gebyok, even it is accumulation from many culture influences, but the visualitation adopted from Arabic calligraphy with Al Quran and Hadist theme. There are many other dakwah messages that formed in the building decoration and it always about aspects of way of life and life attitude of human in do their obligation in the earth for their salvage in heaven.

2. Traditional house as a masterpiece art*)

Traditional house of Kudus if notice deeply is more and more fabulous since its uniqueness and attractiveness in exterior and interior which full with ornamen that made by highest skill woodcarving artist. Foundation of the existancy of the traditional house of Kudus was full with taste and creation that fashioned in the beautiful forms without broken any religion values. Through the activity of art, there is possibility of adding the atmosphere of the deepest metaphysic reality.

Traditional house of Kudus, if seen from Bernard Rudofsky theory, is include in the communal architect that priorities in the art element which done continuosly and spontaneously balanced by whole community with the same tradition from time to time following the ritual habit inside the communal. Art is not just copy and physical implementation of the external form, it also as the spiritual elements that achieve esthetic form. The creation becomes what it called architectural without architect.

The construction of the wooden house made completely knock down that make it easir to release and assemble hence there is possibility also to make part by part of the ornamen fully detail and accurate. The decoration was inspired by the success of temple relief and the development process was instructed by Chinese woodcarver from Sun Ging area. The owners were the wealthy entrepreneurs and traders. The carved decoration were build on the whole component intentionally without gave any empty space left and the results was very optimum, full of meaning, symbolic and the style were correlation among Java, Gujarat, Persia, China and colonial (Europe) style.

Wali Songo influence in the formed of decoration was very dominant even in Islam religion there is a forbidden in the formed of living thing, but they gave the chance of a huge tolerate formed as acculturation and assimilation on the evolutif way thus create a wonderful figurative consequence of imagination from the living thing forms. Art appreciation from the Wali Songo that full with tolerate also accomplished by khalifah in the Arab since Abbasiyah era. Palace of Harun Al Rasyid in Baghdad, palace of Al Mutasin in Samara, Cordoba mosque in Spain, also decorated by fresco formed lion, eagle, horses, and the other creatures. Drawing arts applicated in carpets, ceramics, wall and doors achieved the highest level to become the world admire.

Art ornamentation looks unite with the main building, since the creators were very concern with details, function, structure, ritual, symbol and esthetic that decoratively increase the attractiveness for whoever want to see it. The particular local habitual in the way of life through the architectural behaviour is the description of personification of the Kudus traditional house that make it different in form and style with the other joglo building in Java commonly, except in the form of the roof and soko guru as the support of the tumpang sari.

3. Traditional house as the Class symbol *)

The beautiful traditional houses of Kudus have average age for more than 100 (hundred) through 200 (two hundred). Due to the age of the building, if someone wants to analyze it, they have to use the examination within that era.

According to Prof. Berger, the structure of the Java community at the 19th and 20th century can be divided into several class such as; nobles, government officers, traders and farmers. Colonial politics at that time placed politic emancipation that have aim to liberate individual from old social band which consider shackles the freedom and law enforcement that hold mostly in the feodalism band. Development of individual in the community was appointed to the forming of personality, spirit effort in order to developing the prosperity soon.

In the other words, Kudus citizen that categories as pesisiran (near the beaches) citizen, their wealthy level mostly higher compare with the nobles and the officers at that moment. But in the daily life they did not get any self-respect and honor by the community. They way of living as a trader was qualified as second class and dishonor, hence as the compensation citizen of Kudus Kulon, that the majority were traders, formed the appearance of their house very glorious with the expectation that their too have the rights to get honor same with the nobles. The level of their house made in high five stairs to suit with the social strata like what it done by noble community. Guess from the farmers were accepted in the front room, for the officers community accept in the midlle room while for Bupati (distric chief) and Netherlands people were accepted in gedongan room. Surrounding the house was made high wall same as the form of palace.

Traditional houses that at the beginning owned by traders of Chinese moslem were copied and developed with the Javanese and Islamic values. All over the house were full of carved with ornament from many styles like in the palace of kings in Java, done by high skilled woodcarvers with very fascinating result. Accordingly, it worth to gets the confession of honor like government officers and nobles. For them, house were a symbol of status or stage that worth to get honor and equality.

