Beast Across America

On Being Discovered

2011-03-16T09:38:00.005-04:00

For the most part, we all want to leave a mark. We want an indelible impression on the world that tells all we were here. There would be no graffiti without this urge. No monuments, no bronze plaques on buildings, no children for that matter. We want our face out there in whatever small way and there is no denying it, it feels pretty good. We get a kick out of being recognized, wanted, sought after. Which brings me to the purpose of this post; how I got discovered.

I was sitting in a diner in LA one day when a nice woman came in and offered to buy me a cup of coffee and a piece of pie. No wait that was someone else.

Reset: I started doing this turning thing with my friend Jim in his Alaskan shop before it became jammed with stuff. You know what you have done, Wright, so just suck it up. We were just using firewood on a Shopsmith 5-in-1 tool with old gouges and chisels, and since I had never done this before, I was making a lot of sawdust but nothing useful. Flash forward through Arizona and my own Shopsmith in my brother's garage, New York and a mini-lathe in my other brother's basement, back through Alaska and the first real sales of stuff.

Yep the selling started in Alaska at the Wasilla farmer's market. There we were set up right between the Mexican food stand and the coffee tent. I guess tamale and Mocha-Frappa-lappas are farmed in Alaska but, you try and find green beans, not happening. We were jammed onto two tables under a $29.99 tent for all the world to see. And then the tour bus came. Most people went right past to the embroidered hat lady or the reclaimed wood things guy but we met a nice couple from South Carolina who asked questions about the native Alaskan Birch and where and how the pieces were made and Boom -- first sale of the day with shipping to their home in the mix. Some $400-$600 later we were high fiving and stuffing what was left back into Jim's truck. What was more amazing were the follow-on sales. Jim took boxes of the stuff to a contracting firm in Wasilla where he hosted a bowl party for all the engineers and support staff in the office. Hey it was another couple hundred. And after that, making spoons and honey dippers for a local potter and dropping a couple other bowls off to other folks, the snow came and I was on my way south.

Fast forward to the Mesa Arts and Craft Festivals. An every Saturday event that cost all of $15, had little requirements for presentation and was in the middle of town so there was a bit of a crowd. Remember now this is trip two to Arizona and before I actually started working so it is self-sustaining hobby and some pocket cash. And I did OK there. I averaged about $50 - $100 per week, mostly in bottle stoppers and a small bowl or two but no real doe. Then I got a job, thought about attending ASU for design, and joined some artist guild but, kept my Saturdays open for the MACFEST event. There is a certain loyalty you feel to your first regular gig. I became the poster boy. I was on the pamphlet. I was the weekly constant that broke up the line of "Bead ladies". Oh you know them, the women with glass beads, that sit there stringing their "art" right there in front of you. Funny thing is, in Arizona they make a killing. OK, enough on Bead ladies, though I could right an entire post on that.

So fast forwarding again to Western New York (WNY). Yep I made it home again. Set up shop in my last of other brother's driveways where I parked my RV and started turning his driveway all sorts of colors. Looking for yet another outlet for my work, I started putting in applications to the local art festivals and schleping my lathe, work, shelves, a tent and business license to one craft show per month. Funny thing is, after totaling all the fees against the actual sales, I never made more than exactly $270. And it ain't easy carrying all that crap around.

During my time in NY I had the pleasure of catching up with some old friends, former classmates, people I have not seen for 30 some years. One of whom was my friend Brenda. Now being the show-off that I am I tried to get all the people I knew to come to the shows in WNY and see my work and hang out and just get to know each other again. There is that legacy thing again. So Brenda comes to the Elmwood Avenue Arts Festival, with her husband and her sister and brother-in-law. I am thrilled to see her, meet the hubby and just do some catching up, while showing off my work and laughing about stuff, 'cause you cannot be around Brenda and not laugh. All the while I see the wheels turning in her head about my stuff, presentation, marketing and getting me noticed. There it is again.

Fast forward again to moving to Virginia, living with my long-time friend Susan and setting up in her driveway for the winter. Hey, she invited me. Keeping in touch with Brenda, she tells me about this site the Foundary. OK, she did it via Facebook so she could get a $10 coupon (admit it, you did) and later about a thing called a designer search contest. Well I figure it's a shot in the dark but what the heck. I take some photos, do some editing of other photos I have, do a little write-up about my work and fire it off.

Weeks go by and finally I get this email from the Foundary telling me I made the final three in their designer search contest. Ha! There it is! A glimmer, a flash of color, a fluke. So off I go to fill in the gaps on the phase II of the search contest. Bio, inspiration for my craft essay, finished product essay, why is my stuff unique essay and a video. If it weren't for Susan none of this would have gotten done! She shot the video, edited my bio and other essays, and staged stuff for photos. And away it goes to the Foundary.

Through fate, destiny, chance or what have you I blow out a knee at work. It's sprained, and I am now on the couch with the 14th century torture device strapped to my leg "the immobilizer" and lots of time on my hands to surf the web. Having not heard from the Foundary for some time Susan asks "What have you heard from the Foundary?" Nuthin. But I will search the web to see if there is any movement on the designer search contest. Now don't get bored with the details, this is all important if not riveting stuff. Stay with me. There I was, featured in the designer search contest. In the top three, vying for your votes. And I had not a clue that it had even started the day before she asked. So I start the Facebook Campaign. Prompting for votes, bugging the friends, still pasted to the couch so I got lots of time for this, working the internet room as you would, acting like a real rush chairman.

A week -- a whole week -- of this stuff being on the web. I have all that time to poke and prod and basically annoy the heck out of all my friends and family. And it worked. Thanks to your support I shot to the top of the list taking 2/3 of the votes in the last 48 hours of the contest. (Insert trumpet blast here!) Fame, Fortune, Money for Nuthin, Chicks for Free!

Well as it stands, a whole lot went into this legacy thing.
Recapping:
- Jim introducing me to turning
- People actually buying my stuff
- My brothers letting me use their driveways
- Brenda pointing out the Foundary contest
- Susan doing her level best to teach me how to market myself and my stuff (although she still has a lot of work to do in that aspect)
- Everyone voting for me
- More people buying my stuff

I guess the legacy thing has been achieved. Time to go and sit back and enjoy the fame. And hope there are no returns (of products).

And what is wrong with my maple platter anyway? I just cannot get rid of that thing.
Thanks everyone.

The Modern American Workforce

2011-01-14T07:08:00.003-05:00

The world of work has changed in 34 years of punching a clock. I have been fortunate enough to have never gone more than 3 months without a job. Hell even while on vacation in Alaska I worked for a month in a fishing lodge. I have not had to collect unemployment but once while in my 20's and though I have not always been paid what I was worth in regard to productivity per hour or sometimes not paid at all by certain ne'er do wells, I think it has pretty much balanced out.

There is no consistent theme in the jobs over the years. There was the family business in my youth, working in the shop sweeping up, moving large objects, basically being an unskilled laborer. Then the nursing home where I learned the fundamentals of institutional cooking. I have recapped tires, picked potatoes, cleaned bars, bounced in bars, butchered fish, sold suntan lotion on a nude beach, tended bar, hung drywall, fixed seed display racks, run kitchens, sold hot dogs on the street from a cart with a grill on it, been a professional photographer, oh yeah and there was all that time in the Navy, cooked in a fishing camp, made cabinets, made furniture, made bowls, pens and other objects, sold good equipment in a woodworking store, repaired and refurbished furniture, worked in a Railroad Museum, restored the floors in said same museum while writing a proposal to have $60K more work to be done to the remainder of the museum, sold good woodworking equipment again, made cabinets again and now finally working retail for a large chain. I did not mention a few because they only lasted a day or two for frustration reasons of my own. Like fast food, I hated fast food work. Blah!

With the exception of the family business which seemed more like punishment than work, I have been like the Steve Austin of the work force in all the jobs. Yep you got it, Better, Faster, Stronger. At least that is what I have been told by supervisors and owners alike. And those Navy evaluations! Man I should have been king of the world for what was written about me! (Disclaimer: ok over inflated evaluations in the Navy made the higher ups look good but hey they helped the ego too.)

So where am I going wrong? Why can't I fit in? Why am I not in charge of it all? Because it is the tenet of the American workforce to encourage mediocrity. To feel their personal worth is greater than the job requirement and stick it to the MAN by being less than productive. Now don't go getting all fired up about this and throwing it back in my face. You know that you an outstanding person in your field have suffered the slings and arrows of the underachiever pummeling you to slow the pace, stop making the "rest of us" look bad.

And where has this gotten us as a work force? Why is an American made product so damned expensive over a Chinese made product? Why do we not flood the world market with inexpensive yet well made items that we just can't leave X,Y, or Z-Mart without? Because we have created a less than stellar work force filled with self-important boneheads that do not see the value of an honest day's work for an honest day's pay. Look outside folks, don't see any smoke from the stacks of the steel mills anymore? They did not get cleaner, they went away.
Don't see the bright and shiny face of a kid wiping down your windshield anymore as another pumps your gas and another checks your oil? You get lip or just a sneer from the kids and adults behind the McCounter or can't understand the person in the McDrive through? And how about that house you live in. Is it within code sure, but was it built well and finished in a fashion that makes you bring in the friends to show them how wonderful the joinery is? Well how do you think we got here?

Not by busting out humps, we leave that to the foreigners who we complain about as we hire another one to mow the lawn or weed the gardens, or hang our drywall. Not by having pride in our workmanship, nope industry took some of that away by creating unrealistic goals for production at the top, and innovative ways around that in the middle and more creative ways to fudge it (ie defective products) at the bottom. So why did no one ever stand there and say "Um this is just not right." Well they probably did. Another worker labeled "company man" or "Over Achiever" or any number of derogatory terms by his fellow workers could very well have stepped forward and said just those things but was drown out by the masses of under achievers and self proclaimed worthy individuals. So what happens to the over achiever, the company man, the self-starter, they either get sucked into the same trap as the others or they quit and leave.

In my current employ, and we shall keep this employer nameless, I am surrounded by a number of people who need this job but are not willing to work to keep this job. They waddle around complaining about how things have changed and it made their job harder but when given the opportunity to participate in that change, chose to stand in the corner and wring their hands while avoiding the whole work thing. No participation just a lot of complaining. When asked to produce something that is slightly outside the scope of their job description they purposely screw it up so they won't be asked to do that again. Meanwhile destroying a $350 item in the process. And why were they not fired. Well for the same reason they were not fired for stealing a commission, or for treating a potential customer like crap, or for being generally insulting of the other personnel around them. Because we accept it as a personality flaw or a quirk and not as a potential loss of revenue. Wake UP!

But wait there is more! Next we have the underachiever's apprentice. A person in their mid twenties who is known to complain about not getting any hours, who is known for talking people out of sales because they just can't figure out when to shut up, a person who is pursuing a career in another field and just needs a part time job while attending college. This person, whose latest statement in the presence of others was the amazing "I am only working a 4 hour shift and I intend to spend it on my ass doing nothing." Along with the rebuttal to advice about how to get more hours was "I am getting sick of new people trying to tell me how to get ahead in this job." which they have had for a year or better. OK maybe I stepped over the line offering advice based on a direct quote from the manager who writes our schedule and rewards hard work with more hours. Nah!

