Weekly Blog - August 9th

[john]

Well that's it for this summer's vacation at the lake. Now it's back to reality and catching up on all the yard work, etc that didn't get done over the last three weeks. Speaking of the garden, I saw a squirrel running off with one of my cucumbers this afternoon. First time that's ever happened!

I was disappointed a bit during our second week when I tried to order a SS cross cut sled. This item was on sale just before I placed my order for things to be delivered to the cottage, but was no longer showing when I placed the order. Then on one of my trips home, I noticed it was back up with an ending date of July 31. I called SS that day, but it was on back order and since I only had one week left, I couldn't place the order. I think the sled would really come in handy for cutting some of the wider boards I use for some of my projects.

One of my neigbours at the cottage offered to receive things for me. I am always a little reluctant to take advantage of these kind offers, but if anything interesting comes up before they close their cottage in October, I might be tempted.

I got a little perturbed this past week when I tried to get rid of an old aluminium row boat. My plan was to offer it to the auction house in Alburg, Vt., with the proceeds going to the local fire and rescue unit. The auction house is located about 1/4 mile from the cottage, but neither the auction house folks nor the Fire and Rescue folks could find the time to pick it up and transport it, nor did I get any sense of appreciation for my offer. A friend has since offered to transport it and I will probably go back to Alburg over the next couple of weeks and offer it to the local library. Both these organizations do good work in the area.

My local hardware store finally got my stain, so I guess I will be working at finishing the rebuild of the garden swing this week.

On another front, even though it is August, It's time to start organizing our hockey season. The arena contract arrived during vacation, and now I have to start calling to round up enough players. If all goes well, we start playing September 22nd, so there is not much time.

I hope to get together with fellow forum member Dan1999 sometime soon. Maybe we will end up with a two member SS club in this area.

More next week, I hope.

Have a Safe and Fun week!

John

[charlese]

Sorry, I first posted this in the July blog by mistake - now it's here!

Hey there, John! It is good to read more of the weekly Blog. This week I finally read where the word 'Blog' came from. It is supposed to be short for WeB LOG. Never could figure that out!

Also, I was a bit perturbed to read your aluminum boat paragraph. Maybe because I'm getting old, but it seems these attitudes of "not having time to be bothered" are more prevalent every year - even with folks that say they volunteer. Sorry, Enough of that!

This past two weeks, I've been engaged in working out details of how to make the "convertible" coffee table that my grandson sketched out. Without the help of the Sketchup 101 course Tom K/mo offered us I would have been helpless on how to do this. With the course, I was able to draw up a working sketch and e-mail it to Grandson for approval.

So far, I have cut out the legs and the large panels. Also selected the boards for the top and set them aside for future milling.

In designing, I chose to use similar measurements for the upper parts as the plans in Woodsmith Mag. Grandson gave me a challenge by asking for top drawers that open from the sides, rather than the front. This presents an opportunity to figure out a new way to assemble and glue up, since there will be no side panels, as in the magazine. I'm now figuring out how to make temporary sides that will be stable enough to allow installation of the upper and lower panels. After that, it should be just cutting and fitting.

This is the table I drew up.

[ATTACH]5519[/ATTACH]

[john]

Chuck:

Now we can not only admire your woodwprking skills, but also your "mechanical drawing" skills, (that's what they called it when I went to high school). Good job on the drawing.

Someday I must try tom's course.

Have fun

John

[JPG]

Chuck:

Now we can not only admire your woodwprking skills, but also your "mechanical drawing" skills, (that's what they called it when I went to high school). Good job on the drawing.

Someday I must try tom's course.

Have fun

John

Set aside more than 'a day'!