(Source :* J Pamudji Suptandar, Great Lecture of Rupa art and Design Faculty of Trisakti University/Adopted in English by Deva's father)

The fascinating wooden carved at the traditional house of Kudus must be come from the very skilled woodcarvers. Then, from where the woodcarvers came from?

The carving style of the wooden traditional house of Kudus was quite distinct from the other famous carving centre in Java, Jepara. Historically, Kudus was a carving centre long before it developed as a skill in Jepara. Carving was introduced to Kudus when an emigrant from the famous carving city of Yunan - China, The Ling Sing, arrived in the 15th century. He came to Kudus not only to spread Islamic teachings but also to devote his skills to the art of woodcarving, and his style, Sung Ging, was famous for its smooth and wonderful woodcarving masterpieces.

The Ling Sing was wellknown as mubaligh (spreader of Islam) called Kiai telingsing. The name of Kiai Telingsing until now use as a name of a street in Kudus city. There is a kampong or village surrounding the street called Sunggingan that predicted came from the Sun Ging name. The area, at the past, was belief as the resident of the woodcarvers and carpenters from the devotion of Kiai Telingsing skills.

From the 16th to the 18th century, woodcarvers in Kudus received many orders to construct wooden houses. The main material - highest quality teak - was supplied from Blora's, Tuban's and Bojonegoro's forest. From the 19th century, however, high quality teak became scarcer and scarcer and this, in turn, discouraged the woodcarvers of Kudus to develop their skills.

The carving skills also belong to Jepara's people and has been very famous until now. There is an opinion, which said that wooden carved art in Kudus also done by woodcarvers from Jepara, eventhough in the reality it different in the carving models, especially in the mission and filosophy.

According the history, Mantingan mosque in Jepara has wall that made from carved white stone with the flower motifs that was masterwork of a Chinese called Tji Wie Gwan who brought by Raden toyib to Jepara after come back from his Islamic study in Campa for five years. Raden Toyib then married with Ratu (queen) Kalinyamat, the very famous Jepara's queen at that time.

For his achievement in build Mantingan mosque at the year of 1559, Queen Kalinyamat and her husband gave a new name for Tji Wie Gwan to become Sungging Badar Duwung, Sungging means carving expert, Badar same with stone and Duwung means tatah (tool for carv).

This Sungging Badar Duwung who then recognized as the root source of the Jepara's carving art which consecutively knowing in all over Indonesia and the world. According to history, he was too takes a part in the erection of mosque in Loram (a name of area in Kudus) and mosque of Menara Kudus.

Sungging Badar Duwung then devoted his skill to the surrounding community in Jepara as well as in Kudus and presented high skilled carvers that from time to time growth in numbers. This skill direct and indirect was useful in the process of developing the traditional house of Kudus.

The certainty of mentioned things were still need to be investigated furthermore. But for sure, the traditional house of Kudus has build and become one of the Kudus markers with its fabulous woodcarving.

 

Welcome to The Wood Shop? This entry was posted on 9/21/2006 3:11 PM and is filed under Welcome. Picture Saloondoors2 Courtesy of Warsaw WoodWorks Welcome to The Wood Shop !  Let me first start by Introducing myself to you and let you know what we're all about . My name is Dan Rose . I am the head broom and dust-pan guy around here , so let's help keep it clean. I'd like to discuss Mesquite HardWood and other things wood as well.  Some basic rules : Feel free to post here and visit often. A reminder this is a public forum , your postings here are NOT a private matter. Please no foul language , no links to pornography ,  no extreme political , race , or religious views need to be posted here. Difference of opinion or approaches to a problem are OK , but personal attacks and name calling will not be tollerated. Please let this be a retreat from those things and a place to come and discuss the beauty and warmth that is offered by our common passion , wood. I'll be writing some articles that cover basic properties of Mesquite , Industry News and specific things we are doing here at Arizona Desert Mesquite to improve our service and support of the Mesquite HardWood market in the USA. We'll showcase some of our dealers and end use customers and their pictures and experiences they have had with Mesquite. Most of all I hope this can become a place to learn new things , to share information and knowledge . Everyone that will be featured here can teach us all with something new and exciting to be shared with others . Again as a reminder , this is a public forum. ADM does not take responsibility for content here posted by others. As time permits , I WILL edit any comments that in MY opinion do not meet our standards. So pull up a Log and Set a spell. The Root Beer is cold and there's a gentle breeze a blowin' from the SouthWest. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 2/2/'07 - Check out the New photos Submitted by Murdock Floors on the HardWood Flooring Page ... Awesome ! Reminder : to see full page content click on  the    MORE>> marker wayyyy over to the right under the opening page.

