Orlando, FL

Today was yet another hectic and busy day. The word got out that Fay is still sick and I guess alot of work is going to Hollywood while Fay is out. I am still doing the onesy-twosy requests that come in though.

I talked to Fay briefly this morning. She said she's had this pain since before she went on vacation, but she kept it quiet because she wanted to go so badly. This weekend she got a fever and it kept climbing. She is one sick girl now! She says she is in a lot of pain too.

It is only Tuesday and we have sent over $125k already. It will be a good week, but Craig warned me that Gabe has a $500k order from one of his dealers.

At lunch Debbie came in and watched the phones. She kept herself busy redoing her email accounts too. I brought Buddy back to the office after lunch. It was a change of pace for him and he kept me company.

I forgot that the technician was coming this afternoon to do PMS on our Ansul system. Nick likes dogs and Buddy went to the Test Kitchen to "supervise" Nick working.

It began to rain and storm while Nick was working. It poured and the wind blew, but it only lasted 30 minutes.

Craig returned to the office before the end of the day. He said the trip back from Tampa took him three hours!

Everyone wants Fay to come back as soon as she is well (some want her back sooner). I think that we are starting to hit our stride now with her gone. But, we can't really afford to lose anyone else right now. Plus, a busy two weeks of demos are coming up.

I got my paystub this evening. In addition to my regular salary, there was a $1000 bonus! Most of that will go to savings for my house-hoping account.

Uuuggghh!

The weekend was okay. An average weekend. I did laundry and cleaned the floors. I read a few more sci-fi stories and I listened to the CD's Craig loaned me. I worked in the garage in the afternoon Saturday on my router table extension. Actually I left the real thing alone and worked with the scrap figuring out the best way to rout and cut the section out where the router base plate will rest. That way I don't mess up the real thing immediately.

On Sunday I took Buddy for a drive. We went around and looked at some of the houses I have seen on realtor.com. Geez. Most of the neighborhoods are slums and they still want $160k or more for those houses. The house itself can be cute, but nothing but trash all around it.

We drove through College Park and happened to catch Rick Mullis in his front yard. Rick invited us in and poured a bowl of water for Buddy. Buddy drank it all gone and remained very excited the entire time we were there -- he could smell a cat in the house! Rick told us about his plans for the house and apologized for not keeping in-touch since he lost my phone number when he got a new phone. I hear that alot. People need to write these numbers down!

Fay didn't make it to work today. She has a kidney infection. So, today was kinda hectic for me. I had lunch in the Test Kitchen because I had a few of her quotes I needed to get out. Just a very busy day for me. We don't expect to see her for a few days.

Poor Buddy had to wait all day to go outside, but he was fine. He's been walked and fed now and he is chewing on his rawhide bone.

TGIF !!!

Geez. I cannot believe how busy our office has been this week.

Fay was half an hour late for work. She called in and said she was up at 3 am taking her son to the airport. When she got home she laid down to nap, but overslept. Funny. She left 2 hours early today too. Must be nice to work half days.

Craig comes in this afternoon, "Now don't take this the wrong way, you're doing a good job, but..." and I interrupt, "Oh great, another one of THOSE talks again!" We had an issue with an order this week where the dealer would not revise his purchase order, the order said "Not before 7-25-07", but now of course all of the equipment is required to be delivered 8-1-07. I snarled at Craig, "That arrogant son-of-a-bitch wouldn't revise the order! It's not like I played 'I Have A Secret'. I faxed the request to him four times and everyone in here knew what was up with that order!" I kinda disagree with Craig about how much hand-holding FER should be doing for the dealers.

Greg Olsen thanked me for keeping up with all of the order issues with his dealers. Craig hinted that I will be getting a large bonus this payday. Well, we will see.

As I drove up at lunch the exterminator, The Orkin Man, was leaving my building. So, I let Buddy out of the crate and then, being paranoid, wiped all of the countertops down thoroughly. Is it really paranoid? I mean, a stranger was just in my house spraying poison.

This evening, after walking Buddy, I vacuumed, started laundry, put dishes away, and made a dinner of Gortons Frozen Lemon Pepper Fish Fillets and Green Giant Frozen Brussels Sprouts with Butter Sauce. Yum! I have the plants outside watered. Buddy is contentedly chewing on his rawhide bone now.