And when one starts at a company with disgruntled employees is it not just predictable that previously mentioned employees are the most vocal, the ones you encounter the most, the ones who have influenced the most people they encounter and unfortunately those who are put in charge of training the new folks. What are we thinking? Longevity through mediocrity and known frustration are not the keys to successfully prepare a new person for the job. As a matter of fact it should have sent me screaming from the premises. Well it was Christmas rush time, it was just retail, and it was just supposed to be temporary. It still is temporary.

I have been told that next month I will be attending a tradeshow in Richmond. Working a 12 hour day testing tools and getting first had knowledge of the stuff we sell and why. Getting to fire up some real man stuff and see it in action. I better update my life insurance and redo my will. So how did this happen?

And more importantly: How did the non starters and under achievers not get chosen for this roadtrip? How did the underachiever's apprentice not get a box of business cards before the new guy? How is it that I am working 10 more hours per week than I want to, and 10 - 15 more than people who have more time on the floor? How I ask you is it then a better strategy of work to work less, bitch more and drag your large entitled ass around at a snails pace? How is it a good idea to go and pout in a corner (we are 60ish in this scenario) when someone else crushes your sales numbers because they speak politely to people and can type? How is it a good idea to destroy company property to keep from getting a better pay scale on a future day when something needs to be assembled? How does this work for the industry? How does this work for the workforce? How does this make us a better Nation?

So where in this equation do we find the common denominator? How am I the one who is all screwed up? How is it that I am not dragged out to the village square and burned for being an abomination? How is it that I still have to carry dead weight? Nothing changes. No amount of reasonable discussion, no amount of personal attention, no kind action like giving over a sale to a less competent person, lessens the number of the same nincompoops who I encounter in every job. And the drag is that I am out numbered and that their numbers are increasing every day.

You may want to check the whole buy American attitude too. Those products are nearly impossible to find anymore and harder to afford every day.

It has come to my attention, from the lathe, when it rains.

2010-12-06T08:13:00.006-05:00

So there it was a lame attempt to fill the title of this most recent blog with a number of phrases that will get the general search engineer's attention and bring them to this blog. Yeah it is all science and number crunching and a big fat load of hooey if you ask me. I am not much of a writer in my book but in a couple of other people's opinion I do pretty good. Or would that be fairly well, well there goes the fun of doing this again. Self judging, second guessing and leaving my editing notes all over the screen again.

I am more interested today in singing the praises of one Ms. Susan D. Henson. In case anyone was wondering where I hang my hat these days well it is in a home that Susan so generously welcomed me into. A home filled with warmth, kindness, beautiful smiles, seasonal decorations, the aromas of good food, a good beer when you need one and now a pile of tools and wood in her garage. See I came for her retirement and wound up going north, packing my shop into the RV and driving it south to Virginia. I came for the party and never went away.

Now on to Ms Henson. My friend Susan. A Beautiful woman with a huge heart, a love for life and enough patience to deal with me. The things that define her in my eyes are

1. Her lust for life: Good food, good mead, good friends. Kind of a modern day Viking chick if you know what I mean. An educated palate, the southern upbringing that makes anything edible a potential meal, and no fear of experimenting with a variety of spice combination.

2. She is a hot chick! Can't say anymore because that would just screw this tribute up but in two words, Hubba, Hubba!

3. Patience: The aforementioned attribute that allows me to stick around. Thanks for that one.

4. Brilliance: Beautiful and Smart too? Yep you got it. An accomplished writer, a true artist of the written word.

5. Kindness: She has plenty of that. More than most actually, she volunteers, she donates, she sponsors children in underdeveloped nations, she gives to toys for tots, and spent three years growing a long head of hair for the Locks of Love (see http://www.locksoflove.org/) organization. And a bunch of other stuff that just make me smile to think of.

6. Just lots of fun! She has friends, she enjoys her friends, she puts loads of faith in her friends and she is a true friend. One of those that you keep forever. One of those whom you do everything to make happy. One of those that deserves loyalty, fidelity, to be included in any party and made guest of honor at some.

So there you have it. My friend in only a few words. Not even scratching the surface of the person she is. Not even placing the light in a manner to illuminate the gracious person she is. And by no means, making the kind of heartfelt statement that I really want to. Guess I can't write as well as some people may think.

Ok now on to stuff from the lathe. I have not turned much more than pens lately. Somehow I got into them in Buffalo when I started doing them at work. The boss at that Woodcraft liked us to do something on the floor through the course of the day. (Very nice people Bruce and Sally Anderson) The store had limited traffic, because it is Buffalo NY and people there have learned to live on the cheap since Bethlehem steel closed in the 1960's. But the rest of Western NY and northwestern PA should take note that there is a Woodcraft there and just be nice enough to stop in! (insert Damnit here)

So I started making pens, perfume atomizers and kept going with the Christmas ornaments and other stuff that you could do in a couple hours. Go figure I did it during the work day, and who wants to haul stuff back and forth from work?

Sample photos follow:

And to the When it Rains portion of this post. Hey I got here in November and have been loving every minute of this. I have had the opportunity to spend time with a very good friend, get to know some good folks, see an old friend from High School days, talk to another friend on the phone but not get to see her yet, and get adopted by a cat that does not make me sneeze nor make my eyes itch. Go figure I would have all this luck. I even got a job selling tools here (even if it is just Craftsman at Sears) . So I am off in my goulashes to turn for the day in a lovely woman's driveway, being watched through a window by a cat.

How did it come to this?

2010-03-26T10:52:00.002-04:00

I'm packed. Sort of. I am sitting on the couch of the RV looking at the boxes and systainers and tool bags and electronics and wondering how did my life become so simple yet so complicated. You see the goal was to reduce my personal pocessions, fit it all into a 21 foot RV and drive around like a nomad until I found "the place" to call home. It's clear to me that that is still not the case. I have managed to get everything in but there is some stepping over and moving around that has to happen to simply get a soda from the fridge or reach into the cupboard for the bag of junk food. The piles are those things that I cannot work without but could live without.

Inventory: You have seen the photos if you are a Facebook friend. It fits into 9 boxes in the living compartment. I will be listening to these pieces rattle around until they find the settling point. Ah if only sales were better here in AZ or on the web.

Tools: The lathe fits in the underside compartment with some wood and the rubber matt I stand on to work but the stand is just not making it. It's gonna be the last thing in the door and will sit on the floor at the back door. It's just too wide at the base and will also have to find the settling point. The multi-function table and CT-mini well they have taken over the kitchen area and it's good the wheels lock on the vac. The tool bags, well it's just good that there is not going to be a passenger in that seat. Wood, I did reduce the pile of blanks but did not get to all of the green stuff. Hey it's AZ the stuff has to dry out slowly or it will split. Project supplies, all of the liquids are gone but there are little things like ornament hooks, dowels and stopper sleeves for bottle stoppers, bottles for diffuser/oil lamps, etc. While in AK at SKS I built a cabinet for the systainers but that pile has grown and I have two on the floor. Ah the love of FESTOOL and the smell of new tools.

Computer and camera bags: yeah they live on the couch bed and will be moved here and there to do what I do with them along the way. Gonna get some pictures of the lava tubes in Northern New Mexico. Gotta do FB updates when I can and then there is always mapquesting the next route to program it into the GPS. OK I'm a geek.

Along with this goes the hotel services equipment. Hoses and cords, cables and such, it's gonna fill the bathroom and the last space in the outside compartments.

So this is why I am procrastinating for the day. I have to tie down loose materials, secure for the road, ensure the shifting and rolling is minimized and then button down the rest for the long journey.

The goal for day one is to make it to Parker, CO to visit with a new friend whom I really have never met in person but who has been instrumental in the "pimping" of my wares. Pictures will be posted and I'm sure there will be a blog post about the Beast visit, no matter how short.

Nothing else is planned so it's really up in the air from there. Intention to make it to Buffalo by 1-2 April is still on track and hey if you are in Buffalo on 3 April you can watch me doing a FESTOOL Demo at the Buffalo Woodcraft. Come on in and seed the crowd giving the appropriate oooohs and wows at how well these tools work in the hands of a professional cabinet maker. (Ahem that would be me thank you very much).

So watch for updates sporadically on FB or text messages from me along the way. Happy Trails.

Oh and as far as parting shots on AZ before I go. Nope they can all just sit here and rot in their UBER conservative Tea Bag desert. Hypocrites abound out here. Racism runs rampant, and all things considered, I am not gonna miss this place at freaking all.

closed for business

2010-03-16T22:54:00.006-04:00

This past week I have really started trying to get loose ends tied up and end the AZ experience. Most of it is mundane paperwork to cancel the business license, close up shop and push the inventory into boxes. Doing final projects, maintenance on the lathe, putting an edge on the turning tools and stuffing it all into the belly and living quarters of the RV. OK I bought a couple of tools too, but it's FESTOOL and it is massively discounted.

Tonight I got a phone call from a Prescott based wood turner who was disappointed to hear that I was leaving AZ. He had planned to invite me to do some demos in woodturning for the Prescott Area Branch of the Arizona Woodturners Association. Nothing specific, not a topic that anyone of them could not have done, just a different perspective. Now kids this is a first for me here in AZ. I have done a bottle stopper demo at the Phoenix Woodcraft, have taught classes in woodturning there too but nothing more than intermediate techniques.

I frequently take my projects into work to have a critique session with the more advanced turner, the finishing guy or the carving instructor and at times to just irritate the guy who cannot complete a successful turning project that does not involve a pen kit. Sometimes I ask the opinion of a customer who is a turner or carver and enjoy the differing opinions. Most of the time if it comes off the lathe and I am happy with the shape and the finish I will stick it into the display cabinet with a project completed by Shawn B. Riley card on the shelf next to it. Funny thing is that I think of my self as a beginner or intermediate turner. Much to my surprise I generally get some helpful comments and the occasional compliment. It's good for the ego, I get some good ideas and more fuel for experimenting with shapes or techniques.

So much to my surprise, tonight, a guy who has come into the store, has seen my projects, is generally a nice guy, and who is very enthusiastic about turning, calls me on the phone after hearing from one of his friends that I am leaving town. Wow. We talked about his health as he suffers from chronic troubles with his back and legs, talked about the Prescott wood turners, talked about what projects we are working on and finally he expressed his disappointment that he never took the opportunity to invite me up to one of the Prescott clubs meetings to have me (yep me) give a demonstration on wood turning. When I asked him what stood out in his mind about my work that would have made me the guy whom their club would benefit from my demonstration, his reply was simply "sometimes it's nice to see someone do something that they (the club members) just haven't thought of yet." These guys, who come into the store' apparently discuss the single piece lidded boxes that I turn with long finials and delicate stems. I think of them as continuing works in progress. They have visited my ETSY site and downloaded the pictures of these boxes for discussion at their meetings. WOW!