 

 

WESTERN EARTH KNIVES

Unique handcrafted hunting knives custom tailored for you at WEK.

Photos Courtesy of Western Earth Knives                                            "The dagger"

Custom Handmade knives and sheaths, made to order, using materials of the earth: bone, antler, horn, brass, leather, exotic woods of the West, and only high quality high-carbon steel blades. Western Earth Knives are made using designs derived from the qualities of the earth and her creatures by Douglas Gilbert.

 

Douglas has been a painter and sculptor for 40 years. It is only recently in his life that he has come to specialize in knife making, continuing to exercise his love for the powerful qualities and images of the earth. He spent much of his youth in the woods, and whittling wood was one of his early interests. A temporary illness brought him to abandon the 9-to-5 work-world and to devote himself full time to his craft. He has two grown children, a loving psychologist wife, and lives in southwestern Washington state. For additional information or to talk directly with Douglas ...

 

Contact:

                           Douglas Gilbert, MFA, Artist/Knife maker

                            earthknives@hotmail.com
                             360-501-6939

Matt Vanderlist has just posted a podcast of a conversation he and I had last week. I hesitate to call it an interview because it sounds a lot like us just goofing around and joking about woodworking.

So I guess, it actually just sounds a lot like a day at the office.

In any case, we discuss handsawing, premium tools and how we generate story ideas here at Woodworking Magazine and Popular Woodworking. Plus Matt and I brainstorm an idea for a shop garment that ensures you never have to take a break while woodworking – and it composts the yard. (If anyone has a good name for this product, post it here.)

It was a fun conversation and if you have some time at your desk and want to look like you're working… I highly recommend it.

— Christopher Schwarz

Yesterday I faced my greatest challenge as a woodworker.

I wasn't even in my shop when I realized I was in this spot of bother. I was at my desk at work.

It was the space bar that got me.

As my right thumb hit the space bar the electrical grid of my body communicated that something was rotten in the state of Thumbsville. Yep....little splinter in my big right thumb.

I don't think I visited the shop yesterday morning so somehow a sliver of cherry had spent the night with me, living just under the surface of my thumb.

Normally, Gail is my splinter removal girl. However, less than 24 hours before this she had flown to San Francisco to visit her baby sister. It is interesting, because in our 12 years together this is the first time we have been apart for any reason other than my business travel. In other words, although we’ve spent weeks apart with my travels to Viet Nam, China, Hong Kong, Germany, Spain, Belgium, France, The Netherlands, Canada, and all over the States….July of 2008 will mark the first time I’ve spent a night alone in my own house. Of course I have Peyton.

So, staring at the splinter yesterday, and realizing Gail is gone, I considered options. Gail's middle sister is a nurse with keen eyesight, but she was leaving for San Francisco that very day to join up with her two sisters. Calling her was not an option.

I thought of calling on one of my friends in the office. Except I've been married so long I think I forgot how to "hook up" with a new woman....even for splinter removal. Am I supposed to take in the results of my most recent blood test. Even then, how does the conversation begin? "Excuse me , Gladys, I know you successfully raised children, so I know you've done this before...would you mind going after some wood I have here for you????" (Wow...that would have landed me in HR... PDQ.)

So I decided I was own my own. Naturally, the situation followed the Right Hand Rule. I remember learning about this in Calculus. It means if you are right handed, you will always have to do one handed tasks with the left hand, and vice versa. My tool of choice was a thumbtack/pushpin. As I took that pushpin between my left thumb and forefinger I thought of an interesting paradox:

I'd give my left arm to be ambidextrous....

Like General Eisenhower who signaled the go ahead for Operation Overlord, fully realizing that this necessary step would still require the death and destruction of many Allied forces, I plunged the pushpin into my own Omaha Beach...my right thumb. I dug, I pried, I levered, I cried. The tears served as little magnifying glasses that easily improved my vision ten fold.

At times I pushed it deeper. At one point the delivery turned breech. Still, through the agonizing pain, I continued the pushpin torture. Suddenly, like a prairie dog in the desert or a Whack-a-Mole at Chuck E Cheese....a tiny portion of the splinter popped up. Because I am a committed nail biter, I didn't have the option of pulling it out with finger nails. My choice was to scrape and pray.

