Sweet cheese how many times do I have to see this same ad? For milk? They’re still trying to do this? Leave it alone, stop trying to make fetch happen. Ugh!
Thursday is here and it’s bitterly cold. Looking forward to the weekend. Not much else going on today. Ciao Bella.
It was sunny and plus thirteen for about 90 minutes earlier today, so I popped out to the wood shop and dashed some Walnut coloured Danish Oil Stain onto my youngest daughters new single bed frame for the cottage.
I started by spot sanding a few bits that didn’t get all the love they needed the first couple of go rounds, and then spent a few minutes dusting it off with the air compressor. Then I splish-splashed the Danish Oil rub on it with a very wet foam brush, and ran through a few clean rags wiping it off. I think I managed to avoid runs in the finish, but I’m sure there’s one someplace very visible that I couldn’t see while I was bustling away this AM.
Good thing it’s so light weight, I didn’t need to call for help to move the whole thing around while I worked. Rests on my bench easily enough. It’s times like these that I am thankful for all the space saving theatrics I’ve had to undertake recently. My old layout would never have been wide or clear enough for both the frame and me. No chance I could have freely walked all 360 degrees around it before. I could still do with the whole shop being a good 36 inches wider, but that’s a very expensive construction matter. Also not going to happen. No way I tear down walls, and add roof for just three feet. Plus the property line is right there and no municipal office would ever grant me permits to get closer than eight feet to the line. So I’ll do what I can with what I’ve got.
Side bar: I am toying with the idea of taking down the pre-built racking that looks kinda shifty, in favour of metal racks, and reclaiming higher up wall space, but I need to get rid of several stored doors, and car seats, strollers, and household junk before I do that. It needs careful planning. I could benefit a great deal from doing so, but it’ll cost me both time & money, and a fair bit of aggravation to boot. I’m thinking it over. But I digress.
The Pine bed frame is one inch thick, with box joints, and a slatted cross member design. The feet all screw on, and the slats screw down into their mortises for extra peace of mind. It’s light weight, and has been stained to a Walnut brownish tone. One single pass. I’m told with Danish Oil I could do multiples, but I find one wetly soaked coat works fine for me. It ain’t no heirloom quality piece but it should last a few years. I hope.
Finishing isn’t exactly my favourite thing to do. It’s sticky, and smelly, and finicky too. My shop doesn’t have an air cleaner, nor do I use anything better than a shop vac to control the dust I make. Not good for high end, ultra high quality finishing. But I get it done regardless. Although now the temperature has plummeted down to minus one, and will go even lower and bring in some snow too. So I don’t know how anybody can plan around this type of thing. Well… a temperature controlled working space would alleviate those stressors, but I ain’t got that kinda dough just lying around for a quirk of mine.
So maybe a single spray on layer of Diamond Coat will go on next, or not. This piece may not be worth the additional effort. It will get scratched & marred. I’m none too concerned about that. If I can get a shot of it in situ up north I’ll update about the bed frame one last time. Take care out there. Ciao Bella.
I’ll have to wait until mid March to get the results of my MRI. I hope that because I’m waiting several weeks that means the results are mild to fair and not a total disaster. No major upsets expected is what I’m saying. I’d hope that if things were dire, or required visits to additional specialists that they wouldn’t set the follow up for a month afterwards, but would work a person in asap. But perhaps the medical field doesn’t work that way anymore, for one reason or another.
I’ll keep people posted. Once I know something I’ll be certain to discuss it here later. I could follow the progress if I require surgery, or need to undergo additional testing, or go see other persons in adjoining medical fields. We’ll see where this thing leads us content wise. I’m never afraid to overshare. TMI warnings for everyone.
My hardwood delivery from KJP Hardwoods showed up yesterday, yay! I have 20BF of rough sawn Walnut lumber, roughly 4/4 thick. To tell you the truth with minimal additional work I could put it straight into use. It’s a shame I can’t order eight foot lengths, but shipping gets difficult on stuff that long, and heavy. I’m going to make some book shelves for the girls which are low profile, and make a new Urn for myself with hand cut dovetails. I need to make the covering lid too, and a felt lined interior tray as well. Should be good practice for all those Dovetails. Or I’ll get frustrated and move on to box joints, or try my hand at finger joints. As long as it looks nice. Not that mitred corners aren’t nice, but I want my eternal vacation spot to be premium! With tiny rubber non surface marring feet.
