Year 14, Week 36, Day One (week 683)

Year 14, Week 36, Day One (week 683)
(January 17, 2000 was my first carving day.)
09-28-13 Saturday


    82 degrees in the morning, 89 in the afternoon, loads of puffs and towers, some blocking the sun for a short time, stiff breeze kept it feeling cool. This weather report is brought to you by the City Of Pompano Beach Department of Tourism.


I figured out this weekend that the real pleasure of yard sailing is not, finding things you need, or finding things you want. It is actually finding things that you did not know you needed or wanted. You see something and know it is what you are really missing. 
In yard sailing this weekend, I did not spend too much money. At one yard sale, I picked up a bundle of 76 chop sticks, a see-through ruler and a triangular architectural scale, and a plastic compass that uses a standard pencil. All that for dollar fifty.
At another yard sale, I picked up two boxes, one had foam, rubber, and plastic stamps and ink pads. I also got an embossing kit with anvil, hammer, letter stamps, and disks. all for five bucks. 
The embossing kit forced me to dig into the shed to get two letter sets I had. The new one is a size between the two I already had. Mom has a need for these to make metal tags (using some sheet metal flashing I got last month) for her plans so she can remember what they are.





Since I got all those chop sticks, after I photographed everything, I counted how many sticks I had and looked at the condition. I assume that the sticks were all used once for dinners. 
I figure I can "destroy" them in any way I wish. They will be used as Crochet hooks, dowels, rods, and anything that meets my needs. I happen to have a couple boxes of chop sticks at home so making use of these don't bother me one bit.

I had eight round chop sticks (Japanese style) and I immediately shaped the handle end and cut in the slot to make them into crochet hooks. I got mostly "I" sized hooks, but a few "J" sized hooks. The chop sticks are not all bamboo. Bamboo is excellent for crochet hooks. It bends and breaks with difficulty.
I messed with a couple small ones, trying to knock off some corners. They were not Bamboo and they broke easily. 
As mentioned before, many of my other chop sticks will also become crochet hooks. They can also be used as dowels to connect two pieces of wood together. They will all be used over time.

I have several sized cast iron pans I use regularly. They are usually stacked on one burner of my stove when I am not using them. I decided to make a cup-hook rack to hang them next to the stove but off the surface. 
While getting the letter punches out of the shed, I ran across a package of hooks of various sizes. Later I picked up some larger hooks at ACE HARDWARE. Mom purchased it for me. She told me that she thinks they are a tiny bit big for my Christmas ornaments....
Looking around for some wood, I found a piece of Basswood board that had some cracks running down the center. I cut on the cracks, which was not exactly straight. The wood was rough sawn at the saw mill and had been laying around for a couple years. It was well covered with aged sawdust. 
I used the disk sander on it. I did not get all the saw marks out, and I did not get it absolutely straight and square. I drilled fine holes into the wood for the screws and put in the cup hooks. I over-turned one cup hook and it broke. the end did not come out easily so I left that in. 
I will claim that it has a "RUSTIC" LOOK..... rather than looking lazy and sloppy. 

The dental molding I am using for pasta drying racks were missing a dental. I solved the problem with wood and glue.
One I had glued the damaged strip of dental molding top down on a stick and then sanded off the damaged pieces between the dentals. the count was off. I glued another dental onto it and clamped it tight to dry. Later I sanded off the wood backing so it was even with the others. 
On the other one, a dental was missing, but it was the end of the stick. I had a couple chop sticks where they were made from one piece of wood and were designed to be split apart to be used. I cut the solid back off the chop stick, then made a half-lap joint between the dental molding and the chop stick so the top would be flush with the bottom of the gap that was sticking out. I then took my remaining piece of dental and glued that on upside down and then clamped it tight with a backer piece. I filled the spaces with glue, let it dry, changed the clamp so the backer piece was gone and the clamp applied the full force on the "sandwich" of wood and then let that dry. The result seems very strong. It does not look great, but should work fine since I don't see great forces on these.

We went to the Chinese buffet and that killed some of my working time. Any reduction of food I may have done all week, and will do this next week, was completely erased with that one meal. 

My back complained about bending over on Thursday at the grocery store and it still bothered me this morning. My wrist was acting up and so was my leg. By mid day, though, my back stopped hurting and my other bothers were sometimes unnoticeable. When I started packing up to go home, that was when my back started bothering me again. I had some back damage in the accident and it has been doing well simply because I have been extra careful and have avoided really doing anything. I am not totally sure what it is but for some reason, packing up after a day of projects is hard on my back. I need to look at what I am doing to see what is causing it.

I have a number of projects to work on tomorrow. I will have to see what I actually accomplish.






Year 14, Week 36, Day Two (week 683)
(January 17, 2000 was my first carving day.)
09-29-13 Sunday

89 degrees, puffs moving around quickly, strong breeze to make it feel cool. This weather report is brought to you by the City Of Pompano Beach Department of Tourism. 

In the morning, I decided to put up the pan rack I made. I quickly realized I made a slight tactical error in the design. the holes the mounting screws are supposed to go into should actually be larger than the screw so all screwing force is into the wall rather than moving the screw through the wood of the board. I had used a fine bit just to give a tiny give in the wood as the screw went through and to guide the screw straight. 
I searched for the materials I needed to do the work. My FORDUM motor tool has a chuck that would hold the drill bit I selected, but I could not find the chuck key anywhere. A little battery powered motor tool I have just did not have the guts to do the work. I located an electric drill and that did the job. I drilled out the holes so that while the hole was still too small, it make screwing through it much easier. The pans look natural hanging there now. they are right next to the stove while out of the way. 