I scraped the pushpin against the side of the splinter fully expecting to see it shear off like a whisker in the graphics from a Gillette commercial. Yet, to my great joy, it did indeed pull the splinter fully out of my body.

I looked at that splinter laying on my desk in its own little biohazard containment area. And I was left wondering, "How do single guys deal with splinters?" Then the flood of memories came into my head of the woodworking adventures Gail has shared with me. They all came back...the wound scrubbing...the bandaging...the drives to the Emergency Room... scrubbing the shop floor with bleach...Gail has been an integral part of my woodworking.

So until she returns I am left with the dilemma...

Time in the shop is the perfect way to pass the time while I am alone. Yet being alone subjects my tender body to injuries that may require the assistance of trained professionals.

Finally, the solution came to me.

The Life Alert system (I've fallen and I can't get up) is on its way and will arrive tomorrow. Soon I will be able to maintain my shop independence and can stave off the attempts of those who believe I should move my work to a Group Shop.

Thank you, Life Alert.

For the first time in my life I truly felt like a father this week.

As you know, Gail is gone for at least a couple weeks to San Francisco, so I am alone with Peyton.

Although my office is 60 miles from home (thank God for our Diesel Jetta....), Gail only works 1 mile from home. So even though Peyton spends the day in "his room" (please don't let him know the truth that it is a kennel/crate) Gail comes home for lunch and lets him out.

Well, with me 60 miles from home during the day, Gail's absence would require The Boy to spend 11 hours in "his room." So when Gail flew out Tuesday afternoon, I found a Doggy Day Care in Grand Haven (about half way between our house and my office). On Wednesday morning, Peyton wondered what was up when I didn't beg him to go to his room so I could go off to spend time busting my hump for The Man. Instead, I put his leash on like he was going for a walk.

After all of the associated Leash Dancing was done, Peyton settled down and got in the car. We drove to Grand Haven and I took him into Paw Pro (the doggie day care experts). As I got ready to say Good Bye, the dad thing kicked in. I bent down and rubbed his ears and kissed him on his forehead. I told him to have fun. I told him I would see later that tonight. I reminded him that we were one winning lottery ticket away from spending all our Summer days swimming in Lake Michigan. Then, they led him off for a day of romping, playing, chasing, chewing, etc.

As he strolled down the hallway, he didn't look back. That's when I felt like a dad. I knew he was too excited to be thinking of me, and I knew I was going to have a worse day than him.

Another week in the wonderful Isles of Scilly.

Theresa will be manning office, Monday, Wednesday and Friday afternoons, approximately 2.45 - 3-45.

Short ...

Everybody does it at some time or another….the eternal voicemail.

You know the ones I mean. The attaboy from the Vice President, Your mom telling you that your dad’s surgery went ok, the one where your wife’s excited giddiness comes through the phone like she's screaming in a bullhorn as she tells you that she successfully negotiated Indianapolis traffic to arrive at the Mass Avenue Knit shop. (It was a solo field trip for her while I was in Joinery 2 at Marc Adams School of Woodworking back in 2007). FYI…I don’t think Gail even knew that I have kept that one.

My oldest saved voicemail is actually woodworking related. It’s from Bill W. at Penn State Industries, and it is from December of 2006. Now I would have to believe that Bill would never in his wildest dreams believe that some guy in Michigan still has his voicemail from Tuesday, December 19^th 2006 saved on his cell phone, but I do. I probably haven’t listened to the whole message more than once or twice. However, every three weeks I get queried to erase it, and I spend about 2 seconds listening to Bill tell me that “they are upgrading me to a better dust can� before I hit the 9 button that saves that message for another 3 weeks.

I was redoing the dust collection in my shop over the Christmas holiday in 2006, and the fine folks at Penn State scrambled to get my cyclone system out to me in time for me to install it during my time away from the office.

It was nice that they upgraded me to a “better can� in order to keep my plan on schedule, but the reason I save that message is because installing that new cyclone was the last thing I worked on with my dog, Simon. Somewhere in the confused, cobweb filled part of the brain there is this belief that as long as that message stays on my phone, Simon and I are still together working on that cyclone.