Not to mention I should finish my daughters bed by either staining it, or moving it up to the cottage as is. One way or another i need to get it completed and moved out of the garage. Perhaps I’ll find some time today to decide my plan of action, and follow through on it.
I think it’s Wednesday today. Felt really tired and sluggish yesterday. Not sure where that came from, could have been a symptom of the barometric pressure changes.
In other news I did get a free large drink from Booster Juice yesterday, which was rather tasty. Two of my wife’s friends messaged her to say that my name came up for the daily giveaway promo they do all February. Hard to believe we’re even in February given yesterday’s twelve degrees and raining thunderstorms. I drank 80% of my juice berry concoction and enjoyed it quite a bit. Starts off a bit tart, but once you get used to it then the whole thing goes down pretty easily. I guess I was caught off guard by the inclusion of grapefruit. Have a great Hump Day! Ciao Bella!
I am currently freelancing from home, from my own office/studio space. A place where I can not only create paid design/production work, but can make music, sculptures, paintings, and models too. It’s a place I enjoy hanging out in. It’s clean-ish (depending on the needs of the job at hand) and quiet during the day, warm & dry, and the best part is it requires zero commute time to get to. So I don’t mind getting to an item at 6:30am one day, or answering a panicked email at 11:00pm the next day. I can pop laundry in as I walk to the bathroom. I can do a grocery shop over lunch. But best of all I’m here to drop my kids off at school in the morning, and available to pick them up at the end of their day. I don’t have to spend four hours a day, five/six days a week traveling downtown, and then across town, then walking several blocks to a job. I’ve excised that demon.
My topic wasn’t WFH, but the space in which I operate. I’ve worked places with no assigned seating or computers, in an open room on tables, in a bank of cubicles, and in a couple of offices of my own with a door I could shut, an air vent of my own I could manipulate, and my own lighting. Being secluded by myself was always the best for me. Collaboration is great, and loads of fun, but the bulk of my labour required very little of it. As normally my bread & butter item in my workload was production. Retrofitting someone else’s art work to fit new specs. A style guide answers the most basic questions, and it was just a matter of producing enough of the artwork to suit all the different brands, sub brands, and partner brands to stay afloat. I do not miss firing off 115 projects a week, every week, until the new fiscal when planners, and bulk sell sheet orders would come my way, and I’d do double, to nearly triple that. Yikes. My wrist fried out, and my eyes went twitchy, and I was not a very kind person. I don’t miss any of that, except the steady pay cheque.
The cool thing now is that when I have a quiet period, of hours, days, or weeks, I can tackle a DIY project, or build in my wood shop, or paint/sculpt/draw in my office, ready to answer a phone call or email. Some times I can even pick up a guitar and strum along to music for a spell. I’m contract, and freelance so I’m not tied go an eight hour day, with a keyboard counter, or a clock watching supervisor. Thank god! I’m here and available and you only pay for the hours you use. Works great for all involved.
Hot lunches, and a semi private bathroom, shower and laundry on site. Video games and movies on hand. A gym with weights. What more could a person ask for. Oh yeah – no people though. No external interactions 98% of the time. Ah – PERFECTION!
I tell you what. I could accomplish more at home in 3.5 hrs than I ever did in an office over 8. No walk by’s, no drop ins, no gather rounds or team meetings, no memos or circle the wagon moments. All work, no fluff, and no in office pantomime of walking to talk to all the right people just to be seen, and sound busy. It really is fantastic to drop all of those extra steps and just get to do the work I love. Yes I have to send invoices, and do my own books, and plan around delays in payment or lull periods. But freelancing offers me so much more family time while I have young kids that none of that matters all that much. Glorious. But, I’ve always had a spouse that out earned me by a wide margin, even at my highest paying job, so there is that to consider. It was cheaper in the end for me to take a pay cut, but for us to not have to pay before & after school care costs for two kids, plus sitters for pa days, winter break, and march break, and the whole summer.
How do you have your work space set up? How do you like where you are? What would you change? What are you able to change? Take it easy.