Tomorrow I will work with the scrap wood to test ways of making the router baseplate ledge in my new table. Also, I think Buddy is due for a bath. Then I will have to scrub the tub out. I have a few books-on-CD that Craig loaned me that I still need to listen to also. I want to relax.

TGIF !!!

Orlando, FL

Another busy day, but not quite as bad as yesterday.

It was very hot and again we were promised a 60% chance of showers. But it hasn't rained.

We are coming into another busy period for FER. It is time to demo all of the equipment we sold to schools. This next month is going to be full of demos and training sessions. I bet it will be full of controversy too.

I am glad the weekend is almost here. This has been a rough week.

Orlando, FL

I am exhausted. Today was a "very busy day" as Fay would understate it. I don't even feel like re-hashing everything that happened. Everyday is like a soap opera.

We had a 60% chance of showers today, but even though the skies were threatening in all directions, it never rained here.

For dinner I had a ham steak with spinach. Buddy ate the fat I trimmed off and the bone in the center. It was pretty salty too.

I have a scratch down my forehead and between my eyes from the dog playing lastnight. As soon as I yelled he settled down -- head and tail down... "Uh oh! I messed up again."

Orlando, FL

Well this week is getting off to a good start for orders at FER. We are close to $100k and it was only Tuesday! I stayed pretty continuously busy today too.

Aside from wiping the cabinet project down really good with Pledge or Behold, it is done. Not exactly my best work, but it is done now. My router table extension for the table saw will only be a couple more weeks and it will be finished too. Then I promised myself I would thoroughly clean out the garage. My God! The dust!

Yesterday evening I made chicken breast and chicken drumsticks on the grill. I had leftovers today at lunch. Of course Buddy got some of it. He really likes chicken!

This evening I made a Lean Cuisine dinner. Easy. Tasty. Buddy just finished licking the plastic plate clean. Now I hear him in the laundry crunching on his Science Diet Lamb Meal and Rice.

It only sprinkled today. We had a 60% chance of showers. I guess it still COULD rain, but I doubt it will.

Pictured here is a Volkswagen Karman Ghia I saw in the Publix parking lot this morning on the way to work. They stopped making these in 1974, so that car is atleast 33 years old.

Tammy Faye Bakker Messner

Well, I took the computer to the office on Friday for Evelyn to fix. When I pulled the computer out of the desk I noticed ALOT of dust on the power supply fan and exit vents. I blew this off and took the cpu in anyway.

After Evelyn was done installing fax machine software on Fay's computer, she looked at my computer. I told her that it is possible that dirt and dust were causing the problem and not a virus. I took the cover off of the side of the cabinet and OMG! - the power supply was clogged with dust and everything inside was covered in dust! We got the canned air and took it outside to blow it out. After that we plugged it in and connected it to the spare monitor. It booted up normal. I thought the problem was solved.

Brought the computer home at lunch and left it. After work I hooked everything back up. When I turned it on it began beeping again - same as before. I phoned Evelyn and she said, well, we didn't have a keyboard hooked up earlier either. Turns out the "+" key was sticking on the keyboard! That was the real cause of the problem.

I spent about three hours on Saturday reinstalling the wi-fi software and getting it configured properly. I don't mess with that very often and it took awhile to get it just right - it kept disconnecting me after 15 minutes and would only let me reconnect after re-entering the 26-character-long encryption key (and you have to type it in TWICE each time!!). Turns out I had a switch set to "Open" when it should have been set to "Shared" - as in "shared security key". It's been fine since I discovered that and corrected it.

FER-Orlando brought in $499,000 in new orders this week. FER-Hollywood brought in $82,000. I told Fay that I would fax some of our orders down to Barbara so she has something to put on her report! LOL!

Yesterday afternoon I worked in the garage cutting the phenolic-coated plywood. I cut the piece out to size just fine, then I put the dado blade in. Well, here we had a problem. Making the dado crosscut there was terrible tearout on the top. I tried three things to alleviate this - 1. made a score line with a knife along the proposed cut, 2. covered the top with tape, 3. reduced my rate of feed through the blade. I think slowing down the feedrate is what helped the most, but if you slow down, the blade is rubbing against the wood more and it burns. Sure enough, the garage was filled with blue smoke.