Ok so now that my ego is boosted and I have been invited to join an exclusive online woodturners group, I just might start raising my prices, make a video and be all snooty and stuff.

Social Networking Old Style

2010-01-19T23:08:00.004-05:00

So we have seen that blogging is just not my thing. It takes me forever to think up what I am going to say. Takes longer to get it written, edited, posted, re-edited when I notice misspellings and mistakes in grammar. Takes even longer to find out if I feel comfortable posting it because it may offend my friends or family and then if it passes all criteria I usually cut the text back and start all over again.
The modern (pronounced Moe-dern) approach to self expression got short circuited when I got a Facebook account. I could drivel in short amounts and deal with things being taken out of context in minutes. I could post pictures and sit back and wait for the comments to roll in. I could look at the posts of my "friends" and make a few comments about the things they were interested in. I could look at photos of friends with more interesting lives (in my eyes) than mine and applaud their courage in their causes, delete their FARMVILLE requests and gifts and then move on. It was pretty addicting and I checked it often or stayed logged on to follow a comment stream. Then came the inclusion of family into the mix.

With family I tempered my posts, set up rules for my following their posts and photos, made fewer comments and even hid some of my friends because they posted some pretty raunchy stuff or some things that were questionable and worse to filter the comments of their friends from my page for the same reasons. It was something about my niece ( a wonderful mature woman who has achieved much in her short life so far) looking at these things associated with me that made me cringe. We as a family are like many others. We have our family face and our rest of the world face. Now how could I ever not accept a family member as a FB "Friend" to keep them from the raunchier side of my existence?

Now as for their posts, their friends, their pictures I glance at the public stuff and let the rest reside in their worlds of FB. I do not make comments unless it is encouragement. I do not follow photos back to albums. I do not question them about what they were thinking or doing in a certain situation. It's none of my business. They are all adults now and do not need to be judged by me. Anyway their lives are much less questionable than mine.

So now to the Old Style stuff. I spent the past 5 days in the company of family back east. I stayed with two of my brothers and their families and we celebrated birthdays. We talked and laughed. We ate bad Buffalo, NY food and bad Salamanca, NY food. We tossed back a few brews and a couple of shots. We saw friends and extended family and then we dealt with the consequences of our obnoxious behavior. At one point I actually said to a family member "Damn, I wish I were as drunk as I am acting" as I had become very loud and free with the jokes. Hell, I would have kicked me out of the bar we were visiting but the owner is extended family and we made their month with our bar tab. There was no blogging, no FBing, no tweeting and no texting during that 4 hours of fun. Well having not seen these people for nearly two years it was time to do some real connecting. But with the number of people present, the number of hugs and swigs to be had during that short period of time it really was like internet chatting or micro blogging after all. I needed more time with them, less distractions and a little less beer.

The next step

2010-01-08T19:46:00.009-05:00

Who knows what the next step is gonna be. OK why all the confusion Shawn? What's the problem? You had a plan. You were gonna travel the country and find a place to write about and sample the local flavor and try the local woods. What happened to all of that?

Easier said than done these days. Sure I live in my RV, haul my tools and wood and goods along with me as I go but, there has been no go for over a year. I made my trip to Alaska, turned some birch at Stonekettle Station, made the trip to Arizona, turned and carved some Mesquite, made the trip to Salamanca, NY home of my childhood and turned some Maple and Walnut back there. And though I have my Navy retirement to live off and had the dream of paying for my hobby through sales but here is the rub. Of the hundreds of pieces I have turned, I have only sold a few dozen. My forms started simple, I experimented with combining turning and carving, did some pretty ornate stuff but, still I schlep my boxes to the Saturday market in Mesa and then schlep them back again. My RV is getting full of finished work and unfinished projects. So I took a job selling tools and wood for others to create, taught a few classes and made some contacts but, again the pile grows. Where is the outlet? ETSY, nope but it doesn't cost much so I keep the account. Face Book? Worked for a while but, these are my friends and family and I care to give them away more than sell them to those people. At Work? Nope the owner of the store discourages that and is pissed when we sell to each other too. And on top of that the people who come in there are in the process of doing things for the same reason.

So I keep piling it up in hopes of the outlet making itself apparent to me.

But still I hear the success stories (mostly from Pen guys) who sell some crappy writing implement for $80 - 150 each. Do I begrudge them of their success? Nope they have something they can carry with them, use in front of potential customers, and coyly say they can probably work one in for them (the potential customer that is.) Can you imagine seeing some guy walking down the street with a bowl or bottle stopper in their pocket? Can you see yourself saying "Hey where did you get that bowl?" or more likely "What a freak!" So suggestions are welcome. If you know someone who desperately needs a bowl, bottle stopper, miniature lidded box then hey send them my way. Keep me from being the freak with the bowl walking into the restaurant asking if I can use my own bowl for my soup.

There are also a number of local galleries here in AZ. You figure they may want to discover a local artist with a unique sense of style and some pretty cool forms but, NO! They want the guy from Connecticut or New Hampshire who makes one bowl a year (and not much different than mine) and asks $1500 each. Go figure. So walk-ins are not welcome here. Maybe I will start mailing stuff to Connecticut or New Hampshire. Ok search engine let's find a bowl, bottle stopper, lidded box deprived shop out there in New England and get this party started. Then Maybe I can get the hell out of the desert before Hell temps return.

I am returning to the road in April. I may be in a town near you sometime in those months as I find a temperate climate with loads of trees and eager shoppers who wish to stuff their shelves with affordable art and keep this boy turning. For those who may drop in here is a sample of the stuff I am schlepping around. Drop me a line if you have a question or want to gather some wood products to stuff on your shelves with other stuff.

Claro Walnut Lidded box ($45)

Maple Platter ($125)

Black Cherry Bowl ($45)

Birdseye Maple Diffuser/Oil Lamp ($35)

Madrone Burl Bowl ($45)

Put Americans back to work for America

2009-07-31T12:31:00.004-04:00

OK I get it. Times is tough. Money is tight. People are scared. There is no hope on the horizon. Bull!

Yes the economy is in a pit and the micro-economics of day to day life in the work-a-day world is difficult to live with at best. It's not like this hasn't happened before though. Not like we haven't dealt with economic crisis after economic crisis and come out smelling like a rose. So let's do it again, shall we.

I work in retail but I also have a small business making seemingly useless stuff to fill shelves with things to dust. I also take on small jobs in woodworking to get by but, this is not the only point of my post today. In the course of a day I see 10 or more small businessmen, contractors, cabinetmakers, woodturners, and wood workers of all like from hobbyists to professionals all with the same story. They are being run out of business by the likes of the IKEAs, Targets, Wallmarts and K-Marts filled with foreign made products that are priced to be nearly disposable. Hey I get that too, buy cheap, keep it for as long as you need it then throw it away and get another one just like it. But there are reasons for buying well made products, keeping them for a while, and contributing to the local economy.

In my recent experience with all these local businessmen I have learned one really valuable lesson. They are willing to work with you in meeting your needs for quality products while matching your budget or stretching it out over a period of time. See they have houses to pay for too. They have kids to feed too. And most importantly, they do amazing work for reasonable prices. You just have to ask!

It may seem like you are taking advantage of them by asking for cheaper alternatives but again remember houses, kids businesses to run. Now here are some points to consider before doing so.

- Buy what you need ONLY
- Shop around for the best price with above mentioned business types
- Be fair. (houses, kids, businesses)
- Put yourself in their shoes for a few minutes ask why they do what they do.
- look at the quality of their work and see if you can find something that good at the big box or discount stores (not likely)

So here is MY scenario that brought me into the blogosphere again. I set up my little table full of bowls and boxes in an ART WALK on the fourth Friday of every month. I have to pay for the space and an annual fee to participate. I have a large variety of large and small items that generally serve some purpose but are not essential to daily existence. I stand at my booth and greet everyone who approaches, whether enthusiastically or sheepishly. I am willing to answer any questions, talk about the process that goes into making these things of limited purpose, and give the potential customer to pick up and examine the work. What has happened since January 2009 though is repeated every time I set up. People approach, ooo and aaaah over the work and then compliment my skill as a craftsman. Then just as they seem to be settling on a piece that they really want, they walk away. They don't look at the price, don't try to find a bargain, don't try to even negotiate. They just boogie. OK no harm, no foul, just tryin to pay for a hobby here but if I had a nickel... you get the picture.

So here is a friend's scenario that brought me into the blogosphere again. He has a small cabinet shop in the area. He has kids, a mortgage payment to make, equipment to maintain and is freaking very skilled at his craft. He drives out to homes of people who contact him and does bids on jobs. He competes with less skilled craftsmen and is usually underbid by them because they have the same daily worries to deal with. The problem is that the lower bidders are doing shabby work and the good craftsman is later called to fix the problem of the schlock. OK that's business. I get it. But the crappier craftsman hire unskilled illegals and produce junk and take forever to produce it and install it in a crappy manner but they were cheap! Oh and the kicker is that the better craftsman is called in more often than not to fix the job he originally bid on that went to the schlock. Think people, think!

So what's better about craftsman one? He does a good job, for a reasonable price and is willing to work with the customer to meet their budget. If people want Maple cabinets but have the budget for melamine cabinets he does what he can to meet them in the middle. "How about maple lowers, melamine uppers with a maple face frame and doors." If he skins the uppers with Maple veneer they are still well built, still look like Maple and are done within the budget. HMMMMMM just took a few minutes to negotiate.

So what's your part in all of this? Stop going to the big box store! Start going to the internet and looking for local guys who build things or stop by a woodworking store (not a Home Depot) and ask who they recommend. There may be a guy working there who can fill the order or they may "know a guy". They may also have classes to teach you how to do things yourself. HMMMM there is a concept.

If you are a craftsman, work with the customer. Keep your house, feed your kids, swallow a little pride and match the economic reality of the day. Use less expensive materials and learn to make them look expensive. Do what it takes to keep working and for crap's sake quit hiring illegal aliens. Hire a kid to clean the shop, pay him or her minimum wage and teach them a craft because they are not getting it in school. You see they closed the woodshops, metal shops and art studios first and bought more computers for the kids to learn what they have no aptitude for.

But for Crap's sake stop buying Chinese made crap! Think before you buy! Save up for something that you like or need and buy it right! or Learn to do something for your self and contribute to the economy by buying quality stuff you need to do the job.

Now if you are stuck on what is quality stuff then ask your Grandfather, your Dad or Mom, look at old furniture that has stood up to the test of time and see what kept it together. Open doors and drawers, see how they were constructed. Look for seams where components of the product meet and see if there are any gaps. Pick the wood that is right for your area. Moisture makes wood Move. Expansion and contraction, stretching and warping, shrinkage etc. Again the internet will provide some info but woodworkers in your area know what stuff does in their area and make good recommendations if they are worth their weight in sawdust. Ask if the woodworker if they prefer a certain material and why. Ask to see their most recent work and do the same examination of joints and seams. Hell get involved in your own purchase.

