Year 15, Week 21, Day One (week 718)

Year 15, Week 21, Day One (week 718)
(January 17, 2000 was my first carving day.)
06-14-14 Saturday

88 degrees, mostly sunny with high haze and feathers, no breeze in the morning, Everglades storms built up in afternoon and then headed West. This weather report is brought to you by the City Of Weston Department of Tourism.

We hit a couple yard sales on the way home from breakfast. They had some interesting stuff, but nothing I could not live without. Nothing I really wanted well enough to ask the price of, if it was not marked. I was hoping to find something good, but didn’t. Maybe next weekend.

My brother’s daughter got married this week. Early in the week, they went to get the licence and had a justice of the peace marry them. Then this weekend, they had a reception with an official ceremony.

I did not have much else to do, so I took pictures. I had both my cameras with me. I did some test video with my old camera and it took images like two per second, really jerky. I decided to use that for stills. I then used my other camera and got good video with it. I filmed the ceremony, where they got married by a minister.  The camera started with fifteen minutes and it was really close when they finished.
I also got films of people dancing. Most people watched. Just a core group danced. Other than the official dances of the bride with the father, the groom with his mother, and a couple others, most of the dances was line dancing. Cute.
I did not know it, but the camera recorded sound. There is a lot of clicking of my hands on the camera as I changed positions, and comments with people behind the scene while I was shooting, assuming there was no sound. It is noticeable, but I don’t think it really detracts from it.
Quite a few people were taking pictures and videos. Mom’s pictures did not come out great. Her flash pictures did not reach far enough, and her natural light pictures came out worse. I got some good ones. My videos came out really good. Hopefully, all the images will be gathered together in one place. All my shots from both cameras took three DVDs to hold it. One for stills, and two for the video. The ceremony took a gig by itself.

When we got back, we had just enough time to nap, pet the cat before the day was done.

I hope to do something in wood tomorrow. I have no clue what it will be.

I will see what I do tomorrow.





Year 15, Week 21, Day Two Week 718)
(January 17, 2000 was my first carving day.)
06-15-14 Sunday

88 degrees when I got outside. 93 degrees when I went in for the day. Splashed milk and feathers, along with random puffs in the sky. The puffs built up and solidified into the normal Everglades showers that headed west. There was a nice breeze but I turned on a fan anyway, which helped.

My first project was to dig in the shed. I wanted to find a charger to see if it would work on a battery powered vacuum we picked up. I had to dig deep to get to the stuff. The drill I was after, turned out to use a smaller center pin than the sweeper. I then located another battery powered drill and it fit. It looked like it was charging, the little light seemed to be on, though it was too bright to see it well. I left it for Mom to check out and test.
With chargers, one has to get the right end, and then the right polarity. Sometimes the center post is positive, sometimes it is negative. I have no idea if the polarity is right, but it fit and that was something to try anyway. I did find a couple things I forgot all about. I put them up front where I can see them each time I am in the shed.

I was in the mood to do something in wood, but not really in the mood to do anything at all. I looked at some of my knives. The salt air is getting to the blades. I sharpened and stropped each of them (5 knives), I used one of them to try carving on the Sea Grape mouse I am trying to carve. It reminded me that it is not a great carving wood. I sort of thought it might be that my knife was not sharp enough. I stropped this knife till it could shave the hair on my arm. Not perfectly but did remove hair. I was right. That is just not a wood to carve.
Tired of that, I dug out some rods I machined out of Chop Sticks, and cut in hooks to make them crochet hooks. Each of these needed a little more work and I did sand them by hand.
While cutting in the hook on the first one, I went a bit deep. When I checked to see how strong it was, it broke easily. I did the other end to the same result. I got the third try right. I then did three other rods. The biggest one has hooks on both ends.
I still have to test them out and see how they work. There is usually little problems with them at first. An emery board used for finger nails sometimes solves that problem. Also, how the point is makes a difference too. I might need to shorten the point, but won’t know for sure until I test them out.
I have worked on these rods over the past month or so. Rounding them with various means such as the knife, or driving them through a hole in a piece of steel, machining them on the little lathe. So cutting the hook into them in is a big step in the process. It is actually a completed project. That is something to celebrate.

After lunch, we sat and viewed some pictures. I had not used my DVD hardly at all. Mine could not be seen on the TV DVD player. It should be viewable on Mom’s computer. She will put them on new disks and be able to make something that will be used everywhere.

I have to learn more of the features of my cameras so I can get more consistent results. I really need to do some serious woodworking. I will have to see what the weather will be like next weekend. I have plenty of wood.

I will see what I actually do next weekend.