I stopped at a yard sale on the way to Mom's house. OH MY GOODNESS!!! I found a knee brace in the style of an unloader brace, where it forces the knee straight. It is exactly what I was attempting to design and build several months ago, but did not have the working technology to make it work. What is more, It only cost me $2. 
It took a little bit to figure out how to put it on. I got it on and was walking around with it just before Mom got home. I had it on the outside of my clothing so I could get a feel for if it was going to work. It encases almost my whole leg. 
We went to the Festival Flea Market, which is on Sample Road next to the turnpike in Pompano Beach. It is a large mall filled with tiny little flea market vendor shops. There are also some larger stores in there including an Antique mall Furniture stores, food court, a Farmer's market. My favorite store is DOLLAR AND UP. It is almost like yard sailing, as it has wonderful things, just like a yard sale has. There are two sites, one is a big store and the other is a medium sized booth. they are operated by the same people but have some different selections. If you cannot find it at one, you can find it at the other, sometimes. 
With the new brace, I walked the mall from about half way to the end and back. My leg itself did not do to bad. The brace, though, pressed into my leg at a couple places. I have to work with it and figure out padding and settings to make it comfortable to wear all day long. There are problems with having it outside the clothing, but those problems will be cleared up after I work out the setup of the brace. 

I finally got to get outside. It was already getting late. I cut the sticks for my pasta drying racks. One of the tools I dug out when I looked for my letter punches was a jig saw attachment for a drill. It just happened that the dental molding is longer than can fit in my band saw so I put the jig saw attachment on the drill and cut right through the wood. It would have been better to clamp the board down so I could hold the drill with one hand and the jig saw with the other, but instead I used the stick to keep the jig saw from spinning on the drill. 
This time, I sanded all the pieces, squaring the ends on the disk sander. To do that, I eyeball it square to the sanding disk, touch it, then rotate a quarter turn and touch it again. Usually two or three full rotations will square up the ends nicely as each time it goes up against the spinning disk, it is flattened top to bottom. That evens out any angle errors. 
Since in was late, I decided to not try to do the prep-work for assembling the drying racks. it will be a quick project next weekend. 

Just before Mom asked to go out to the Festival Flea market. I was trying to tip the table of the table saw on a 45 degree angle. I had cut blanks for Christmas Ornaments but wanted to put it on a 45 degree angle to cut for the fish ornaments. I have to figure out how to tip the table as I need to lop off some wood  with the stick at a 45 degree angle. The way I have been doing it is dangerous and was trying to find a safer way to do it. tipping the table of the bandsaw might be the way to do the project safely. 
I just now wonder if there was a pin or something on the opposite side of the angle control that needs to be pulled to tip the table. I will work it out next weekend.

I have loads of projects to work on next weekend. I will just have to see what projects will get priority. 

I will see what I do next weekend.

 Metal punch set with chains and disks

foam stamps 

 wood mounted rubber stamps

 plastic lid mounted stamps with inc and some shaped punches

chop sticks, triangular architectural scale, clear plastic scale, plastic compass that uses a pencil.

 alphabet punches, top and bottom ones I already had, the middle one (shiny) came with the metal punch set.

 76 chop sticks

 round chop sticks made into "I" and "J" crochet hooks

sandwiched wood to add an additional dental to the stick.  

 "rustic" cup hook strip for pans

"Rustic cup hook strip in place with pans hanging on it.

leg brace opened up

brace on leg my leg I have to figure out how to adjust it properly

THE SHADOW LEGION: NEW ROADS TO HELL (BOOK REVIEW)

From Airship 27, cover by Mike Fyles

Hello Everybody.
Recently I had the honor of being Ric Croxton's guest co-host on episode 77 of his Ric's Comics podcast.
You can listen to that here, and the topic of discussion was The Shadow Legion: New Roads to Hell by Thomas Deja.
While the podcast was spoiler free, what did I actually think of the book?
Well...

In her final days, a woman makes a desperate bid to survive and becomes a growing menace to innocents and criminals alike. Now the criminal Rose Red, she will obtain her goals and stay alive, no matter how high the body count rises.

In his debut novel, Thomas Deja brings together a diverse quartet of mysterious beings to combat a threat to the city of Nocturne, Florida.

While the Black Talon was already an active character at the start of the novel, his girlfriend reluctantly uses the code name Dream Catcher when in public; because she does not really consider herself a crime fighter. However Night Breaker was just a character on a radio show and the person who becomes The Ferry Man had no heroic aspirations at all when the story begins.

Yet these four people wind up being the only ones who are able to stop Rose Red and restore order in Nocturne, although their adventures are far from over at the end of the first book.

Out of all the characters within the tale, the Ferry Man bears watching, and I felt sorry for poor Isaiah Copper even before the cataclysmic events that dragged him into the battle with Rose Red. The villainess her self was unique not only for the pre-World War Two time period the first adventure is set in, but her initial choice of weapons (her 'thorns') was totally appropriate.

As revealed in the podcast, Deja has long term plans for the characters. While most media today is a combination of both words and pictures, he does an excellent job of not only conveying the action and drama in just straight prose, yet delves into social situations that unfortunately existed back then, but are hopefully better today. Overall, a good and recommended read for people looking for something different with their superheroes, or mystery men and women.