There are hundreds of craftsmen out there. In your local area. Available over the phone. Worth seeking out. Put down the computer, turn off the TV, get in the car or on the bike and seek them out. You will be contributing to the local economy, building the tax base in your city and state, keeping someone deserving in business, getting a better long term deal and maybe just maybe being happy with what you buy for more than a year. Oh and you may just enjoy the process of working with someone skilled to get the best product for your budget!

I hate being ill

2009-03-04T16:04:00.001-05:00

That's about it! Just hate, hate, hate it! I can't turn, I'm bored, it's my day off and I'm sick. I tried surfing the web but found myself hopping from turning site to turning site. I tried channel surfing but daytime television is worse than prime time which really sucks. So I does myself with Nyquil and crawl back into bed which lasts about 20 minutes then it's back to channel surfing and web surfing.

I need a shower, need food, need a cold compress, need a sexy female in a tight nurse suit like the old days with the buttons straining all the way up from the skirt that starts just inches from the top of sexy thighs. Instead I sit in my little RV with my notebook on my lap hoping to recover from nothing more annoying than a cold. But it's a really bad cold so I have the right to feel miserable and sorry for myself so there.

The latest from the woodworking world

2008-11-27T12:55:00.002-05:00

I always count on November to bring new things into my life and it always happens. Sometimes good, sometimes bad but always change. This year it was a conversion from the rolls of the unemployed to the employed... times two. On 11 November I was in the local Woodcraft store "turning pens for troops" in their annual support the troops effort. I hate turning pens so it was a sacrifice. While there I was pulled from the classroom/shop and the boring pen turning thing and asked to assist customers in choosing tools for carving, wood turning and selecting the right lathe. Well I like to do all those things and the carving expert from the staff was on vacation and the turning expert (a really good turner) was just off for the day so there I went. The owner was there and saw me assisting customers and there you have it a Job offer. So I started the next day as a retail sales guy and instructor for classes there.

After leaving Woodcraft and heading to get some new T-shirts I get a call from a furniture maker/cabinet maker/wood retailer asking me to come to work there. After explaining that I had taken a job already I was still offered the job around my Woodcraft schedule. OK being somewhat greedy and wanting to make furniture I said yes to that job too. Downside. I work 6 days a week between 6 and 14.5 hours each day and there is no time to turn. Upside. Massive tool discount, Massive wood discount and access to a big ass shop!

As part of my duties at Woodcraft I am tasked with writing a weekly article for the Arizona Republic. No fixed subject, no formulas just 500 words every week to get some cheap publicity for the store. I have spoken with Jim about writing a book on woodworking over the past year so there are many outlines and chapters rattling around in my head already so type type type and as I have creative license on this I figured I would assemble the articles as I would write the book. So here goes. First samples of the articles assembled as the first section of chapter 1. Setting up shop, furniture making tools and additional furniture making tools are the articles and the first three sections of chapter one. Turning tools essentials, Carving tools essentials and cabinet making essentials are the next three sections. Drop some feedback if you get a chance. We shall see if there is any hope of getting this written before Christmas and my next potential day off.

Setting Up Shop

You want to start woodworking but don’t know where to begin. You make a trip to the local woodworking specialty store or a big box store and start looking at all the tools and then it hits you. “This stuff costs a lot of money!” “All this is too big for my little work area in the garage.” “What the heck does that thing do and when will I ever use it?” Don’t panic. It can be a bit overwhelming, especially if you haven’t been in a wood shop since Junior High. But there is an easy way to get through all the confusion and past the shiny new tools to get you going in the direction you want to go.

Specialty woodworking stores often offer classes or have demonstrations that can assist you in taking your first steps. Take a trip to you local store and do a little watching first. If you do not live near a woodworking store then stop by the local community college and shop the adult learning classes for woodworking classes. In either case the cost is usually pretty reasonable and you get to tour the shop, learn a little about woodworking safety and by all means use some tools. Take some time during the class to ask questions about the tools and their uses, alternative means of getting the job done and recommendations on brands of tools from your instructor.

So you took your class, you made your Heirloom box, wooden pen, wooden bowl or picture frame and you feel confident and ready to go. Make a list of those tools you have used and make notes on those you really liked to use and get yourself a few quotes before you leave the store. But, mind your wallet just yet. There may be a few more classes you want to take before you rack up the big ticket on tools.

Now that you have chosen your favorite woodworking discipline, take out your lists and your tape measure and some graph paper and get to work designing your shop. Make the determination if you ever want to park your car in the garage again or if your spouse insists on having the parking space for theirs and block out the space for that. Look at what you have in that highly organized space attached to your house and see if new storage requirements have arisen once you take into account that you are gonna be generating a lot of dust.

That done, start looking at the floor models, bench top models, midi and mini tools and see how they fit into your plan. Yep it’s true! Tools come in all sorts of sizes and shapes and functions and some with multiple functions but you will pay more for those and sometimes they are great for one thing but not for another. Again visit your woodworking store and ask questions about their tools and volunteer the alternatives you have found. The staff there may have gone through all the same decision making woes which you have. Remember to inquire about safety precautions and features, dust control, mobility and versatility.

Furinture:

You have decided that you want to make your own furniture. Great pieces have come from the garage or barn shop over the years and you may have some pretty unique ideas that you want to put into your home. There are some essentials that you will need to take those boards and build your sofa table, blanket chest or computer desk.

Some furniture makers say there are three essential tools to get you started, especially if you plan on saving some money on lumber by buying it rough cut. There are also alternative tools for each of these featured big foot print tools but they do require a bit more skill and your results may not be consistent.

The Planer: Rough cut lumber will have an irregular surface and edges. It is also sold in quarter inch increment sizes (2/4, 4/4, 8/4) and is normally slightly larger than you may need. You will want plane the boards to a uniform size and the thickness planer is the way to go. Sure you could save the expense on the tool and have the boards planed for you before leaving the lumber yard/store but the results may not be to your liking and remember the $15 - $30 you pay the store for milling services could be put toward tools. There are a variety of thickness planers available at your woodworking or big box stores to choose from and you may just find your results reflect your care and investment in the project. Take multiple passes, removing a small amount from each board before changing thickness settings and be ready for the mountain of dust and chips. Alternative tools: Large hand planes (6 – 8), belt sander, powered hand planes, routers with a shopmade jig and flat bottom bit.

The Jointer: “What’s the purpose of that tool?” Is a common question. Jointers ensure a smooth and square edge to your lumber which is essential if you plan to “joint” or glue up a number of boards to create that ultra-smooth table top or sides for the heirloom blanket chest. Though the base has a small foot print the table is fairly long which is a necessary feature to support the board as you feed it over the cutting head and support it as it comes out the other end. Make sure the jointer fits your floor plan and think about a mobile base to push it out of the way when you finish using it. Jointers are challenging to maintain and tune correctly so do not throw away the manual when you take that heave monster out of the box. Alternative tools: Hand planes, powered hand planes each with a fence or jig to keep square.

The Table Saw: It’s a big investment but your Grandfathers circular saw is just not gonna measure up to this power house standard tool. The table saw and a variety of add-ons or shopmade jigs is going to save you time, money and aggravation by providing a large level platform, square fence and a fairly powerful motor to drive that blade through a variety of thicknesses of lumber and sheet goods (plywood, MDF, Melamine etc.) The table saw is a great tool for ripping, cross cutting, joinery cuts and more advanced techniques using store bought or shopmade jigs. Alternative tools: Plunge cutting circular saws, standard circular saws, framing saws with a guide rail system and clamps.

Yep it’s a big investment so do your homework, shop around and ask lots of questions. Do not forget there are safety features on every one of these major tools and dust management is something else to consider when you get ready to purchase one or all of these tools. A dust collection system may also be a good item to work into your floor plan and budget.

Additional Furniture Making Tools:

After you get some experience with basic construction, joinery and consistent results you may want to expand your tool collection to include some more specialized tools to make your pieces a little fancier or your life a little easier. Consider these additional tools:

The Bandsaw: If you want to add a curve to you table legs, book match your boards to have a consistent appearance to the table surface or add a little flair to your furniture the band saw is a great tool to get the job done. Yep it takes up some more room in the garage but if your floor plan allows for the necessary space, you will find yourself at the band saw doing more advanced features for your pride and joy. It’s a very useful tool for cleaning up joint components, cutting long curves into boards, and just making your piece a little more unique. Alternative tools: The crosscut hand saw, dovetail or backsaw, coping saw, hand held jig saw or scrolling jig saw.

The Router: What a versatile machine. Used as a hand held tool, mounted on a table, with store bought or shopmade jigs, the router can add some real flare to your furniture designs. The routers come in a variety of sizes of motor, with fixed or plunge bases, with soft start motors and variable speeds these little beauties will get you hooked but they do take some getting used to. I know people who have 3 to 6 routers with a variety of features or set ups that they dedicate to specific jobs. The router can be used to clean up pattern made edges, cut channels, soften table or leg edges, create unique joints and many other applications. The router uses a removable bit and there are hundreds of profiles to choose from to accomplish as many or more combinations of applications. Alternative tools: Specialty hand planes, hand saws, scrapers, spoke shaves, chisels or carving tools.

The Drill press: Whether drilling holes for shelf pins, making holes into compound joints, starting a through cut for your jig saw or making repetitive holes, the drill press is a versatile tool with numerous features that can suit furniture making applications. A good drill press features a tilting table, depth scale and locking stop. These will assist you in repeating wood boring functions at the same angles and to the same depth. Alternative tools: Hand drills or augers, power drills.

The mortising machine: The mortising machine is a specialty tool with one function, cutting mortises. If you want to repeat the same cut though it is easy to configure, assists you in cutting the same mortise in the same location of different pieces of wood. The table features sliding locking components for controlling your stock and can be configured with store bought or shopmade jigs to add your own flare to this joinery standard. Alternative tools: Mortising add-on for a drill press, hand chisels.

Tenoning jig (table saw add-on) or loose tenon joinery system: What goes better with a mortise than a tenon. That’s what the mortise was made for. Tenoning jigs are a table saw add-on that assist you in making consistent square cuts into your stock for sinking into or passing through mortises for joining legs to table skirts, arms to uprights on chairs, stretchers to table or chair legs or other joints of one component to another. A loose tenon joinery system uses a separate component (the loose tenon) to join components of your furniture in a similar fashion. It is designed to cut the mortise into the joining components giving a little more flexibility and allowing for movement of the wood in changing environments. Alternative tools: Router with shopmade jig, back saw, hand drill and chisels.

Sliding or Compound Miter or Radial arm saw: Table saws can be used for making cross cuts and miter cuts but they require space for your longer board as they are fed through the table say and you will want to use a miter gauge. This can be cumbersome and difficult to control the stock in small shops or with small table saws. The miter or radial arm saws let you control the stock and bring the blade to the surface. It is easier to control longer material, easy to set up stops for repeating lengths and these smaller saws can be mounted on a bench or cabinet and rolled out for use and returned to the storage area when the job is done. Some Radial arm saws can also be configured for ripping boards or changing the depth of cut which makes them that much more versatile than compound miter saws. Alternative tools: Plunge cut circular saws, circular saws, hand cross cut saws.