I never would have imagined while stepping over Simon that day as I ran 6 inch pipe along the basement ceiling that his healthy 6 years of life were near an end. I suppose I was naïve. Simon died 4 weeks after Bill W. left that message.

I’m not quite as naïve as I was back then. That message is my ongoing reminder that life happens.

I’ve been thinking about nomenclature. I’ve been thinking about what I call the area where I do my woodworking thing (or at least where all of the tools and equipment live when I am busy surfing the internet or playing Wii Fit and complaining about having no time to do any woodworking.)

Some people call those tool filled places their “SHOP.� However, that seems a little too generic for me because I have more than one shop in my life. All of the car stuff happens in my garage, but it is more of a combination garage/bicycle shop. I’ve said before that somewhere in between my Park Double Arm repair stand and Park TS-3 Master Truing Stand are enough tools to make 90% of the bicycle shops in North America jealous. Do you need to re-tap a bottom bracket? All decent shops can do either English or Italian Threads. However, for some reason I also have a tap for French Threaded bottom brackets, even though I neither work on bikes professionally nor have any French Bicycles. (I never know why I buy every tool I see, whether I’ll ever need it or not).

The non-bicycle part of the garage is pretty well set up for anything I need to do with cars. In the last ten years I have done engine swaps, clutch replacements, Air Locker installations, countless tune-ups, 30 or so brake jobs, 100 oil changes, water pump and radiator replacements, Axle replacements, ring and pinion set-ups, and on and on and on.

Before my wife and I moved to this house, most of the automotive stuff was done at my father-in-law’s shop. Long before I met him he ran a 2000 sq ft body shop behind his house, but he retired and closed his body shop before I ever came on the scene. So in the early days of my marriage, I would commandeer his shop for various automotive projects.

So now to differentiate between his shop, my bike shop, my garage shop, and the area of my plantation where I do welding and metal work, I always refer to my basement area as my WOOD SHOP. I say to Gail, “I’ll be downstairs in the Wood Shop. If the lazy dog should wake up, feel free to convince him to come keep me company.�

I am very happy with the Wood Shop in my basement. However, I will inevitably have to rename that space. Eventually my work will be good enough for me to call my wood shop a “Studio.� It’s a subtle little thing, but it is the key to being a wood artist. Adirondack Chairs are made in Wood Shops by woodworkers. Commissioned furniture projects are done in studios by two types of guys. To the uninitiated, woodshops and studios look a heck of a lot alike. They have identical equipment and tools. The difference between woodshops and studios is the guy doing the work and the deposit slips for his bank account. Today I came up with the official list of criteria required for a woodshop to be called a studio, and here it is:

1) If the woodworker went to art school then it is acceptable to call it a studio. Art School guys are different. A couple of years ago I was a Mechanical Engineer who worked with a bunch of Industrial Designers designing Office Furniture. It was my job to make sure the roll-formed steel and the drawer slides could support the required loads. It was the responsibility of the Industrial Designers to make sure the theme of the company was represented with a passionate design that made one think, “If I have to spend 10 hours a day in a cubicle, this is the work space I want.� Those left handed, beret-wearing guys were studio types.

2) If you are a woodworker who has ever made $1000 profit on a piece then you can call your woodshop a studio. The keyword here is profit. It’s more than selling cherry cabinets for $2000 when you have more than half of that total tied up in materials, overhead, labor, and burden. Woodshops produce items that either generate no income or can sometimes sell for as much as one half of the price of the lumber they use. However, studios are the setting where profitable wooden art projects are created.

Someday my basement woodshop will become my Studio. I am not able to go to art school, so criterion 1 will not happen. However, I have a plan for creating a 4 digit profit on a piece of furniture or a similar woodworking project. I’ll share that plan with you now.

Someday I am going to resaw a walnut plank and find that the bookmatched inner faces form a distinctive picture of Jesus. Then, I will put the resawn slabs on eBay, and send out a press release. Within 24 hours of FoxNews and Headline News doing bits on Jesus in the Walnut, my auction will have bids over $5000. And when the auction ends and the buyer’s PayPal clears, my basement woodshop with the resawing 18� bandsaw will forever be referred to as “My Studio.�

And I’ll get to show pictures to people and say things like, “here is a picture of my Studio. The Unisaw is in the middle, and on the left is my hand crafted maple workbench. If you look closely in the corner you can see my bandsaw where I created my most famous pieces, Jesus in the Walnut, as I was resawing stock one day…