I look forward to future installments and adventures of the Shadow Legion.

Published by Airship 27. Cover art by Mike Fyles. Interior illustrations by Chris Kempler. Available through Amazon or the publisher.

Year 14, Week 35, Day 0ne (week 681)

carved figurines, A penguin on the left and a marlin (sail fish) on the right.

Pasta drying racks. The one on the right  is smaller except in height and used dental molding to hold the rods.

 My drill press using a regular drill.  It is actually quite good.

gluing the tops of dental molding to a stick with the plan of cutting or sanding away the existing backing. The stick being glued is to the right. the stick to the left  is just to allow even pressure all along the length.

A closeup of the clamping and dental molding. In this case the glue surface is to the left.




 The finished stick of glued dental molding after the rough base was removed.

 New wheel on wagon. Opposite wheel broke while putting the wagon back. I guess I have to replace all four.

 Some figurines I picked p at a yard sale. The guy also had unicorns but held off on them.

Cast iorn fry pan with wooden handle. It had some surface rust. I cleaned it up and this is after I gave it a light seasoning and used it once. I will use it for a while to give it a real good seasoning.





Year 14, Week 35, Day 0ne (week 681)
(January 17, 2000 was my first carving day.)
09-21-13 Saturday
   
    86 degrees at nine, 89 at two, blue sky to the east over the ocean, puffs to the west over the Everglades. A good breeze kept things nice. This Weather report is brought to you by the City Of Pompano Beach Department Of Tourism.

The mocking birds have started singing again. You cannot get a better singing bird than them. I can listen to them all the time. The variety of their songs, and between birds make them the ultimate singing birds.

We hit three yard sales and I somehow left all of them without buying anything. I had seen something I wanted to get as a present, but it turned out to be part of a set and I did not need the rest of it.

I had a number of projects in mind. The big one was to make some pasta drying racks. I had done most of the preparation for the project last week. Today was the cutting and assembly.
For the screws that went through the sides of the sticks, I used a larger drill bit than the screws I was using. This would allow the parts to rotate. Some did not need to rotate, but I did the same thing for them anyway.
I also used a tiny drill bit to drill into the ends of each stick that got a screw into them. This aided the screw entering them, prevented splitting of the wood and helped me get the screws to go in straight.
On the side pieces, I also used a very big bit and countersunk the holes by hand so the screws would not stick out. This was especially important for the feet so they could sit on the counter flat.
The hardest part was to decide how big the racks would be. My main decision was to cut the three foot long sticks in thirds and that gave me the height and the width of my first two racks.
I found that I need screwdrivers with larger handles as the ones I was using was really wearing out my skin as I could not get really good force on the screw. I would have used a drill or battery powered screwdriver but I could not remember where my bits were and was too lazy to look for them.
My first two racks used the rod holders I made last week, where I clamped two sticks together and drilled between them on the edge.
Later in the day I went to HOME DEPOT and picked up some more rods and sticks. I made a third rack and I used the Dental Molding I had purchased a couple weeks ago. When I made the other ones, I realized that I really should have cut some of the sticks in quarter rather than thirds. This third rack was made at the same 1 foot high as the others, but all the rest of the sticks were at 9 inches, a quarter of the three foot stick. Part of the reason I did this was that the piece of dental molding I was using was not as big as the rod racks of the other two. I went with the foot tall because noodles can easily be that long.
I still have sticks and partial dental molding that I can make use of.

Between the racks, I carved another penguin. I was getting close to finishing when I lopped off the arm. One problem of carving in WHITEWOOD is that it splits easily and delicate parts disappear faster than you would believe. I glued the arm back on and set it to the side. Later, after the glue dried, I carved more on it and decided to let it set for when I do the finishing carving on all the penguins.

I decided to experiment with a possible second carving design. It was suggested to me a few times and fits for down here in Florida. I took a four inch long stick and cut some of the corner off on one end, then the opposite corner on that end. I then turned the piece a quarter and removed those corners so the piece was twisting.
I then kept shaving and shaving until I had a nice fairly flat twist. I also started shaping the head end of the stick based on memory of what a MARLIN (A sail fish) looks like. I started splitting off a fin so I glued that back on and let it dry. Later I did more carving on it. I have more clean up but it came out pretty good so far. Everybody will know what it actually is once I paint it.

I finished working at about three. Both of my wrists bothered me as they both got a real work out between carving and driving in screws. I was seated all day long so my leg gave me just the normal bother when I first got up.

Tomorrow, I hope to work on more pasta drying racks and carve some more figurines.


Year 14, Week 35, Day Two (week 681)
(January 17, 2000 was my first carving day.)
09-22-13 Sunday

90 degrees with good breeze, interlocking feathers to the east over the ocean, building puffs to the west over the Everglades. The puffs started building bigger and bigger as the day wore on. This Weather report is brought to you by the City Of Pompano Beach Department Of Tourism.

I got kidnaped by two yard sales, one going to Mom's house and the Other on the way home. going to Mom's house I got some figurines, some are refrigerator magnets. Most are some form of dragons.
The one on the way home netted me a cast iron fry pan with a wooden handle. It had some surface rust as it did not have any seasoning. I gave it a very light seasoning and then used it to cook dinner. I will use it for a while until it is properly seasoned. I will likely gift it to someone who will really enjoy it. I do like the wooden handle, though. Nice to handle it. The eye hook on the end is what keeps the wooden handle in place. I found out that the eye hook is basically a threaded rod that goes into the pan where it meets the wooden handle.