After cutting the dado on all four sides, I got the maple frame and dry fit it up on the plywood table top. It fit almost perfectly! So, that project is coming right along now.

Next I put a furniture pad on the table and laid the cabinet carcase on its back on the pad. I started to fit the drawers in one at a time and used the mallet to drive the pegs in that they pivot on. All five drawers fit, but I need to go out this afternoon and sand tops and sides down alittle bit (in some cases ALOT, actually). I can see this project being substantially done next weekend.

This morning I took Buddy to the West Orange Dog Park and let him run and play. He took three dumps while he was there! Partly because we did not take a walk lastnight - it was raining. We stayed there for an hour. He is laying down now.

I have four books on CD to listen to today. CD's that Craig left on my desk. I am sure the business ones will be boring, but two of them are the Trends magazine that I like.

Uggh! Back to work tomorrow. One more week til payday!

Thunderstorms

The days lately have been very hot and humid, but we have started having very strong afternoon/evening thunderstorms. Lastnight the storm was very strong - very high winds, torrential rains, hail, lightning. The water was coming under the front door and wetting the office carpet! I did not leave until 6:45 pm. Two miles away the street was as dry as a bone!

This evening looks like a repeat of yesterday. It has already started raining. This storm is probably going to snarl the traffic up badly.

When I came in this morning my fax machine was not working -- the line did not have a dial tone. We called the phone company to fix it. I think we took a lightnight strike because the surge suppressor was dead from it. Thank goodness nothing happened to either of the fax machines!

As soon as I finish this entry I am going to make a run for it and get home. I am making spaghetti tonight using turkey sausage for the meal in the sauce.

I need to disconnect the computer and home and bring it in tomorrow so that Evelyn can take it with her to troubleshoot. Hopefully it isn't too serious, but even if the hard drive has to be wiped, I have a back-up on the "D:" drive and nothing that can't be replaced on the disks anyway.

Virus

While surfing Sunday night I was trying to navigate away from a wood working site that was taking way too long to load. I figured that maybe some ad-ware was slowing it down so I ran AdAware, but it did not find any ad-ware. At that point I rebooted the computer. When it came back up the bell on the cpu kept dinging, non-stop! The eMachines screen came up and then nothing. I guess it got infected. I took the antivirus off six months ago when it kept bugging me for money.

Evelyn comes to the office on Friday. I will hand it over to her then.

This weekend I did laundry. I stripped the bed Friday night and washed the sheets. I even washed Buddy's bedding! Nice and clean.

Saturday morning I dusted. OMG! The dust! There was alot of dust.

Also in the morning I changed the oil in the truck. 20 minutes to get that done. About time to take my oil collection can to AutoZone or Pep Boys and pour the oil out for recycling.

In the afternoon I drove to Winter Park to deposit the cash Craig refunded me into my checking account at Navy Federal Credit Union. They are open until 4 pm on Saturday.

Saturday evening I put a second coat of black paint onto the project cabinet. I think one more coat on the front and sides while it is standing up will be enough.

On Sunday I made pot roast, carrots, onions, and celery in the pressure cooker. The meat cooked for 35 minutes and came out perfect. The vegetables cooked for 8 minutes and were still too soft - next time I will cook them for 6 minutes.

I rotated the tires on the truck in the morning too. It was starting to get very hot, but I had them rotated in 15 minutes. I inspected each tire before it went back on the truck. The driver's side rear tire had a screw in it. I put that tire on the front wheel, but after I lowered the truck I noticed that it already a little low. So I drove it to the tire shop to have the screw taken out and plugged. That cost $22. In the afternoon it looked like that tire was still leaking. I am not sure. I will keep an eye on it during the next few days.I rotated the tires on the truck in the morning too. It was starting to get very hot, but I had them rotated in 15 minutes. I inspected each tire before it went back on the truck. The driver's side rear tire had a screw in it. I put that tire on the front wheel, but after I lowered the truck I noticed that it already a little low. So I drove it to the tire shop to have the screw taken out and plugged. That cost $22. In the afternoon it looked like that tire was still leaking. I am not sure. I will keep an eye on it during the next few days.