Driiiiivvvvve, My Baby drove up in a brand new Cadilac

2008-09-13T23:10:00.008-04:00

With the Clash blaring from the CD player I drove out of Stonekettle Station heading up the Glenn Highway, hoping to avoid snow on the Tok cut-off, and finally East South East along the ALCAN. I stopped quite a bit along the road this trip and still made most of my goals if not just short. I am amazed at the landscape along the way and cannot resist stopping to shoot, turning back when an image catches my eye through the side view mirror, or just slowing down long enough to give it one long look before moving on. The first shot is from the end of Day One. The moon was rising over the mountains near Haines Junction in the Yukon Territory. When you see something like this, sleep can wait another hour.

The world is exploding with color these days. New snow on the mountains, all the leaves in the northern reaches are turning bright yellow, the grass and weeds are browning and turning shades of red and orange, and the skies are pretty dramatic these days. The days are growing shorter and the nights colder and this little RV has covered over 1500 miles in these three days. The outside is covered with a million dead bugs and pounds of dirt and the inside is getting a little messy with more dirty laundry filling the bag and stuff not being put away exactly where it started the trip.

I'm sharing the road with herds of Buffalo, a few wild horses, Elk, Caribou and Mule deer but the Bears, Moose and Dall Sheep have not shown themselves this trip. Mostly there are no problems but the Buffalo are unpredictable and tend to turn into the road when you don't expect it. And they stink really badly too.

It's all boring plains and farmland from here until the border and a little more remote. More pictures will be posted in my Picassa album so stay tuned.

What's going? What's staying?

2008-09-09T19:57:00.003-04:00

I have been struggling over the past few days as to what will actually fit in the RV and still make it comfortable to live in. Yep for the next few months I will be living in the box in the desert. I thought about trading it in for a big old Frigidaire box and finding a nice sewer grate but that is a plan for later in life. You will know me, beard down to my ankles, ragged old Carhardt jacket, clutching a paper bag with a magnum of beer inside. There are a few openings in our larger cities but the best locations are still occupied so I will keep the RV and wait it out.

But I digress, the real reason for this post was left in the first sentence. I have a 21 foot RV that was "built for two" (yeah midgets that weigh in at like 90 lbs each) and has seen two major modifications to make it more a single guy ride. First it was a nice little family rig with a galley kitchen and a dinette that just took up too much room and limited my tool hauling ability. So out it came and a long ass tool bin took it's place. I jammed in FESTOOL systainers, hundreds of pound of wood, a Shopsmith, two long FESTOOL rails to make a massive multifunction table, lathe tools, random hand tools and did I mention, a massive load of wood. Well the wood is gone, the Shopsmith has a new home here at Stonekettle Station and I can live without some of the other stuff because of where I will be working. They got nice tools there. So Mod II was undertaken.

I built a small floor to ceiling cabinet to hold systainers, food and small power tools, but in a small bench to give me a place to relax and boxed in the furnace with more logical locations for the vents and cold air returns. Hey now it's a box but it will someday be a place to plant my ass. Ok the modification is made of pine, unfinished, a little rough around the edges but hey that's a two day mod and it holds my stuff.

OK there is still stuff on the floor, the passenger seat and jammed into every nook and cranny but it's life on the move. I will be arriving in Arizona some time in late September and start work as soon as I find a place to park. Funny how the RV parks in the Phoenix area have a 55+ age restriction. Desert Blue Hair RV park, OOO my joints hurt Vista RV Park, Casa Raisin RV Park. The choices are just so huge. Well if all else fails I can park at the Ranch where the job used to be and commute to the new location (probably hauling tools and wood in a trailer behind the RV) until I find a less wrinkley RV Park. Why doesn't some one open a LOOK AT ALL THE BABES RV Park?

So for those coming back to Beast Across America, the Beastly Blog, welcome back, sorry I was gone for so long and hey check out the new slide show feature and yes I will be populating it with more Bowl shots in the next couple days.

The anchor will be weighed Thursday or Friday or Monday if Jim wants me to help him out with stuff. Well it is part of pulling your weight when you come to Stonekettle Station.

ALL THAT CRAP CAME OUT OF THAT LITTLE RV?

2008-09-03T21:31:00.002-04:00

As the weather gets colder and the days get shorter I am forced (because I am a "Big Baby" according to a very good friend) to prepare to leave Stonekettle Station. I have enjoyed myself hugely. Made lots of sawdust out of perfectly good wood. Met some nice people and hung out with my favorite folks. Even if one of them (Jim, no question it's Jim) is everyone's favorite Asshole.

As I look around the woodshop I have to pick and choose what goes and what stays. I am amazed that I got all this crap in there for the trip up here. But alas as I see that I will be spending the next few months living in the RV, I will be forced to leave somethings behind. The best little multifunction table in AK, my Shopsmith, a nearly new TS-75, a Biscuit Joiner, tons of exotic woods, a few turning tools, a grinder with a Wolverine sharpening system, a full sized router table, and all the other bits and pieces that make woodworking easier. But I leave them in good hands and will one day return to use them all again.

In the months to come, I will be working in a furniture shop in AZ if all goes well. I have called ahead and got the nod to bring nuthin but my skills and desire to have some fun and start as soon as I get there. YAY!

Well we shall see how it all goes from here.

Preemptive Strike

2008-06-23T23:15:00.002-04:00

Ok it's been a while since I posted anything but today I just had to get this out there before Jim takes the opportunity. Today I turned 48. Yeah big deal, just another Birthday. No spectre of black balloons, no hill to be over, no mid life crisis gnawing at me. Overall just another day. I usually don't think about them until dinner time when it's off to my local favorite place for a big fat steak, a pint or two of my current favorite beer and a big piece of carrot cake with coffee.

This year I am at my friend's home. Jim and Becky and young Jim are friends that I have walked on fire and ice with OK it was a Kilueau and a couple of glaciers but we have been friends for a while. So this year as I was working in Jim's shop drinking my last Diet Pepsi I decided to head to the supermarket and get a case of refills. I hoped in the RV and off I went. And then it hit me, "I want carrot cake!" So there I am with my case of Diet Pepsi and Carrot Cake and a big stupid grin on my face.

Then it happened. As I put the cake and soda in the fridge Jim came out to the garage and asked the very innocent "What's in the bag?" Proud of my achievement I announced "We are having cake!" A huge gahfaw follows with comments about being a pitiful so and so, jokes about sitting in my crappy little apartment in my underwear with one slice of cake and a birthday candle softly sobbing happy (sniff) birthday to (sniff) me until there is nothing left but crumbs and a cream cheese mustache. Well it's not true I was wearing clothes, I was not in my crappy apartment and I was hitting on a cute bartender girl. So there!

Yep life as a single guy is sure a lot of fun. BTW Becky had bought me a carrot cake yesterday so it just fueled the laughter and never ending jokes. Well I asked for it I guess.

Stuck inside of Tempe with the Palmer blues again

2008-05-23T10:51:00.002-04:00

OK this is a long delay but it has been a very lack luster trip. Best that way but hey it's always nice to have something interesting to write about. So the trip has been slow, loaded with bad weather avoidance and in doing so I have missed out on some pretty scenery for less rain, no tornados and now I am in a low pressure system that has brought, wait for it, SNOW to northern AZ in May. Yep it's snowing in Flagstaff and I have to rearrange my trip again to avoid the crap on the road. So instead of going north through AZ to UT, MT and Canada I have to detour to Vegas then shoot back east and north.

So far my travels have taken me to VA where I visited with a friend from the Navy, to Knoxville TN to visit with a friend from my childhood, to Baton Rouge, LA for the night and into San Antonio TX for a short visit with other friends from the Navy. It was nice to see everyone and visit place I have never been before but it added time and miles to the trip and now at my oldest brother's house in Tempe AZ (tool retrieval stop) I have to either wait or reroute to do weather avoidance again. Weather avoidance is the option I am exercising so I can get back to it.

Don't get me wrong I love spending time with my brothers but my tools are all packed in the RV, gas prices keep rising and there's not a lot to do in Tempe. I have visited friends here, seen my oldest nephew did some project with my brother but it's still painful to see the stuff packed and not fire up a lathe for this long. So tomorrow I brave the weather, head north west and northeast then straight north if the weather holds long enough. But for tonight it's beer and a free Nova G3 w/35MM stepped jaws then road tomorrow. BTW there is still no better pie in the US than the Julian Pie Co, deep dish Apple but a Country Peddler in Buffalo makes it's way into second place.

The New Adventure Begins

2008-05-11T05:37:00.002-04:00

For the past few weeks I have been attempting to tie up loose ends, finish jobs I started, get my affairs in order, all the stuff you do before embarking on a new adventure. Well I suck at all that stuff so I am just going anyway. My 25 lbs of crap is stuffed into a ten lb bag and it is warming up in the driveway now. What started out as a way to beat the heat of AZ last summer has turned into a year of living in a town where I grew up and seeing why it is that I cannot stop here for very long. I did some nice work on the lathe, made a few sales via the internet, gave away a lot of stuff to family and friends but found out that this is not the place for me to work, live or get too comfortable.

My family, my brother Randy was entirely too generous and patient with me filling his basement with sawdust and tools. He actually built me a shop down there out of an old coal cellar room, ran power, cleared stuff out and let me come and go as I liked. His home was always open for me to stay and come and go as I liked. Thanks Bro! you rock. My sister in law Laura and her family. What a bunch. The biggest hearts of anyone I have known here and a lot of fun to boot. Her boys Michael and Brian are awesome and will do great things in their lives. Thanks Sis and the boys. And congratulations to my niece Kelsey for earning her Masters in Education, Spanish Language. Kelsey is the hardest working woman whom I have ever met and does not take life too seriously nor responsibilities lightly. Great things are in her future as she takes on the hardest job in America now, teaching!

My other Brother Jim and his bunch. Thanks to you too for making this stay fun. My nephew Cory and I enjoyed two Marvel Movies and just a bunch of goofing off. I do recommend IRONMAN for all you Marvel nuts out there. Good flick and pretty true to the original except the villians were Arabic and not Chinese. Guess you have to make it more believable for the times. Chris and Ashley, sorry I did not spend as much time with you as you would have liked. It was winter and the tires on the Jeep sucked.

So all of you I am leaving behind but not forever. We will see each other again. Just not for so long and not in winter. Ugh. Snow. Blah.

More later. I will be reviewing more dives and diners along the way. The best pie is still in Jullian, CA but a close second goes to the Country Peddler in West Seneca NY.