When removing the dental molding from the cornice piece I had purchased a couple weeks ago, some of the glue was stronger than the wood and the wood split on an angle when I was trying to separate them. Some of it was unusable as it was not strong enough to take light abuse the pasta racks might take. I applied glue to tops of the dental of the dental molding and applied it to a stick I got yesterday. I put another one on the other side to allow me to apply even clamping pressure. I used a number of clamps to make sure I had good pressure everywhere. I set that to dry.
I later un-clamped it, used the bandsaw to remove the worst of the old wood, and then used the disk sander to bring it down to where the wood between the crowns came off. It looks good. They should stay on nicely. I consider that one of my best glue jobs. I did a lot of measurements and decided to wait till next week to make more Pasta Drying
Racks.

I was planning on turning some wood. I even cut a piece off a branch my brother gave me from his Live Oak Tree. I looked at the wooden wheel I made and decided to put that onto the wagon I made it for. I was not going to put the rubber tire on. That, I think, requires boiling water and gloves to get it to stretch enough to fit.
I broke off the rest of the wheel. the part around the axle was good and strong. I ended up using a dremmel to cut the plastic off the shaft and then it took a lot of prying to get it off.
My next project was to get the end cap of the axle off. It took some pounding. After trying different methods, I took and set an ax blade against in and hammered on the flat end of the ax. That finally drove the cap off so I could put the new wooden wheel on. I did some guesses of how wide the wheel needed to be to fit. I sanded off a bit more than I needed so there is more play than needed. I also guessed on the right size drill should be used for the shaft, going a bit bigger. Smaller would have been better. I got the wheel on and figured it will work for a while.
I was pushing the wagon into the hole it came out of next to the band saw and the opposite wheel broke!!!! I see now I need to replace all four wheels. That will give me a good lathe project in the next couple weeks.

About the time I had done those projects, I had enough for the day. I cleaned up, which putting everything away is a project itself.

The Marlin needs some clean up to be presentable. It will also need paint. I still have not decided whether to do them as a series. If I can bandsaw the corners off it will make my project easier, but I need a safer way of handling 45 degree angles that the two by twos have to be. I might try setting the bandsaw table to 45 degrees. Then the stick will think it is laying flat on the table.

I have a number of projects to work on next weekend, some have been sitting for months.
I will see what I work on next weekend.

Year 14, Week 34, Day 0ne (week 680)
(January 17, 2000 was my first carving day.)
09-14-13 Saturday
  
88 in the morning, 94 in the afternoon, blue sky with puffs low on the horizon over the Everglades. Nice breeze to keep things feeling good. A slight haze and some high streaks in the late afternoon to the south and over the ocean.
I have noticed it is getting darker. It was not long ago that I would be driving to Mom's house and it would be light and yard sale signs would already be appearing. Now it is dark and no one is up yet. I got to Mom's house and just barely saw the start of sky getting lighter.
I personally like Daylight savings time as driving in the dark in early morning is much nicer than in the dark at night when the traffic is heavy. Also, in the morning, while it is dark, you know it is going to get lighter.
This weather report is brought to you by the City Of Pompano Beach Department of Tourism.

After breakfast we hit several yard sales. At one, I hit the mother-load. I got another crank meat grinder along with a Tupperware burger press with several containers. I really don't need another meat grinder. My old grinder is by UNIVERSAL and is NO 00. This new one is also UNIVERSAL and it is #1. The grinding bits are interchangeable. It is very slightly bigger but basically the same machine.
I seem to remember having a burger press the exact same design as what I got, so I will have to do a search of my house for it. the nice thing is that the containers is that you press the burger in them, then stack them up, nesting.

After petting and feeding the kitties, I dug a whole bunch of projects and tools out. My plan was to do some of each, giving me a rest on the other.
  
I looked at the parts for the pasta drying rack I intended to make and kept looking at it. I ended the day without doing anything with it.


I sat and carved two penguins. They came fairly easy. As I started my third carving, my wrist complained and let me know that I would suffer if I tried to even get far with that carving. Two would have to do.
This gives me seven penguins. I did two, two weeks ago, three last week, and two this week. Considering that all I really need is twelve of them, I could well get them all done by next week. I still have to come up with several more designs. Some designs are being suggested, but I am looking at how difficult it will be to do them. Simple is the watch word this year. I don't want to be laid up before I finish all of them.
I did figure out that my wrist hurts most when I twist it under pressure.

Between the penguins, I repaired a banana hook I broke last week. Last weekend, I drilled two holes into the faces of the mating surface going all the way into the open. I then settled the piece in position and glued it.
Because I was in a hurry and did not clamp it, it slipped and twisted a little. I could have broken it free and glued it again, but instead I continued on. I drilled through the existing holes out the other side so the holes went all the way through the wood. I then glued in some thick skewers into the holes, going all the way through. After that had dried some, I cut the excess rods off and then spent time sanding it. I used some sawdust I had saved for another project to fill in the gap, but it looked bad. Sanding eliminated all but a tiny bit of the crack that showed. This is not a professional job and many would not want this, but it is repaired and likely stronger than it was before.

Last week I picked up new knobs for my stove. During the week I started to install them. the kit comes with fittings for several different designed posts. I found the right one instantly.
I ran into a little problem. My stove requires you to push the knob in first, then turn it. the new knobs are designed strictly to be turned, and have nothing to push against.
In the end, I did swap some knobs around so the two I use most are readable.