On Sunday evening I was reading various websites about do-it-yourself (DIY) injection molded plastic when I came across this low-temperature moldable plastic called "Shapelock" or "Friendly Plastic" or "UtiliPlast". Seems like a very useful product! You add a spoonful of plastic beads to hot (168F) water and stir until the beads become clear. Then you can mold the object with your fingers or against other hard objects. Let it sit and cool and it will harden up and turn white. Then it can be sanded, machined, or painted. If it does not turn out right, simply heat it up again and remold! Of course a big drawback to using this is that the molded parts cannot be used around heat!

It was during this search that the computer troubles began.

When I came to work yesterday morning I could see that Craig went to BJ's over the weekend. He got pretzels, cases of water, cases of Coke Zero, Diet Coke, and hand soap for the bathroom. There were only a couple of orders, a few quote requests, and the phone was not even very busy.

After lunch I brought Buddy back to the office with me. It was a nice change of pace for him and Craig seems to like Buddy.

I put wax on my project drawers lastnight and buffed them with the random orbital buffer. They still feel rough - a product of finishing in the Florida humidity. After that I put all of the hardware on them. After I get that last coat of black paint on the cabinet we will start fitting the drawers into the cabinet. I will have the sanding disk installed in the tablesaw because I will have to sand some of the drawers to make them fit -- the cabinet did not glue up square.

Also did some shop math to determine what overall size I should cut the phenolic plywood to for my router table. I arranged the edging pieces on the floor and measured inside width and inside depth and they matched my predicted measurements within 1/16 of an inch! Can't cut that wood until I am done painting though.

With the leftover phenolic plywood I am going to make a fence for the router table and breadboard the edges with the leftover maple. There should also be a large piece of scrap that I can make a cart on casters to roll the electric generator around on.

After I get the media cabinet done and after I get the router table extension done, I am pulling everything out of the garage and cleaning. I have to get all of that dust out of there!

Black Friday

This morning there were two more orders waiting for me on the fax machine. I wrote four or five more quotes today. Craig was in during the morning and said he'd get my money for the copies after lunch and he asked me if I could be back from lunch by 1:30 because Evelyn was coming in.

I came home at lunch and ate a LeanCuisine meal, walked Buddy, and returned just a few minutes before Evelyn arrived. The truck rolled past 137k miles during lunch - oil change time.
Evelyn had a 10-foot USB cable to attach the fax to my computer -- now I can fax things from the desktop, use the fax as a sheet fed scanner, and use it as a back up printer! She also installed a new USB hub on Fay's computer.

When Craig arrived they ordered a new fax for Fay -- hers died yesterday. Her fax will be like mine, but the newer model. I am glad. They should program the same and take the same toner cartridges.

I got the hand cart and gathered up all of the bankers' boxes full of files marked for destruction since January and carried five boxes of paper out to the recycle bin when I took the trash out.

Craig put 9 $20 bills on my desk for the copies. Evelyn could not find a color copy service agency to do the work for less than 50 cents per page. I guess we will have to print them out homemade on the color printer then. A color cartridge only costs us $40.

It thunderstormed a couple times this afternoon. Once it was very powerful - like a monsoon!

This evening I am making a skillet of chili while I do the laundry. I even stripped the bed and put the sheets in too.

Tomorrow I am going to change the oil in the truck. Then I need to drive to Winter Park and deposit the cash Craig gave me so that I do not overdraw the checking account (I suspect it's overdrawn now anyway). Then I am going to vacuum and dust the house. In the afternoon I will work on my wood projects in the garage.

Uggghhh!!!

On the way to work I stopped at FedEx/Kinkos to get the color copies for our cookbook dummies printed out. They charge 89 cents per page for color copies! The bill came to $181. Craig is gonna shit when he sees that. We definitely have to find a cheaper copy service.

The rest of the morning was going okay -- very hot day. I took lunch and came to the house to eat a Lean Cuisine dinner and walk Buddy. Then, when I returned to the office, things started to head south.

Now Fay is in a big hurry to get out of the office and start her vacation. She started bringing piles of paper down the hall and dropping it on my desk! "Fax this to Barbara, fax this to her too. Fax this to Herbert Alvarez, then call Julie or Janet to make sure he got it since he loses stuff. When the Omni quote come in fax it to Gill Group. Beltram will be calling with the model number of this oven I am quoting, we discontinue making THIS one in two weeks...." Too much shit to remember.