A premature posting

2008-04-23T08:44:00.002-04:00

Today marks the T-Minus 17 days and counting for the launch of Beastly 1 from the little town of Salamanca NY. I have the route planned, all interested parties along the route have been warned and I am packing up like the Grizwalds on their way to Wallyworld. OK no kids or wife or dead Grandma or dog but a load of wood, a mini lathe and a bunch of FESTOOL. The camera is going too so watch for pictures. There will be many a review of towns, small dive type restaurants, roads and bridges too so this should be fun.

In preparation for this festive jaunt, I have closed up shop, sold off some inventory and will be carrying only the bare essentials. Clothing may have to be optional. I am getting antsy, have sufficiently procrastinated in hope of a good day before panic but everything is moving towards the fated day when I pull up the bumpers, free-up all lines and take her out.

Wish me luck all.

Walnut goes BOOM!

2008-03-13T18:52:00.000-04:00

This week I have been painting myself out the door and making my way out of work early enough to get some turning in. Janiece you will be happy to know that your bowl is finished, in the box and will be making it's way to you tomorrow. Now back to the turning part. I got a bunch of walnut from a friend and decided to give it a whirl. It's green, filled with excellent grain of sapwood and heartwood. It shines nicely when sanded and burnished but man it explodes nicely. I had a nice hollow form going, thin walls, nice shape, nice surface and then just one more cut and BOOM! five distinct flying pieces of walnut flew through the shop and made a hell of a mess. So for now no new photos for now but as the 1st of May approaches there will be more sawdust, more bottle stoppers, bowls and boxes and more photos to come.

REVISED: Bowls, boxes and other stuff from the lathe.

2008-02-24T15:31:00.000-05:00

I posted a couple of photos earlier of some of my work but did not describe the pieces or place prices on them. This time I am at least going to describe the pieces. Jim Wright and I are partners in this woodworking gig. I learned how to turn about two years ago in Jim's barn/workshop and got hooked. So much so that I find myself tied to the lathe every chance I get. It's an expensive hobby for me as I do not have a place to harvest and store wood before I turn it so I look for deals on kiln dried exotics and turn them almost as fast as I find them... you see my lathe is in my brothers basement. It's a mini lathe with limitations on the size of the objects that I can turn so I am restricted to a 5" clearance, 10" swing and 14" spindle length. Ok this time size does matter.

My work is more stocking stuffer size with the exception of Maple and Myrtle objects because of weight and density of the wood as in the case of my friend Janiece (my pimpmomma) and her splated maple bowl.

Jim and I have different styles of turning and ornamentation is a fantastic feature he adds to his work. Where I rely on the character of the wood alone and have yet to master the green wood turning style of Jim's work. If it sounds like I am a fan of his art... Well yep I am.

So with all that said and a smattering of self pride and promotion... May I present, my stuff!

MYRTLEWOOD Hollow form. This here is the latest piece of work. A Myrtle wood bowl with a hollow form top rim. There are a number of knots running through it, holes where ants got to the blank before turning and unique grain that is typical of Myrtle wood. It is 7" across the widest part, 8" tall and finished with walnut oil and wax.
Price: $125, $10 SH (lower 48)

MYRTLEWOOD Lidded Box: Keeping with the Myrtlewood theme this is a lidded box that is very thin walled, thin walled on the lid too. It measures 2" wide at the base and rim and 6" high. finished in a tung oil and polyurethane blend.
Price: $35, $10 SH (lower 48)

MYRTLEWOOD Vase: From the same blank of Myrtle came this thin walled vase looking thingy. It is 1.5" at the base and the rim, 6.5" tall and very thin and light. Finished with the same tung oil and poly finish.
Price: $45, $10 SH (lower 48)

Now for the maple.

QM1 Hollow form small base:

Quilted Maple #2 Hollow form scored side Quilted Maple #3 Spalting along edge

Quilted Maple Bowls: Maple All three of these bowls came from the same spalted maple blank that Janiece's bowl came from. Each was cut furthest away from the spalting than was the first. Spalting is the dark stuff or a mold that grows along the grain. The darkest parts are the highest concentration of the mold but it made it throughout the blank. I chose different styles for these but they are all medium thickness walled, 7" across, 2.5 -3" high and all finished with tung oil/poly. Because of the spalting none are food safe nor can be finished for use with food.

Prices:

QM#1 $45, $10 SH Sold

QM #2 $60, $10 SH Sold and shipping tomorrow.

QM #3 $60, $10 SH

That's it for now. I got more and plenty of bottle stoppers of various styles that range in size and are of various shapes from globes to chess pieces to wine bottle shaped. drop me a line on the blog and I will contact every one who may have questions or want to see more photos.

HINTS and out right STABS

2008-02-24T10:43:00.000-05:00

OK I GET IT! I am falling into the trap that you have all set. I appreciate the interest and am including some of my favorites here. I have a paypal account to make life easy and will pass out the email address for direct contact. here are some of the photos I have done and there are more to come this evening when I get the finish on the latest two.

Enjoy

Collecting vs. Consuming

2008-01-13T17:58:00.000-05:00

OK I will admit I do not get the whole collecting things thing. I know many people who passionately collect things and dust them and check their value and go out of their way to get more of these things they collect so passionately. There are train buffs with whom I work. They love the railroad. Collect railroad memorabilia including lanterns, dinnerware, uniforms or items from uniforms, menues, timetables, coffee cups, badges, you name it. There are web chat rooms dedicated to their passion where they virtually gather to talk about what they have, what they want, what they saw that someone else has, criticize the collections, values placed on items in the collections, brag about their collections and in some cases trade pieces of their collections with others who have collections. It's probably the same with just about any other collector and any other collections but I have first hand experience with these folks right now.

Now technically you could probably call me a collector as well as I have a passion for tools. Specifically woodworking tools but they are useable and not just collecting house dust. Sawdust is another matter all together. I see myself as more of a consumer. I buy things I want to use. I use them until they are no longer useable and then I get another one just or just about like the last one.

There are some things that may have been viewed as collection items. I have this thing for old hand tools. Planes, spokeshaves, drawknives and other such archaic items. I buy them from garage sales, restore them and then use them. Why buy old? Well they were just made better for the most part. A Stanley (Bailey) bench plane from 1943 is an excellent tool and you can get one for a couple of bucks. A comparable modern tool would cost you an arm and a leg and is based on the design of that 1943 model I spoke of.

Now there is a minor rub to all this tool gathering... I am going on the road again in my 21 foot RV this summer. Imagine packing a whole shop load of tools in with your socks and towels. This presents a problem. As a consumer I should be able to leave a trail of tools along the way but that has presented problems too. My brother in AZ was victim of the first deposit of tools. Yep I left my shopsmith in his garage along with a load of FESTOOL I bought for him. Not a good solution. First off I miss the shopsmith. Second he is stuck parking in the driveway vice garage.

As I leave NY I will have to find a way to stuff my mini-lathe, grinder, FESTOOL, construction tools, many turning blanks, finished products, and other stuff I will probably not be able to live without into the RV. HMMMMM maybe I will disassemble the router table.

What was I thinking II

2008-01-09T18:36:00.000-05:00

I Feel Terrible! There are times when I feel my ambition is far greater than my good sense. Today is one of those days.
Weeks ago we at the Rail Museum decided it would be a good idea to make a lit of those things we needed to get done during the shutdown months. We wanted to work on the plumming (not me) work on the electrical panel and some lights (again not me) and touch up some of the wear marks in the floor (ooh ooh the floor is made of wood I can do that I can I can).

So we put together the proposal to get some grant money from the city and do a little comparative shopping for professionals to complete the tasks we determined most necessary. We put in for bids with an electrician, a plummer and the floor refinishing guy. The electrician came in within budget, the plummer was a little high but still within budget but the floor guy... Now that was way over budget ($7K). Well it is wood and I have installed and finished a section of the floor for a much needed repair soooooooo. Yep you guessed it. I had to phone around and get some prices on rental floor sanders. That plus poly and incidental equipment I came in some $5K below bid. Now that also included my estimated hours for completing the job which I figured would be around a week or so. UH no.

I have just spent the last week in prep, removal of artifacts and cases and started some 1,100 sq ft of the 3,300 total. OW! I hurt. Hauling stuff, working a 130lb sander and doing edge sanding with a 70lb monster can get to a guy's back, shoulders and legs and yep it really hurts. So as I stated at the beginning of all of this... WHAT WAS I THINKING?

Get your Geezer on!

2008-01-07T19:32:00.000-05:00

Today was the another day of work that made me break a sweat, strain a few muscles and I am paying for it already. I will probably regret it all tomorrow but I got the job done, and at the end of the day felt pretty damn good about myself. What was the driving force that caused me to put myself in potential traction or a truss? I had a point to make!

I am currently embarked on the project of refinishing 3300sqft of yellow pine flooring at the Rail Museum. It's been 20 plus years since it was done the first time and there are coat after coat of yellowed GYM SEAL that have been lovingly applied by an 70 some year old man who happens to be my boss. He is an excellent old guy who taught history in high school, is and has been involved in the local community as a member of the Chamber of Commerce, member of a number of politcal, social and religeous groups and has touched the lives of countless children in a very positive way. He is a pillar of our society and deserves a lot of respect but I digress. No I do not have to prove anything to him, he is convinced that I can do just about anything except for plumming and electrical (as I have voiced this lack of talent a number of times.)

What children do

2008-01-03T18:23:00.001-05:00

Today the class of 2008 visited the Rail Museum. Now these are 17-18 year old children from the Process in Government class and though most of them were well behaved, respectful to the Director of the Museum and carried out the tour without incident, there is always one.

A very large lad probably 18 years old, slopily dressed, unkempt, needing a haircut and a bath decided it would be "cool" to pick up an axe and swing it around. Now there is no lock on the tool display, heck they mostly sit on the floor in the baggage check room but we normally don't have to worry about visitors picking up the tools because they understand that they are artifacts in a museum. Hmmmm what would pocess this 220 some pound dolt of a child to pick anything like that up and then be stoopid enough to swing it around in a room full of antiques that are probably worth more than his family makes in a couple of years. When asked what the hell he was thinking his response was a mumbled "I don't know". Now the last time I used that line I was say 6.

So there we have it. What is coming of the next generation and the world we want to leave behind for them to manage. I think the fact that there are fewer bees in the world is the least we have to worry about. These children are out there, they are aging rapidly and oh yeah they are bucking for your job. And if that doesn't scare you enough... they are reproducing.

Resolution

2008-01-01T05:39:00.000-05:00

At this time of year we reflect on the last year, pick it apart, twist it and turn it around, look at all sides, search for meanings, and formulate resolutions.

For years I was a gym rat and it used to crack me up that one of the four crowded times of years was 2 - 10 January. "I'm gonna work out and lose weight!" was carved on all the chunky faces of those portly buggers stepping on to a treadmill for the first time in 300 some days, stood poking at some machine or left some big sweat puddle on the floor mats. They would suit up in the sweats, the 1970's dancer gear and in some cases spill out in all directions from smaller than they oughta wear gym gear de ano. I used to avoid the gym for those periods and hit the road instead. Hey you can always run and reschedule the lifting. OK why the memory of the seasonal sweaters? I just thought the visual images might get some chuckles and it kinda kicks off the discussion, and I know there will be some, about resolutions no matter how short lived.

