Opus #1

One of my alleged passions in life is woodworking. I say alleged because until just now, I hadn't attempted a woodworking project since my 7th grade wood shop class. Even though Kelly has been gifting me tools at each birthday and anniversary for some time - a power sander, a Skil saw, various clamps, and so on - I haven't found or made the time to really make my so-called passion a reality.

Well, as you can guess given this post, I did just recently turn all that talk into action. Check out my first attempt at creating something out of wood (before and after).

This is your basic laminated table top that was one of the six projects you could pick back in the aforementioned 7th grade wood shop class (I think technically the options were: fish wacker, cutting board, toy truck, pencil holder, plant stand, or chess board).

Due to our in-progress change of residence, Kelly and I have decided to acquire a few new pieces of furniture to go with our new house. We found these end tables (we purchased the pair) at the warehouse sale of Ballard's Collective. They were created in the 70s by a local metal worker named Harry Lunstead. The hipster in charge of the cash register at Collective was really jazzed about Mr. Lunstead, but I've used the Google on this person and have yet to dig up much info. Despite their creator's relative obscurity, these end tables are indeed quite cool; they are solid brass, very clean design with seamless mitered joints (welded on the inside). They really look quite modern and cool. They are technically retro I guess, but I think they've held up well and their age is really more of a subtle afterthought. This is all just my opinion of course. The only exception to this opinion is when it came to the oak inlays which neither of us liked very much (probably because the color and grain remind us too much of the 70s). Thus, and so forth, I took it upon myself to build something to replace these less than desirable inlays with.

To make an increasingly long story short, I bought some hemlock strips from Home Depot, laminated them together, cut the resultant board down to size, planed, sanded, planed a rabbit joint into the bottom of the board, sanded some more, finished with an oil finish, sanded some more, finished some more, repeat a couple more times, and viola! a new replacement inlay for the end table!

This was a huge learning experience! I made about 50 mistakes and the next project I do will turn out much better. It actually looks pretty good (my opinion and Kelly's... I think), but it could be much better. Squarer, straighter, truer, flatter, cleaner, fitter, and happier.

More pictures of this initial adventure are located here: Woodworking Project #1

I am a Ridiculous Person

As Jeff Buckley so aptly put it, "I am a Ridiculous Person".

In this case, I am ridiculous because I am so happy about a recent shoe purchase that I am actually feeling compelled to post about it. Ah, well. I learned long ago that my only option is to just give in to my ridiculousness.

I purchased these leather lace up shoes, by MOMA, from one of my favorite Seattle shoe stores Re-Soul. They are incredibly nice, extremely high quality, made in Italy, with a classic but also modern design (they have a very traditional shape, but are elongated which gives them a very sophisticated feel... but again, that just helps to prove my point about me being ridiculous). For all those that care, they were on sale, 50% off.

The first time I wore them I was really oddly happy the entire time. That feeling you get when you spend some money on something and you have absolutely NO remorse about your purchase whatsoever.

Just to cement how ridiculous I actually am, I am going to post pictures that I had Kelly take of me wearing them.


(If you look closely in that last picture you can see Neko on the right side.)

Dog Bites Man (Wikipedia Not Helpful to Productivity)

Just now: I needed to find out where I could get rid of a pickup load of scrap lumber that I removed from our new basement. I called "Pacific Topsoil" and found out that they would take it for "$23/yard". Great, but what is a "yard" (in this context)? Time to hit wikipedia.

• yard: Didn't actually read the article before I clicked on:
• fathom: A fathom is two yards! Never knew that! Makes me wonder about:
• league: So that is weird, but it makes sense. A league is the distance you can walk (or a horse can walk) in an hour. But hold on that means "20,000 Leagues Under the Sea" is about 60,000 miles! That can't be right, better go check:
• 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea: That Joules Verne, he was a smart guy. Ahead of his time. Makes me realize that I never actually read this book - only watched the movie. What was the plot? Oh yeah, submarines, isolated life under the sea, giant squid, whirlpools... whirlpools... are whirlpools real?
• Moskstraumen, Maelstrom, Whirlpool: Very cool. I'd like to go to Norway some day and see Moskstraumen, sounds awesome.
• Lake Peigneur: Crazy! This would really be something. A drilling rig and several barges sucked through a hole in the bottom of the lake. An entire lake emptying before your eyes. A canal flowing backwards creating a 50m waterfall! The lake went from fresh water to salt water - from 10 feet deep to 1300 feet deep! And nobody killed! Amazing story I had never heard.

45 minutes later... "what was I doing?" Oh yeah, I still need to go find out what a "yard" is. This is why the fact that I am still employed always amazes Kelly.

Nine Eight Double-One Eight

North by Northwest - Blue Scholars

Today is the day. We pick up the keys and put down new roots in Columbia City, Seattle, WA. New dwelling, new community, new neighbors, new lifestyle. We are now officially [Seattle] Southsiders. Time to depart our extremely comfortable Green Lake existence and embrace our future! Who knows what will come? Home ownership, exploring ideas, making possibilities realities, a family. I know it will be different and I am excited about the change. My hands are sweaty, my knees are weak. We are now living in the future.

"we're broke but not broken
"cold but not frozen
"lost but not forgotten
"kicking the doors open