I took out some frozen bread dough out of my freezer just before  I went to bed. I have two different recipes. I am doing a test. I am seeing which I like better, and also I am going to let some rise over night and sew how the flavor changes.



      
Year 14, Week 34, Day two (week 680)
(January 17, 2000 was my first carving day.)
09-15-13 Sunday


84 degrees, cloudy and threatening. To the south, a line or storm came in like a train. To the north there was a wide blob. Over us, other than some light sprinkles in the afternoon, was pretty good. The breeze was strong which made sure it was not humid. This weather report is brought to you by the City Of Pompano Beach Department Of Tourism.

I dug out the parts for the pasta drying racks I want to make. I decided to start by ATTEMPTING to do it right. I measured several times and cut two stick in thirds, about twelve inches long. I then marked one inch increments down the length, starting about half inch from the end.
I went to the big drill press and put in a big drill bit and drilled right between the two sticks which I clamped together with clamps from a battery cable. There was very little movement. It did mar the surface but that is all right. These are not going to be professional anyway.
Once the holes were drilled, I sat with a tiny sanding drum on my dremmel and cleaned up the holes.
I have a drill mounted in a drill press adapter. There was an axillary chuck in it for holding really tiny drill bits for scroll sawing. I had to remove that. I chose a drill bit that was bigger than my screws, and I drilled through each of my rod holders in the center. What this does is to allow the parts to rotate while the screw holds firmly into the wood.

Mom wanted me to go with her to the FESTIVAL FLEA MARKET, which is on Sample Road next to the Turnpike. It is a mall filled with small vendors and a few larger stores. If one knows prices and quality, one can get real bargains there. they also have stuff you would be very lucky to find anywhere else.

I cleaned up my stuff, making sure everything is put away. I had planned on trying to carve another penguin but going with Mom eliminated that opportunity.

I walked the length of the place and back and walked several stores. At the far end from where we parked is a FARMER'S MARKET. I found some BUCKWHEAT there. I like to mess with different grains. I usually cook them together like rice. I have not had buckwheat so I had to get a package. I picked up a few other things I DON'T need at a few other stores. When we got back to the car, I was tired. It was good exercise which I really needed. I ached all over but was well worth the pain.

I baked a batch of the two recipes of bread dough. They are both good, but I do like the new one better. I had added a whole lot more sugar but it does not taste sweet. The old recipe was in a small baking tin while the new one was in a bigger pan. Both will end up being eaten fairly quickly.
I plan to bake the other two batches tomorrow night so I can compare the flavors .

For next week, I hope to carve a few more penguins. I also want to get at least one pasta drying rack made. They are simple in design. I am just not great at assembly.
I have some big projects still looking at me. I have a dragon I was carving before the accident. I have a vase that is supposed to be carved with five faces on it. I have loads of wood that needs to be turned into pretty objects and saw dust.

I will have to see what I actually do next week.

  
  

meat grinder

burger press

repaired banana hook

benguins

battery cable clamp, holes drilled, and resulting two pieces.

Year 14, Week 32, Day Three (week 678)
(January 17, 2000 was my first carving day.)
09-02-13 Monday
   
    Actual weather report unremembered and never checked as I never left the house. (written later in the week.) This weather report is brought to you by the City Of Sunrise Department of Tourism.
   
    ABOUT THE WEATHER - Theorizing
   
    While looking at the weather radar today, something dawned on me. The nature of South Florida, is that sand and dust is carried across the Atlantic and it settles on us. In Palm Beach County, they have high sand dunes along the coast and they are created from African Windblown sand.
    There is a chain of islands off the coast of Florida known as the BAHAMAS. They catch a lot of the windblown sand from Africa so that Broward County and Miami Dade County don't develop the high sand dunes. The beaches themselves are built from sands that work their way down the coast from up north.
    When there are not storms or fronts, we get weather that develops from the prevailing winds from the north-west, and winds coming off the ocean.
    I had noticed over the years while watching the weather radar that Palm Beach County tends to get heavier rains, and they tend to last longer than farther south. The idea that came to me was that the Bahamas might be mellowing some of the natural off shore winds. http://www.worldatlas.com/webimage/countrys/namerica/caribb/bs.htm The way it looks on the map, Mom's house is about in line with some horizontal islands at the top of the chain, which might help in it being the driest part of the county.
   
    Grand Bahama and Little Aboco, along with Great Aboco provide a line aiming at Pompan.


 