My resolution this year is to finish what I (wait, what was that? OOOOO Shiney!!) Oh as I was saying finish what I started! Yep I'm the guy with a hundred projects going all at once. As I type I am thinking of the flooring project at work, Started; the display project, Started; the databasing of the collection, Started and a long way from completion. Personal projects include staged bottle stoppers, started; a cabinet, started; a spice rack, started; organizing my mini-shop, started; clearing out my closets, started; paring down the collections of things that would just rattle around in the RV when I leave this god forsaken place.

I am looking at fitting a shop full of tools into a 21 ft RV (again) stopping at my brother's place in AZ and picking up more tools then filling the remaining storage spaces, nooks and cranies and cubbyholes with turning blanks, spindle blanks, planks, chunks and slabs of wood. Oh and then there are the finished projects that I have not sold yet. I gotta get a bigger RV. Gas mileage is gonna be in the single digits unless I can find a way to prioritize... HMMMMM maybe a trailer.

Well for the rest of you, Happy New Year. May yours be filled with starts and finishes, bundles of success, lives filled with satisfaction and harmony in your personal digs. BTW lighten up on yourself. If you don't like something about yourself, take small steps to change, ditch the magic pill, device, book of quaint phrases and just reflect on why it is you feel you need to resolve to do something and finish what you...

Merry Christmas

2007-12-24T15:55:00.000-05:00

Yep Merry Christmas. I was raised a Catholic boy here in WNY and we said Merry Christmas. I cannot remember any Jewish families in this town but I didn't get out much besides school and the friends I had on the street. I do recognize that there are other holidays celebrated at this time of year and I would use some other greeting besides the generic Happy Holidays but that would be lazy. I am gonna be lazy because I don't really know the proper spelling for Hannukah so if I screwed it up then sorry but, Happy Hannukah. Kwanza? yeah well I'm not too well versed in that so I'm gonna skip it. And what would a Druid say for Winter Soltice? Or a Wicken say for whatever they celebrate?

I find that the whole controversey over what people say as a nice greeting for this time of year and the reaction that people have if you don't get the right one. Hey if someone says Happy or Merry or Good or what ever take a second and say thanks or substitute with your own Happy or Merry or Good whatever. They may be just being nice. I respond in kind normally especially if the greeting is delivered with some enthusiasm. If it's some store reply following the taking of your cash well I just say thanks.

Here in WNY a small town had a huge melee over the placement of a manger or creche in the village square on public property. There were letters to editors, emails to TV stations, public protests and the like. So the mayor made the call to invite any other relegious sect, cult, denomination to place there holiday symbology in the same park. Well the Wicken were the only to reply with a Pentagol. And with that the fur flew. People drove there pickups over the Wicken symbol, spray painted the manger, made a big mess. OK so the manger (on wheels) probably should not have been on public property but it's really the way people chose to react that makes me laugh about how self-righteous and sensitive we have become.

AH well, the Manger moved to the grounds of a Catholic Church, the truck driver was ID'd because of the choice of paint and wheels on the truck and all else settled down as it was before. Well I guess the mayor will not be running again Oh and they stopped saying Merry Christmas at City Hall.

Go figure.

Out sourcing gets a new face

2007-12-19T18:58:00.000-05:00

OH this one could not be passed up. NBC Nightly News just aired a story about Monkeys taking over Delhi. 20,000 plus monkeys are over running the city and were even the cause of the deputy mayor falling to his death while trying to fend off monkeys on his balcony at his home. They even broke into the defense ministry and scattered secret documents throughout. What a world.

Small town America

2007-12-19T18:19:00.000-05:00

Ok, I admit it. I made a choice to stop here for a while and stay here for a while and I got what I paid for. I grew up here on a little street off the main drag. It was a simple life, surrounded by woods, an old railroad track bed, a creek and plenty of other kids up and down the street. I was the big clumsy kid that stank at sports, was fair at school and had one ambition, to split from here as fast and far from here as I could. It took a couple of attempts but finally with the help of the US Navy I made a clean break.

I would come home for leave when my folks were still alive, would do things around the house for them and not really venture out very much. The town had changed and not just in my eyes. Industry had died, the railroad had pulled out, the economy was in the crapper. I had to travel to the next town for a meal or a movie and to another town for a beer with people from all over the area. This town just didn't have much of a draw nor did it invoke any inspiration to stay and enjoy anything.

Now I look around and see some pretty angry people, living meager lives and staying around for something. The biggest industry in town is the casino. Haven't been there, don't plan to go. I could get the same results by giving away $20 to some random stranger and it would take less time doing it. This does not describe all the folks here, but it sure includes a lot of them. The angry people don't care about their neighbors, go out of their ways to do crappy things, greet pleasantries with scowls and grunts and in one case curse me out for politely asking one old geezer to move his car out of my driveway. Oh he was parked there scratching off his lottery tickets and could give a crap about where he was or who he was affecting. Well my response through gritted teeth was not so polite and I regretted it because he was a geezer but sheesh.

I know that this is not my first unpleasant day here nor will it probably be my last but come on people.

There are some great folk here though. My boss, My brother and his family, my landlord and the owner of my favorite restaurant, The guy who made the threshold for the back door of the museum, Angie at the post office, some old friends from school, and the hot female bartender with the fantastic posterior. There are more I am sure but, they are somewhere behind the conspiracy theorist, crabby old guys, the jerk who parked behind me on purpose and the endless number of welfare breeders who clog the line at the supermarket trying to get the foodstamp card to work.

Well at least there is an ample supply of hardwoods and it's kinda scenic.

More Snow

2007-12-18T05:08:00.000-05:00

Yep we keep gettin it. Light snow, crunchy snow, freezing rain, sleet, it just keeps coming. This apparantly is one of the heaviest snow years in many years and I am lucky enough to be here for it. The doors returned, it's time for more photos of the Rail Museum. Built in 1912 this building survived the BR&P RY, the B&O, 20 years of abandonment and many face lifts. I am starting to refinish the floors this January. yep sanding em down to the bare wood, restaining the oak and fir floors and slapping a new coat of finish over the top of all that. When all this melts we are back to the chimney, repacing the soffets and facia boards and gutters. Then I'm out.

Skewing Around

2007-12-16T08:37:00.000-05:00

Jim makes it a point to upload photos of his recent works and of nagging me to do the same. Well here they are... from 09:30 to 16:30 I stood in a cold basement here in Western NY with my winter jacket tightly zipped making sacrifices for my art. OK I love turning and can't in my crappy little apartment so I work in my brothers basement in an unheated former coal cellar. I can't put a heater in there because of all of the sawdust, polishes and green wood. A firey potential mess. So with my handy skew and mini-lathe I shivered my way to creative superiority! I love the skew chisel. A much misunderstood tool as far as turning goes.

In case anyone who hasn't done any turning on a lathe wants to know... the greatest invention to come to wood turning is the skew chisel. Sure you got your bowl gouges which are really awesome, the roughing gouge which starts the whole process and then various scrapers that make life pretty darn easy in some cases but the king bufoo of all is the skew chisel.
With what other tool can you make a perfect globe, a half dome with a hollow underside, various beads and coves, All this with the wonderous skew chisel.

NO MORE MR NICE GUY

2007-12-14T17:53:00.000-05:00

OK Ladies, Girls, Women, fellow human persons of the female persuasion, or what ever you prefer to be called or referred to as. Here it is in a nut shell.

I am tired of being the friend. I am not another female, don't like hearing your deepest darkest secrets, don't want to hear how much like a brother I am. It's old. I am now declaring that even though I am a single nice guy it does not mean that I am not looking at you like the hungriest man on earth eyes up a cheese burger. Yep! I'm looking at ya! Anybody got any ketchup?

What has prompted this? Why is Mr Understanding Safety Guy suddenly looking down your shirt? What could be bothering this once Nice man? It happened again and I'm sick of it. I had the occassion to assist a family of friends the other day with some pretty rotten stuff and I heard that phrase from the corner of the room... "What a nice guy." followed by "He's so sweet"

Ok I was not doing any of this for attention, did not intend to "land a honey" for being a decent human being, but Come on! IF I am such a decent man then MAUL ME right then and there. If you are married then be married and don't tell my family that I am a threat to your marraige. And if you are single then walk right up and plant one on me.

For the last few years that I had been in the Navy I was always asked "Why aren't you married?" Many times by single women who worked with or for me (big taboo if I did not answer politcally). Well here's the reason...

I was too nice to leer at you before this. Had too much respect for women to avoid telling them what I really wanted to do with them (instead of talking about how they feel).

MR Understanding Safety Guy is now officially dead! I am going out for a beer and some grub and to Oggle a female bartender until she sweats from the laser beams that shoot from my eyes.

For those of you who may be offended and want to comment about what a schmoe I am becoming, Bring it on. Try being 47, single, in a small town, healthy as a horse and skilled in many things but can't pull a bird with a 15 foot net. Get the picture?????

Farging ICE HOLES

2007-12-12T19:01:00.000-05:00

Contractors... Sheesh, can we hold people hostage with our skills any more adeptly?

Part of my self assumed duties in the Rail Museum is to deal with contractors. Finding them, managing their quotes, tracking the jobs and authorizing payment when the work is complete to MY satisfaction. OK I got some skills but there are some things that I just don't want to do because they are beyond my skill level. I can build a cabinet, put in a hardwood floor, refinish fixtures (wood fixtures that is) but I will not do plumbing, electrical repairs, masonry nor anything to do with metal forming or welding. Just ain't got the chops.

I have to find these people and get them to give me a quote in the first place. This is painful because it requires them to put down the doughnut and make their way to a potential job site. And following the consult which takes all of maybe a half hour of their day, there are some who want to charge me for their time.

Next comes the fun part... After working their bid into the budget and getting approval from the city, I have to actually get them to the job site. Now if you are relying on your skills to get paid, does it not behoove you to show up and actually do the work? The last guy missed the first appointment, did not work up a quote, did not do a follow-up with me to say there would be delays... Nope he went to Florida for vacation for a week instead. Followed by a trip to Atlantic City for another week, and when he finally did show up (three days after his equipment was delivered for the job) he found out that the job was too big for him to complete with the equipment he had. He and his crew used the man lift to haul a chunk of our broken chimney off and LEFT! He has not been back since except to collect his manlift in the dark of night.