I have an inkling that I should be more focused as I attempt to reclaim my writing streak. Have a more defined plan. Make a statement. Possibly. I don’t know. I’m fighting with the urge to be disheartened and frustrated at losing the number, but all this time I haven’t really done much of anything in regards to the number of consecutive days. 800 sounds really good to me, but it wasn’t defining anything about my blog posts. I just let milestones walk away as unremarkable as any other day. I guess, I’m just pissed off that I’m below even ten percent of where I was. All due to fixing a loading error on a post from two plus months ago. Idiot. Atleast on the bright side I can load posts with photos more easily now, as that problem posts is chewing up my queue. That’s a great thing. Just sad I had to give up more than 90% of my streak days to get that win.
Resolute! That was the word I was looking for, not focused. Though being focused is good too. Determined, even. I’m not going to pack this in just yet, even though I did have a good pout and mope about it after realizing what I had done to myself. No matter. Time marches on, and with each new day, I can add another notch to my belt regardless of what else is going on.
What a strange weekend it was. We both did a lot and nothing much at all. Drove about town for various things, but then had to sit and wait at each and everyone. I have paid work to accomplish today, so I’ll be getting to that at 9:00am. I started it over the weekend because I gave up a good chunk of Friday for the funeral events. That was a good four or more hours, plus driving time to & from. So I felt it reasonable to work later into the night on Friday, and to pick up again on Sunday for another few hours. Nothing too crazy.
Domestic Duties Monday calls. Best get the girls laundry in, and then start my work. I need to eat too, so I best be about my business. Ciao Bella!
With a valiant effort, and two tries at breaking the board my eldest managed a promotion to a full Green Belt in Taekwondo. We are all very proud of her for doing so. Three nights a week, and lots of sparring with other kids. We now have a few more weeks left until we hit the pause button on Taekwondo in favour of summer activities, so we’ll take care to learn what we can, and attempt to retain it for our return to the discipline in late August. Then she can aim towards a blue stripe/blue belt in the next set of sessions next fall. We’ve talked about it, and though she was initially eager to get to a black belt, her goal now is to stop somewhere in the blue belt, or red belt space. And you know what, I’m ok with either option. It’s not just me being cheap. If she knows how to throw a punch, and deliver a devastating kick to protect herself, and has undergone extensive sparring one on one with larger opponents, then we’ve done what we can to see that she is capable of protecting herself reasonably without heroics. Tick that box off the list. Call me satisfied.
This Sunday feels like an extra random day. Friday being so disjointed with the funeral, visitation, and social afterwards has left us feeling a little out of sync with the calendar. Yesterday was busy too, with the testing in the morning, and a four hour play date for the kids in the late afternoon and on into the evening. They were still up until 9:00pm, and were exhausted. They should have slept in until 8 or 9am today. But no. Still up before 7:00am like it won’t be a chore to get them out of bed at the same time for school tomorrow. They never sleep in when given the opportunity. I’ll remind them of that once they become drowsy, mopey teens/tweens.
It was randomly minus sixteen yesterday, but sunny and bright with blue skies. It was rather deceiving if you ask me. Felt very much like the February I remember. Seasonal is the word I’m looking for. But this week will see lows in the negative double digits, and highs in the pluses in double digits too. Very odd. That’s quite the range if you ask me.
I had high hopes of continuing on with the pine bed yesterday, but those cool temps put me off the idea of doing any gluing fixes, or staining. Just too damn cold. The glue wouldn’t take, and the idea of handling fluids in the cold makes me shiver just thinking about it. My space heater is only good to about 12 inches directly in front of it, and I don’t fancy putting any fine dust particles into it, or having it run with flammable fumes in the air. Not looking for a ball of flame to the face. I do not wish to test any close quarters DnD scenarios about a fireball in a small room. 10D6 damage taken. Yikes!
That’s all for this cold Sunday morning. Take care out there. Ciao Bella.
That ruined my streak, because it bugged out when I initially uoaded it, and it was impeding any additional post with photos from uploading. So I tried to put in back as a draft then retry to upload it, which worked by the way, but all of my progress was severed from that point. No longer am I in the 800’s, but I’m back down to 72. Ugh! It’s a heart breaker. But atleast I know that I didn’t really break the streak. I am angry with myself, because I thought really hard about getting a screen shot of Day 800 notification, and thought I’d get it later. Made that mistake a few times. The most tragic was not taking any photos at a five year olds birthday party, expecting to get some at the next play date, only for the little girl to perish along with her mother (my friend) two weeks later. Gotta do that shit now. No guarantees for a later chance.