    LABOR DAY MONDAY AND ABOUT FOOD
   
        Last week, one of the local stores had the Boston Pork Butt Roasts at almost a quarter off the cost that the big chain stores carry it. It was a little over ten percent less than this store normally carries it. This was half the cost of the cheapest beef steaks. I don't buy beef because of the cost. Over the weekend, I ended up with eight of the bone-in medium sized roasts.
    On Sunday evening, I sliced steaks off each roast first, until I reached the bone which in most cases is small. Most of my freezer is filled with pork steaks. I have a powered meat slicer but found that the Chef's knife is easier to set up, works better, and is much easier to clean up.
    Monday was Labor day which I had off from work, I took a fillet knife and removed the meat from the bones. The bones are now in the freezer and will later be put in the CROCK POT and made into soup stock.
    Now my plan was to make sausage. I love sausage and the idea of making my own tugged at my brain. I don't have a way to put them into casings so they were going to be sausage patties.
    I took out the meat grinder attachment that fit my SUNBEAM mixer and set it up. I then started feeding the meat into it. Meat showed up at the end and nothing happened. It just stopped feeding. I was going to check the instructions to see what was wrong, but then changed my mind. I disassembled the grinding unit so it could be washed. I will figure out later what went wrong.
    On TV, I saw where they used a food processor to make ground meat. I chopped up my trimmings (including some from the steak) and ran it in batches through the food processor. When I was done, I took about three patties worth of meat and added some seasoning I thought would be right for sausage and fried them. I saw that I did not have enough seasoning, The meat was not chopped enough, and I was not impressed with my mixture.
    I dug out my crank meat grinder and ran the meat through that. Being broken up made the job a whole lot easier. On TV they use the perfect cuts of meat with no connective tissue and limited amounts of fat. that stuff gave me some trouble with the food processor but was not a problem in the grinder because they were already somewhat broken down. I now had 2 one gallon baggies of ground meat to deal with. I had to re-pack my freezer to make room to just freeze the patties flat.
    I made my normal burgers. I add my seasonings, oat flour as a filler, egg as a binder. I formed them into balls and stuck them into sandwich baggies and pressed them. I made these thicker than I normally do. I then stacked them in the freezer.
    My freezer is full and I have no chance of making use of any kind of sales on meat or frozen veggies for a while.
   
    BREAD
   
    Sunday I made some more bread dough. I added more sugar to this batch. I cut that in quarters and stuck it into the freezer. I then took out some of the dough I had already had frozen. I thawed the dough, kneaded it, and let it rise. I had gone to Moms and when I came back, I kneaded it and let it rise again. I put it in the pan and let it rise over night.
    Monday, I baked it and found it had developed a whole lot more flavor than it did when I cooked it after it had doubled in size. When I re-arranged my freezer, I found that I still had a few balls of this dough left. I intend to try making bread again with it and let it set between kneading to develop flavor. The worse that could happen is I end up with sourdough. Not having to rush to kneed the dough increases the ease of making bread.
    I have already made the decision that I have no use for a bread machine. It is not a difficult process to make bread by hand. I did read that because bread dough is by nature sticky, one tends to add too much flour when making it by hand and it does not rise as much.
    I likely will never use my electric pasta maker. I don't even buy those kinds of noodles. I make the noodles I buy most, which are flat.   
   
    Will have to see what I  end up doing next weekend.
   
   

Year 14, Week 32, Day 0ne (week 679)
(January 17, 2000 was my first carving day.)
09-07-13 Saturday
   
    80 degrees, light breeze, pregnant clouds early morning, giving birth to the north and south of us, with a thought of it before breakfast in our area. Over us became high boulder clouds with bases reaching down to the ground to the North of us. We got a little bit more wetness in the evening.
   
   
    We hit several yard sales but I did not see anything I could not live without. the early morning did not look good for yard sales but it improved as the day wore on.
   
    I am making some penguin ornaments. I needed some blanks. I took my stick of 2x2 whitewood from HOME DEPOT and cut three twelve inch lengths from it. I still have about four feet left on the stick.
    I then dragged out the lathe. The weather was questionable so if I made my carving blanks early, I could easily just sit and carve while the weather did its thing.
    There are days when you should never get near a power tool. You usually don't know it until after you are using it. It does not fully dawn on you until later. You usually try to get the job done anyway. Luckily, I was not working with a rushed project or a big project.
    I mounted the stick into the lathe after marking centers on the ends and marking thirds down the lengths, I took my parting tool and started cutting in at the base of the three pieces. The corners of the stick broke.
    I am not exactly sure how it happened, but I do know that my parting tool got pulled into the work because I was not moving it over to make a relief cut. The base of my little finger got pinched between the tool rest and the work for a fraction of a second and it nipped a piece of skin off. It did not bleed much but it did hurt. After a very quick check, I got back to work. I cut in the tops of each base also and then changed sticks.
    On the second stick, because I was not making relief cuts, I was making the relief cut on the base of one figure  a little deeper and it bound. the stick bent right there, showing that the wood twisted at the cut.
    I got the third stick done to the same amount. I did not remove the excess wood where the figure did not stick out but would take the extra cuts with the knife to do that.
    I went to the band-saw and sliced the blanks off the stick. On one, I cut at the wrong point. One blank has two bases attached, while another has no base.
    I put everything back so I would not have to give the weather another thought.
    It was not a good day with the machines. It was only later that it dawned on me how bad I was doing. I am actually quite surprised that I did not get hurt worse.
   
    I settled down with my carving kit, stropped my knife so it had a good edge. I took a blank I made last week and started carving on that. I had removed the wood from where nothing was sticking out. the problem with this is that you cannot change your mind, shifting things up or down. That penguin went fast. I then started on my second penguin with the new blank. It was more cutting but that was really not a problem.
    One problem with Whitewood as opposed to Basswood, is that Whitewood is a little more brittle. It will splinter. The favorite thing for it to splinter on is noses and beaks. One then has to cut a little deeper to bring them out enough. I lopped off the beak while cutting wood from beneath it so I had to cut in. One would not notice that I made that mistake. I doubt I could tell you which one I made the mistake on.
    I was finished on the third penguin except for the legs, which all three need more work. Three carvings was a good result for the day.
    My body and I have conversations. My wrist was explaining to me that if I even gave a thought about carving a fourth penguin, or finishing up the three I made, it would make me regret it for the rest of my life. I know it was exaggerating but I took the advice and cleaned up.  It then nagged me the rest of the day about how much it had to do. In the afternoon, I gave thought to going out and carving a little more and my wrist reminding me about the warning. The nick in the skin on my hand screamed at me each time I bumped it. It not bad, but it does hurt. My legs only complained at me when I got up after sitting too long.
   
    tomorrow, I hope to carve again. I should finish carving the three I made today, and then paint them. When painted, there is a satisfaction that it is complete, no question as to what it is. As to any other woodworking or projects I might do, I will have to see. It is not like I have no ideas for work to do.
   
