Okay, so I was looking back through my blog roll and I noticed I only had 72 posts for the last 3 years. I feel like I can do better than that. So here we go. What do I want to talk about? This is totally a stream of consciousness post. No telling what will come out. No telling if anything will come out. Okay, so nothing's coming out.
I'm getting pressure from a couple of sources to resume my short story writing. This is problematic for me as I have just taken up woodworking, as I mentioned in my last post. I enjoy both pastimes, but the workshop is new and exciting, whereas the writing is something I'm a little more experienced at. It's kind of like when you start playing an instrument. When you first learn where to put your fingers, how to make the notes on the page form a melody, it's very exciting. Once you're over that initial excitement however, it becomes a bit tedious. The amount of effort required to improve the quality of your performance is very daunting. Frequent practices, lessons, etc make it seem easier to simply accept your current proficiency.
It's this way with my writing. I know how good I am (eh), and I know to get better I'm going to have to spend a lot of time on a lot of really bad stories before I'm able to produce something anyone would actually want to read. So it's easier to focus on my new hobby, and develop those initial skills and enjoy the fruit of that easy labor. Maybe my writing here and my regurgitation of whatever pops into my head will aid me in developing my skills as an author. I apologize to any of you who are left to slog through the nonsense I produce between now and then.
Friday, January 13, 2012
Thursday, January 12, 2012
Woodwork
It was tough for me to settle on that title, what with it having wood in it. But after considering several other possibilities like Working With Wood (alliterative!) Or How to Start Being a Handyman, my sophomoric mind could no more accept such vague and poorly constructed entendres as the current title. And since "Carpentry" has far too much impetus for the infantile level of knowledge I am attempting to apply to my work, I shied away from it as well.
I've spent the last 6 months or so attempting to turn a portion of my garage into a workshop. The first step of course was clearing out all of the clutter that was constantly-present-and-ever-growing on the half of my garage that didn't contain a car. I had a very clear line of demarcation running down the middle that allowed enough room for entering and exiting the vehicle, but not much else.
So after many weeks of sorting and disposing of the massive amounts of detritus our lives had collected, I realized that I had far too much stuff that I couldn't in good conscience throw out, but had little or no immediate use for. That was the motivation for building "The Shed". Oh what a project that was. Through the intermittent assistance of a couple of associates (one in particular, you know who you are) I was able to construct a 6' tall shed that had a footprint of 4'x8' over the course of about 2 and a half months. Yes, it really took me that long. But I built the thing from 2'x4's and plywood, almost exclusively. And despite what some naysayers may think, I think it looks like a barn. There are those who think the red I chose to paint it in was too garish, since I went for more of the Playskool red barn versus the more traditional blood red.
Anywho, once it was finally finished, I moved all of the indispensable but unnecessary accoutrement out back to the shed and now have a viable space to begin building. The first thing I want to build is something like this, which I expect will take a significant amount of time and many tools I don't currently own. Maybe before starting that I'll work on one of these, if for no other reason than to appease the missus. Show a benefit for all the hours I'll be spending in the garage, that sort of thing. She also wants one of these, which shouldn't be too hard to put together.
I don't plan on this blog becoming a how-to for beginners such as myself, but I may post the occasional pat-on-the-back (kind of like this one) when I complete a project. I promise to minimize the pictures.
I've spent the last 6 months or so attempting to turn a portion of my garage into a workshop. The first step of course was clearing out all of the clutter that was constantly-present-and-ever-growing on the half of my garage that didn't contain a car. I had a very clear line of demarcation running down the middle that allowed enough room for entering and exiting the vehicle, but not much else.
So after many weeks of sorting and disposing of the massive amounts of detritus our lives had collected, I realized that I had far too much stuff that I couldn't in good conscience throw out, but had little or no immediate use for. That was the motivation for building "The Shed". Oh what a project that was. Through the intermittent assistance of a couple of associates (one in particular, you know who you are) I was able to construct a 6' tall shed that had a footprint of 4'x8' over the course of about 2 and a half months. Yes, it really took me that long. But I built the thing from 2'x4's and plywood, almost exclusively. And despite what some naysayers may think, I think it looks like a barn. There are those who think the red I chose to paint it in was too garish, since I went for more of the Playskool red barn versus the more traditional blood red.
Anywho, once it was finally finished, I moved all of the indispensable but unnecessary accoutrement out back to the shed and now have a viable space to begin building. The first thing I want to build is something like this, which I expect will take a significant amount of time and many tools I don't currently own. Maybe before starting that I'll work on one of these, if for no other reason than to appease the missus. Show a benefit for all the hours I'll be spending in the garage, that sort of thing. She also wants one of these, which shouldn't be too hard to put together.
I don't plan on this blog becoming a how-to for beginners such as myself, but I may post the occasional pat-on-the-back (kind of like this one) when I complete a project. I promise to minimize the pictures.
The dirt at the bottom is from a recent rain,
the poor paint job is just a poor paint job.
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