Today I had a pair of real craftsmen in to complete a job involving repairing our main entrance following a fire. Yep we can get people to destroy the place but fixing it is another story. Well after taking the job in September I called the supervising contractor to get the doors every Monday, Then Every Monday and Friday. Then every other day including the weekend. Well the doors arrived yesterday after 5 false starts and though they were well made and rather beautifully done, not everything arrived for the installation and these guys were acting like I was bothering them. Hey I even bought doughnuts to get them there. Well for the last two days I have hosted these prima donas as they short cut the door frame, did a sloppy job of trimming the doors and cut the doors too wide for the opening. And today they actually asked me when they were gonna get paid as they packed their trucks after the sloppy unfinished job was left in their wake. Well The hardware is not in the doors, they wanted to leave a shim holding the transom window closed with a nail, didn't puddy the nail holes in the trim nor caulk the door frame. Paid???? "If you get your shit together and finish some simple no-brainer crap then maybe I will think of signing off the job so you can get paid." They did put the transom window hardware on but the rest is still unfinished and I had to nail into my hardwood floor to keep the doors closed. Did I mention they have had the doors since the fire in July 2006? AGGGGHHHHHHH!!!!!!! is contractorcide a crime or will I get off on a technicality?

Maybe a creed or an oath is in order for people to qualify for a contractor's lisence.
We who have skills should not take money for a job we are il-prepared to do.
We shall ensure we are prepared with the proper materials and tools to complete the job.
We shall take pride in our work and let it show in the end results.
We shall create, repair, finish or cobble our projects to the best of our abilities.
We shall take responsibilities for our mistakes and correct them without incurring additional cost to our customers.
We shall humbly accept criticism from those who we serve. And if they are right take action to correct what our customers find wrong. And if they are inccorect we shall explain the discrepancy and ask if they would like us to correct them for a fair price.
We shall provide a bill and ensure we accept pay when it is available and not because we over extended ourselves or need to pay for our next job with money from this one before we complete it.

I do not believe the customer is ALWAYS right but they sure get the right to have an opinion if they have the check in hand.

Ok boys and girls if you got a skill and the confidence to use it for cash think twice before you tread down this path. It's a lot of responsibility and you should be fair and responsible to the customers.

The Greatest Generation

2007-12-11T06:08:00.000-05:00

Making comparisons between my and my parents generation aren't easy, not pretty nor particularly comforting. I have heard a number of stories from them regarding sacrifice and why we really had no real family heirlooms. They were farmers and steel workers. The average backbone of American society during the Depression and World War II. They lived their daily lives through the tough times, cut corners when they had to and did what was necessary to help the country prevail through those difficult times. They saved newspapers in bundles, turned over gold and silver items, turned over spare tires and lived through rationing. When times were really tough on the farm and the food bank needed the live stock my Grandmother, a widow herself, made a chicken last for her 6 kids for a week. She baked bread, made chili sauce and her own ketchup, put up preserves and canned vegatables for leaner times. And she sent all her sons off to war. Three of the four returned home though they were wounded but one never returned. Those kids became my uncles and father and carried on the traditions of conservation and preparation for the worst.

Now where are we...? and worse where are our kids? I have only myself to make the comparison to them directly but I see where the rest of our society is going. Let's try an experiment. Let's take the kids to the toy store this season, have them pick out their favorite toy and then buy it. Take the toy over to the Toys for Tots bin or the Salvation Army or what ever help those in need thing that is at the local mall or Superstore and have them drop it in the bin. How much argument do you expect to hear or how much explaining do we have to do. I plan on taking this experiment to my nieces and nephews just to test their character... Wanna play too. Keep an eye out for the results and let's share what happens. I know times are tough for some folk so keep it small, simple and within budget. I'm not talking about a WII of Playstation III just something they really want that you can afford. I have done this before and after the tears there can be some pretty interesting discussions and opportunities to provide history lessons. BTW clean out the closets... there are folks out there that can use the dusty stuff that you don't use, can't sell nor want to keep around anymore.

Things we do for fun

2007-12-06T22:22:00.000-05:00

There are certain things we do for fun. Nonsensical things. Silly things. Things that have no real outcome other than enjoyment.

The things that make us feel like a kid again.

Riding a bike. We can claim it's for exercise but for me it's about feeling like we are going faster than I could ever imagine.

Throwing a snowball. Not at anything in particular but just picking up some powder, mushing it around in my hands and giving a good Umpf! while flinging it as hard as you can.

Holding a door for a nice old lady. Not for any other reason than your parents told you it was the right thing to do.

I think most people have forgotten these simple pleasures and replaced them with self importance and seriousness that can be put aside from time to time. Today a co-worker brought his 10 year old to work and I watched the look on this kids face as we did just those things. He was thrilled to throw a snowball, grinned like a gleeful little kid when I nodded approval as he held the door for an older lady who came in to buy a calendar, and just about lost his cookees giggling as we ran and skidded on the ice outside the museum. His dad was there too and had just as much fun.

I would hope that you all will take the time to play just a little for the sake of doing nothing else but playing. No charts to measure caloric burn, no clocks to time our duration of activity, no measuring devices to see how far we throw, how fast it goes or measure the splat pattern of the impact site.

And for those of you playing the game... Enjoy before that snowball melts, that bike rusts or that nice old lady has to grunt like a linebacker trying to open that door.

He's not in dis stove

2007-12-05T20:06:00.000-05:00

My good friend Jim has pimped me in his blog and as it is a cold night and I am avoiding work it's time to set the record straight.

The Actual routine from Bugs and Thugs goes something like this....

All Right Rabbit. Where's Rocky? Where's he hidin?

He's not in dis stove.

Oho He's hiding in the stove eh?

Now look would I toin on da gas if my pal Rocky was in deir?

You might Rabbit. You might.

Well would I trow a lighted match in deir if he was in deir?

BOOOOOOMMMMMM!!!!!

All Right Rabbit you've convinced me, We'll look for Rocky in the city.

I am not a crushingly large individual, Did not thunk John Lennon for his specks, have shattered a couple of noses with my hands behind my back and will drop everything if a slinky hot red head roams into my line of sight. There is only one thing that will make me drop everything faster and that is a cool foamy glass of John Smith's Extra smooth.

You too can make Kailu pig if you have a pork butt, 5 bannanas, aluminum foil, liquid smoke and naquida.

Thanks for pimpin me Jim... tell your Son Head on a plate. He will drive you mad for hours saying it. It just sounds funny

Lake effect snow... well it is wet anyway

2007-12-05T18:47:00.001-05:00

Well I understand the science of Lake Effect Snow but I thought you had to live near a lake to get the full effect. It skipped Buffalo (right on the lake) and made it's way south over the hills and dumped 24 inches in that many hours. Here in what is normally a quiet little river valley town that gets a dusting once in a while. We got dumped on. I hadn't bought a shovel yet because it never really gets this bad this early. I used a pine plank to push a path out of my apartment and down the outside stairs to street level. Used the same plank to push a pile off the RV and tamp down a path to the Jeep. Found my way to work and found I could not get into the building without wading knee deep through drifts. I never even got out of the Jeep. I put it back in gear and went to the hardware store and bought a shovel and a bag of rock salt.

Did I give in to the power of winter weather? Hell yes! It's cold and wet and though the snow fall is light fluffy stuff, it piles up! I got a better work out clearing snow from the stairs, the walks, the entrance and the parking lot and found that one of the doors leaks and it snowed inside! only a small amount but back to the hardware store and a few pounds of weather stripping for indoor and out door use and I got the leak plugged. Worse than plugging and shoring a leak in the flooding simulator. Hey they could turn off the water if it got outta hand there.

And it didn't stop there... it kept snowing, The city plows forgot us and it was off again to open the entrance to the parking lot, clear the city sidewalk that leads to our building and then clear the deck on the freight house in case I had to go in there. And why do you ask did I have to do all this pushing of snow for the last two days... I am the only one who can! I ain't complaining about that (the snow yes, the need to shovel nah) because the other guy is 79 and still kicking.

Work will set you free is what I used to tell my Sailors. Well baby I am free! I like to work and like that I can again.

Enjoy the photo and see if you can name the building, When it was built and what it's original purpose was.

What a way to start the day

2007-12-05T18:47:00.000-05:00

Have you ever had one of those mornings that start out bad and lead you down that dark path for the rest of the day? Today I did the snow thing and at the end noticed there was a truck parked behind my Jeep. Ok there is a business right next to where I park so I figure it's gonna happen once in a while but this was placed directly in my path and while I was shoveling. The sniveling weasel purposely parked there to make some kind of point about my parking in a small patch of grass right next to the building. Well being as nice as I can be and because Weasel-man was in the store of an old family friend I politely asked if that was his truck and informed him that he had blocked me in. I mean I was really polite. Took a lot but I did it. Well then came the reason for the parking job.... He declared that he was coming to this place for 8 years and did all that he could to avoid blocking my driveway (an asphalt pad that houses the RV now) and that the place where I parked was obviously (insert business name here) property. OK that was totally uncalled for but out of respect for my friend I swallowed hard and only said "Well things do have a way of changing now don't they?" I have to tell you I tasted blood! My eyes bugged out my eyebrow went north and I put on my best I am gonna eat your liver smile.
And the day just got better. Everyone I ran into had some kind of axe to grind. in my direction. By the end of the day as I roamed through the local super market I ran into another of the lovely locals and got sniveled at again. Well that was about all I could take. Oh did I mention that these all were Man-bitches... This one got the brunt of the day and I invited to show him what his F...ing liver looked like! Ok it was a little over the top but Man-bitches piss me off. and a day loaded with man-bitches makes me see all kinds of red. There I feel better now!
Man-bitches beware. I am not happy and it's still snowing!!!!

What was I thinking???

2007-12-03T23:02:00.000-05:00

Ok so here I am in my small apartment in the Southern Tier town of Salamanca. It's snowing a lot. I mean a lot! There is at least a foot of accumulated snow on the ground, the porch, my RV and my Jeep since I came home from work at 6PM ET. So you may ask why this is an important detail...
Well 22ish years ago I left the boosom of my family and headed off to boot camp in Orlando Florida. It was August, hot, sticky and it rained on and off for the 8 weeks I was there. I slimmed down some 35 lbs, learned what it was to be part of a team and took a lot of crap. Then off to tech school in Pensacola Florida for 8 months and it was still hot but got mild and then hot again before I left for Southern Spain where I experienced more heat, more mild, and more heat. Can you detect a trend here?
Iin the 22 years of Naval service I saw my share of weather. Japan (Northern Japan) was like this and I was pleased to leave that behind me when I went to Hawaii, Virginia and then London. Ok London got cold but there was no real snow and though I spent a Christmas in Prague where it snowed I had a pretty mild three years troopin around Europe and the UK. Then San Diego.

And after all that heat and my retirement I bought the RV and vowed to follow 85 degrees for as long as I could take it. Well the AZ summer came and 115F and I decided to head back east to good old Salamanca NY and here I stayed. It was fun, inexpensive and I got me a job. Well now it's cold and call me a woos or a baby if you like but I am yearning for 85 degrees again and if I can dig myself out in time...

Ah who am I kiddin. I am in training. I want to feel the cold again, run from the car to the house like there is Christmas waiting every day and get warm again. Now if I go to work tomorrow I am gonna have to wear one pair of foot wear and change to another but hey it's all a part of it. Stay warm out there and hope the power does not go out. I got electric heat man!