    I will see what end up doing tomorrow.
   
   





Finished penguins. Well, not finished, but close. There is some carving to do on all of them.



   
    LABOR DAY MONDAY AND ABOUT FOOD
   
        Last week, one of the local stores had the Boston Pork Butt Roasts at almost a quarter off the cost that the big chain stores carry it. It was a little over ten percent less than this store normally carries it. This was half the cost of the cheapest beef steaks. I don't buy beef because of the cost. Over the weekend, I ended up with eight of the bone-in medium sized roasts.
    On Sunday evening, I sliced steaks off each roast first, until I reached the bone which in most cases is small. Most of my freezer is filled with pork steaks. I have a powered meat slicer but found that the Chef's knife is easier to set up, works better, and is much easier to clean up.
    Monday was Labor day which I had off from work, I took a fillet knife and removed the meat from the bones. The bones are now in the freezer and will later be put in the CROCK POT and made into soup stock.
    Now my plan was to make sausage. I love sausage and the idea of making my own tugged at my brain. I don't have a way to put them into casings so they were going to be sausage patties.
    I took out the meat grinder attachment that fit my SUNBEAM mixer and set it up. I then started feeding the meat into it. Meat showed up at the end and nothing happened. It just stopped feeding. I was going to check the instructions to see what was wrong, but then changed my mind. I disassembled the grinding unit so it could be washed. I will figure out later what went wrong.
    On TV, I saw where they used a food processor to make ground meat. I chopped up my trimmings (including some from the steak) and ran it in batches through the food processor. When I was done, I took about three patties worth of meat and added some seasoning I thought would be right for sausage and fried them. I saw that I did not have enough seasoning, The meat was not chopped enough, and I was not impressed with my mixture.
    I dug out my crank meat grinder and ran the meat through that. Being broken up made the job a whole lot easier. On TV they use the perfect cuts of meat with no connective tissue and limited amounts of fat. that stuff gave me some trouble with the food processor but was not a problem in the grinder because they were already somewhat broken down. I now had 2 one gallon baggies of ground meat to deal with. I had to re-pack my freezer to make room to just freeze the patties flat.
    I made my normal burgers. I add my seasonings, oat flour as a filler, egg as a binder. I formed them into balls and stuck them into sandwich baggies and pressed them. I made these thicker than I normally do. I then stacked them in the freezer.
    My freezer is full and I have no chance of making use of any kind of sales on meat or frozen veggies for a while.
   
    BREAD
   
    Sunday I made some more bread dough. I added more sugar to this batch. I cut that in quarters and stuck it into the freezer. I then took out some of the dough I had already had frozen. I thawed the dough, kneaded it, and let it rise. I had gone to Moms and when I came back, I kneaded it and let it rise again. I put it in the pan and let it rise over night.
    Monday, I baked it and found it had developed a whole lot more flavor than it did when I cooked it after it had doubled in size. When I re-arranged my freezer, I found that I still had a few balls of this dough left. I intend to try making bread again with it and let it set between kneading to develop flavor. The worse that could happen is I end up with sourdough. Not having to rush to kneed the dough increases the ease of making bread.
    I have already made the decision that I have no use for a bread machine. It is not a difficult process to make bread by hand. I did read that because bread dough is by nature sticky, one tends to add too much flour when making it by hand and it does not rise as much.
    I likely will never use my electric pasta maker. I don't even buy those kinds of noodles. I make the noodles I buy most, which are flat.   
   
    Will have to see what I  end up doing next weekend.
   
   

Year 14, Week 32, Day 0ne (week 679)
(January 17, 2000 was my first carving day.)
09-07-13 Saturday
   
    80 degrees, light breeze, pregnant clouds early morning, giving birth to the north and south of us, with a thought of it before breakfast in our area. Over us became high boulder clouds with bases reaching down to the ground to the North of us. We got a little bit more wetness in the evening.
   
   
    We hit several yard sales but I did not see anything I could not live without. the early morning did not look good for yard sales but it improved as the day wore on.
   
