Friday, November 11, 2011

So, Now What?

I have been making all these silly little machines. But how do I show them? Sue took the spinning chair piece to work to show Jacob. Jacob and Marvin own the sandwich shop where I have shown and sold a lot of my work in the past. But these can't hang on the wall. Marvin still has the piece and is trying to figure out a way to display them for a show. I have come up with an idea I think looks pretty good:





I've simply built a crude box around each piece and voila! It can now hang on a wall or sit on a table or shelf with or without the box. I can get the wooden slats at Home Depot for about 33 cents each. It only takes me about 15 minutes to measure the piece and build the box for it. Then I stain it with watered down black acrylic paint.

I'm pretty happy with this.

Tuesday, October 11, 2011

The Spinning Chair Machine


I figured out how to make a pretty good gear with my Dremel workstation using pre-cut discs and Popsicle sticks. This piece uses 2 gears at right angles which turns the propeller vertically while the chair on top spins horizontally.

This is about 11 inches high and about 7 inches wide at the base. I'm not selling this one online...I'm going to work on more pieces and have a local show somewhere.

Sunday, September 25, 2011

While I Wait

While I wait for Jeff to get some woodworking done for me, I'm entertaining myself with other things.
Like this:



This is going to be a depression-era shack.

Saturday, September 24, 2011

Too Many Options

Waitress: Do you want your eggs scrambled, over easy, well done, or over medium?.

Sue: Over medium.

Waitress: One egg or two?

Sue: Two.

Waitress: Do you want pancakes or toast?

Sue: Toast

Waitress: White, wheat, rye, or sourdough?

Sue is ripping her napkin to shreds. “Wheat.”

Waitress: Coffee, orange juice, milk or tea?

From under the table, Sue yells, “COFFEE!!!”

“She’s gone now. You can come out,” I say.

Sue could just say, “Two eggs over medium with wheat toast and coffee.” Simple. However, there is the, “Would you like to try our special? It includes two eggs, bacon, sausage, or ham with hash browns, fries, or fresh fruit with two pancakes for $6.99?” to get past first.

Sue and I went to breakfast this morning. This time, Sue had the Philly cheese steak with fries. Sue eats dinner in the morning. I had a spinach omelet There was a little old lady seated next to us. She was having two poached eggs and hash brown potatoes and pancakes. I like to see what people around me are eating. I want to know if they got something better than what I got. She had smiling eyes and she asked if we would please pass the pepper. Later I helped her get the top off the syrup bottle. We didn’t chat with her because she wasn’t actually at our table. Sue and I talked about where we would like to spend the holidays this year. I said I wanted to go to Europe. Sue wants to go back to the Islands again. We’ll probably just end up going on a cruise. That part isn’t true. What we really talked about was what we were going to buy at Pet Smart.

I had a bad dream at work the other night. I dreamed that it was dark in our office and everyone was sleeping in their chairs. I was walking around taking down names to put on my spreadsheet and someone took my clipboard away from me and told me to go sit down and go back to sleep. Someone else told me to stop being such a suck-up. Then I woke up and everyone really was asleep. And my clipboard was missing.

But that’s neither here nor there. What’s really on my mind right now are options. I read that too many options can cause stress. It can also cause you to make bad choices. You could end up with wheat toast when you really wanted rye.

Thursday, September 22, 2011

Sue's Delicious Savory Baked Chicken

Kaye Sledge's book, "Southern Style & Southern Fried Redneck Cookbook" inspired me to share one of Sue's favorite recipes:

Sue's Delicious Savory Baked Chicken
Get you some chicken. Ask Phyllis to bake it for you.
Go someplace nice, like the zoo.
Come home later.
Ask Phyllis is the chicken done yet?
If Phyllis forgets, you take it out of the oven.
Put it on paper towels to soak up the grease.
Enjoy.

Wednesday, September 21, 2011

Two New Things!

When I got my Dremel Workstation, it opened up a whole new bunch of things I could make. I use the drill press feature the most...it allows me to drill more precise holes than I ever could by holding the wood in one hand while drilling with my big drill in my other hand...very dangerous and very sloppy.




And