This morning is Green Belt Testing Day for my eldest at Taekwondo. I’m excited. She’s taken to it like a duck to water. I look forward to seeing how far she can progress. The next belt will take four months to achieve, and they get longer and more difficult the further you move along. We will have to hit pause come the end of April, but we shall resume in late August. I’m happy she knows how to throw a decent kick, and can punch with effectiveness.
Yesterday’s funeral was a nice affair. A bit churchy for my tastes, but I’m alive to see it so I don’t care. Great turn out. Very busy. Funny & charming stories were shared during the speeches. My urn looked solid up on the pedestal. See you around Uncle Frederick George Pike.
Moving an old post that was holding up the queue has killed my streak! It doesn’t read 801, it now reads 71. Fucking hell. God damn. Son of a motherless goat. Cheese and rice. Well this sucks. I’m gonna have to sit with this for a while. I knew I should have screen shotted the Day 800 notification. Fuck!
Today is THE day. It’s here. We made it. Hurray! And it looks as though I am going to be busier than originally planned. So I will do a select few notes on the books I read, and enjoyed more than most.
***I’m still reading both System Collapse, and Lords of Uncreation at this time, I just haven’t finished yet due to travel, and a busier than expected work schedule.
I started the year off with Tom Segura’s book, and enjoyed the hell out of it. Short & sweet, I think I fi wished that in a day and a half. Not very thick, and reads like a funny conversation. The Fart Quest D&D books are always a pleasure to read. Childish and silly with lovely illustrations on many pages. A fun treat for me. Don Winslow’s books are cracker jack popped full of organized crime, murder, gangsters and Danny Ryan. Fast paced, exciting and I can’t wait to read the third and final installment. The Steel Remains was entertaining. I did at one point look into buying more of the series as I like Richard Morgan‘s work. I read two of his books this year, along with Mo Hayder, and Adrian Tchaikovsky too. I read an entire trilogy of a new to me author very early on this year, and it was decent. Had a lot of SA, and physical abuse of kids in it which I didn’t care for, but the writing was good. Those were written by N.K. Jemison.
All told I read 15 books cover to cover, and another 4 books were partial reads of 1/4 to 1/3 of the book in question. So I hit my 12 books in 12 months reading goal. I slowed right down as of September as I got busier with work, as I knew I would. I front end loaded the year pretty heavily to make up for my waning attention, and increased work schedule.
Also for this year in review I didn’t do anywhere near as much sculpting, wood working, or model building. I did one or two items in each category, but I don’t think I finished much. Perhaps next year. I did use my airbrush a fair bit this year to paint old sculpts, and board game pieces. That was a lot of repetition, but also fun to do.
No short stories were written that I can think of this year either. At least nothing comes to mind. I should check the website closer to New Year’s Eve for the official word count for the year. I do not believe that it will even come close to 100,000 words for the year. I just didn’t have that much jam this year. Also I don’t think I made any real progress on my illustrated children’s book either. Was just too busy during what is typically an 11 week long slow period. It was all go-go-go!
We had Covid in march of 2023 and that caused a 90 day reprieve on my exercise regimen to try and avoid long Covid symptoms. Also meant that my weight has remained in the 205-209lbs range for the majority of this year. I swam a lot, but did not ride my bike much, nor run, nor skateboard like I had hoped. I do need to sort something out on that front as I am unhappy with my current pear shape. I could do with being about 175lbs and reduce the belly by a wide margin. Eating and exercise. Simple solution, but oh so hard to implement. Ha. Habits to be build and enforced, just like the writing.
Big question looms. Do we go for a year three of the writing streak, or go until we forget or have more pressing matters to concern ourselves with? If I have another obsessive compulsive year of writing this blog then so be it. I’d blow a kazoo to celebrate if I could. Pfft! W00t-w00t!