    I am making some penguin ornaments. I needed some blanks. I took my stick of 2x2 whitewood from HOME DEPOT and cut three twelve inch lengths from it. I still have about four feet left on the stick.
    I then dragged out the lathe. The weather was questionable so if I made my carving blanks early, I could easily just sit and carve while the weather did its thing.
    There are days when you should never get near a power tool. You usually don't know it until after you are using it. It does not fully dawn on you until later. You usually try to get the job done anyway. Luckily, I was not working with a rushed project or a big project.
    I mounted the stick into the lathe after marking centers on the ends and marking thirds down the lengths, I took my parting tool and started cutting in at the base of the three pieces. The corners of the stick broke.
    I am not exactly sure how it happened, but I do know that my parting tool got pulled into the work because I was not moving it over to make a relief cut. The base of my little finger got pinched between the tool rest and the work for a fraction of a second and it nipped a piece of skin off. It did not bleed much but it did hurt. After a very quick check, I got back to work. I cut in the tops of each base also and then changed sticks.
    On the second stick, because I was not making relief cuts, I was making the relief cut on the base of one figure  a little deeper and it bound. the stick bent right there, showing that the wood twisted at the cut.
    I got the third stick done to the same amount. I did not remove the excess wood where the figure did not stick out but would take the extra cuts with the knife to do that.
    I went to the band-saw and sliced the blanks off the stick. On one, I cut at the wrong point. One blank has two bases attached, while another has no base.
    I put everything back so I would not have to give the weather another thought.
    It was not a good day with the machines. It was only later that it dawned on me how bad I was doing. I am actually quite surprised that I did not get hurt worse.
   
    I settled down with my carving kit, stropped my knife so it had a good edge. I took a blank I made last week and started carving on that. I had removed the wood from where nothing was sticking out. the problem with this is that you cannot change your mind, shifting things up or down. That penguin went fast. I then started on my second penguin with the new blank. It was more cutting but that was really not a problem.
    One problem with Whitewood as opposed to Basswood, is that Whitewood is a little more brittle. It will splinter. The favorite thing for it to splinter on is noses and beaks. One then has to cut a little deeper to bring them out enough. I lopped off the beak while cutting wood from beneath it so I had to cut in. One would not notice that I made that mistake. I doubt I could tell you which one I made the mistake on.
    I was finished on the third penguin except for the legs, which all three need more work. Three carvings was a good result for the day.
    My body and I have conversations. My wrist was explaining to me that if I even gave a thought about carving a fourth penguin, or finishing up the three I made, it would make me regret it for the rest of my life. I know it was exaggerating but I took the advice and cleaned up.  It then nagged me the rest of the day about how much it had to do. In the afternoon, I gave thought to going out and carving a little more and my wrist reminding me about the warning. The nick in the skin on my hand screamed at me each time I bumped it. It not bad, but it does hurt. My legs only complained at me when I got up after sitting too long.
   
    tomorrow, I hope to carve again. I should finish carving the three I made today, and then paint them. When painted, there is a satisfaction that it is complete, no question as to what it is. As to any other woodworking or projects I might do, I will have to see. It is not like I have no ideas for work to do.
   
    I will see what end up doing tomorrow.
 




Year 14, Week 32, Day Two (week 679)
(January 17, 2000 was my first carving day.)
09-07-13 Sunday
   
    94 degrees at noon with the sun shining. Thunder bumpers towered to the west over the Everglades and to the North over Palm Beach County. 88 degrees after the sun snuck behind the thunder bumpers. Light breeze did not help much. it started piddling around two thirty, but I was well done for the day by then. This weather report is brought to you by the City Of Pompano Beach Department of Tourism.
   
    I decided I would look into making a new pasta drying rack. I had figured out some techniques that was used in the construction.
    I went to a local HOME DEPOT STORE and searched for materials that would work. I found the three quarter inch square sticks, and the rods. I then needed to look for molding that would work nicely.
    I found one corner molding that had an applied series of squares that the space was wide enough for my selected dowels to fit into. I had not given thought to what it was going to cost until I paid the bill. Ouch!
    At Mom's house, I dug out the tools and started the process of slicing off the square strip. I got half of it off before it broke. The second half started splitting as they had glued the strip on heavier. I lost some but got the rest of the strip off. I will have to do some work to make it work right.
    I really should have mounted the molding in the band saw or table saw and sliced off the excess wood to have free access to the dental strip and could have completely removed it without any damage. But, I though it would pry off easily as part of it looked, and was, not glued on perfectly.
    I was trying to avoid doing the project right. I should have set up the drill press with a fence, attached two sticks together, mark my spacing and drill down at the gap between the two sticks to get my rod holders. That still might end up being the way I will end up doing it. At the moment, though, there is junk and equipment all around the drill press so one cannot really do the right kind of work there. I do have a portable drill press using a regular drill. I might decide to take that out and see what can be done with that.
    20/20 hindsight is everything. I can see I should not have tried to take the short cut.
    I did not take recent pictures of the drying rack I am trying to replicate but basically it is two base pieces, two upright pieces, one from each base, two cross braces between the uprights, and two rod holders centered on the ends of each uprights.
    The long noodles are draped on the dowel rods and set on top the rack to dry.
        The dental molding was to hold the rods in place.
   
    During the week, my banana hook fell to the floor and broke. It was cut from a board and it split at the top, where the grain ran the thickness rather than the length.
    I drilled two holes right through the face of the break, one going through the end, and the other through the arm of the hook. I then glued the two pieces together.
    They will set until next week. I will drill through the "guide holes" I have already made and glue dowels into the holes to give the broken joint strength.
    I will admit that I have never been good at fixing such breaks. Since I picked this up at a yard sale real cheep, if it does not work, I won't cry. If it works, it will be a feather in my cap and still be useable.
    My thought is that I could never drill holes that lined up once it was put together. By drilling through the face first and gluing it, I will, hopefully, get the holes going through lined up properly.
   
    I really did not get a whole lot done today, but have set up for some interesting projects.
   
    Now whether I work on the projects I started, or work on ornaments, or get involved in something else,
   
    I will have to see what I do next weekend.