Other things to reflect upon? Hmm. Great family vacation to Florida this year. Hadn’t gone anywhere since 2018 so we packed up and flew to Tampa, and then spent a week in Orlando/Kissimmee area. Did three theme parks for 11 of our 14 day trip. One beach day in Clearwater, and one visit to Disney Springs outdoor shopping centre. It was sweltering in Tampa, and rainy and 73°F in Orlando. Not too shabby. Warm enough to swim in the rain, or sit in the hot tub unbothered by it all. We essentially gave the month of November a miss by going away mid month. Strange, but very effective.
Great grandma is alive and kicking, heading towards her 96th birthday in January. Uncle Fred is still in the hospital trying to recoup enough to do another week of 3 Chemo treatments in a row. Otherwise we had the kids pick up a missed immunization that the Ministry notified us of, though they were way off with our youngest. Bit of a mix up there. I picked up a Tetanus shot as I have zero recollection of the last one I ever had. Was probably in high school, if not grade school before that. Good to have as I work with reclaimed wood and pull rusted nails every so often. Better safe than sorry.
I was busier with more work from fewer clients this year. The two micro breweries I usually get work from were very quiet this year. Perhaps in 2024? Maybe. My three biggest clients all did more work this year than usual. Well, two of three did lots more. Not going to complain about that! I lost one client to an acquisition to a large conglomerate that had it’s own in-house design team. No harm no foul there. Win some, lose some. Hard to complain when other clients pick up the slack and then some.
I’m sure more happened that I will remember in a couple of hours time. But that’s the gist of my year. Kids got bigger. Moved up in grades. Homework and extracurriculars abound. Taekwondo, dance, gymnastics, girl guides, and soon Ringette too. We’ve been busy if not over scheduled for children’s programming. Can’t say they didn’t get the chance to try lots of things.
New water softner, fixed water heater valve, and a fridge freezer we no longer use in order to keep the fridge running smoothly. Some how the AC unit has kept chugging along. We will see if that luck continues into 2024. I do see a new fridge in our futures if im being honest.
That’s my 2023 year in review. Ciao Bella!
The story up till now goes as follows; My youngest was in a crib at the cottage for a long time. Then I transformed said crib into a day bed, which she used until she was too long for it and spent all night kicking the end and side panels waking everyone up. I took the crib down and we pulled a single mattress into the room and set her up on the floor. With the intention of putting up a bed shortly there after. Things happened over the summer and the bed was forgotten about. Travel, funerals, anguish, and work took a front seat. Come to September and I milled down a few pine boards, cut them to size, made lots of tight fitting joinery, and then let it sit because I had other things to do and it wasn’t a priority. Fast forward from September to February and a warm spell and I finally had the time to sand it all down, and then I went ahead and began assembly and fitting it all together. Wood movement is a thing, and I continuously don’t pay enough attention to that fact and leave projects for months on end. Good news is, we are assembled. I need to do a few gap fill touch ups, and then a final sand in a few spots, and then stain it all. Let is stand & off gas for a few days then schlep it to the cottage in the back of a truck. It’s pine so it’s pretty light. Easy to move around, and lift up several sets of stairs.
It’s not the prettiest thing, certainly not heirloom quality, but one inch thick pine should hold up for a few years at least. Slatted to hold a box spring, or go straight over with a firm mattress. Would I have preferred to build it with Walnut or a hardwood, certainly I would, but it would be 10X the weight, and who knows how much extra in cost.
I put in an order for 20BF of Walnut last night from a company that delivers. Rough cut, one inch thick. Should come some time next week. I can then plan some narrow book shelves for my kids, and a new Urn. I’m going to try hand cut dove tails this time. I want to book match the outside so I’ll also need to cut some boards down the middle too. That will take some time. Sounds like fun!
I just can’t seem to find the time to get over to the mill to view lumber, so getting some delivered is really helpful. If the wood quality is a bust then I will have to do so myself, shop in person that is. I didn’t spend crazy money on it, so I’m not expecting glowingly perfect boards. A touch rustic perhaps, definitely straight with no cupping, or twist would suit me just fine.
I recently had the chance to use my wood moisture meter. Works great. Reminds me I need to charge and format my endoscope for the car. Has lights on it too! He-he.
We have the funeral today, so I need to fetch the kids from school, change, and head over to the visitation, and then the service proper, and then hang around after to take all of the decorations, flowers, and photos down. Hug your loved ones. Ciao Bella.
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