In the middle of her panic her fax machine died.

Around 3:00 pm she left. I was very busy with the onesy-twosy quotes she left for me to do, the service calls, and trying to process all of the orders that suddenly started to appear on the fax. Last few hours were hectic.

Stayed until 6:00 to get it all caught up because I can promise you there will be more tomorrow. Plus Evelyn is visiting our office tomorrow.

Lady Bird Johnson

Today was the busiest day at FER in the past two weeks. To start the day off I was running a little late. In fact I caught up with Fay at the traffic light, but I beat her to the office anyway. Then when I get there I discover that the fax machine ran out of toner during the night. Fortunately only one order was lost. We ordered supplies today.

Fay found the broke-back binders in the Royal Office Products catalog and ordered one of that type and one easel-type. I am going to have Kinkos print out the Cleveland Range ConvoTherm Cooking Guide and we will make a couple of prototypes for our reps to evaluate. The broke-back type is $13 each, so Fay is going to set out supplies salesman down and really negotiate for the lowest price on the quantity order.

While I was at lunch my table saw mobile base was delivered. Big flat box. 22 pounds.

Hellishly hot and humid at lunch. It is almost to the point I don't want to go out at lunch time. I come back soaked and hot. Usually lose my parking space during lunch too.

Fay remarked how quiet it was Monday and Tuesday and now that she is trying to get ready for her vacation everything gets busy as hell. Does not matter - most of the stuff she cannot get too we will put into the fax machine and send to Barbara to do.

When I came home I put the mobile base together. All I had to do was attach the front caster and lifting lever to the rest of the frame. Four bolts and nuts. Then I rolled it over to the saw, lifted the saw, and set it down in the base. Now the saw rolls around easy peasy!

Hot Humid

The high today was around 95 F and it was terribly humid. The good news is that as I write this it is thundering loudly outside and looks like a strong thunderstorm is coming through. Dog days of summer indeed.

There were only three new orders today. As good as last week was, this week will be poor. But Gabe Puerto is excited because our year-to-date numbers are 48% over where they were this point last year.

Well, Buddy is on the balcony watching it monsoon. Damn. I should have left the truck outside to get the dust washed off of it!!

Today Fay went to lunch with Dee. Dee is a woman who used to work at FER but Craig had to fire her. Fay was friends with Dee before she worked at FER and she remains friends with her today.

In the news today -- a plane crashed in Sanford today killing five people. It completely burned up two houses.

The mobile base for my table saw is scheduled to be delivered tomorrow. Having that on the saw will help alot when it comes to setting up and putting away.

Hot Dawg Days

This weekend was spent painting. I hung newspaper up in the bathroom with masking tape and covered the floor with newsprint on Friday evening. I know the dog must have been wondering what I was doing!

I put a couple of coats of spray polyurethane on the project drawers and I put the first coat of black paint on the carcase. Next I decided to do something different with my computer keyboard and mouse.

I disassembled both components and put all of the screws and keys into a bowl. I cleaned all of the hair, dust, and other dirt out of the keyboard and lightly sanded the top shell of the board and the top of the mouse with 400 grit paper. Next I wiped them down and took them to the bathroom/spray painting booth and liberally coated them with flourescent green Rust-O-Leum paint (see picture).

After I took the freshly-painted parts out of the bathroom I was horrified to discover the entire bathroom coated in fine green powdered paint!! I had to scrub the entire room from the ceiling down. That little exhaust fan really doesn't pull enough air to safely use the bathroom for spray painting. Anyway, I think the mouse and keyboard turned out pretty good!

I paid a visit to Skycraft Surplus on Saturday and I drove to Casselberry to the Woodcraft store to get a board. I found a suitable piece of Ambrosia Maple for $11.00. "Ambrosia" maple is wood that has unusual color, pattern, and boring holes from the ambrosia beatle. It is less-desireable and cheaper. I decided that I want to get 800-grit and 1200-grit wetstones for chisel honing next payday.

On Sunday I cleaned. I cleaned the bathroom and kitchen floors and I scrubbed the bath tub. I ran the dishwasher in the afternoon, and I made stuffed peppers for dinner. Around noon or 1 pm I took Buddy down to Lake Eola and we walked around the lake, but it was sooo hot the poor dog was suffering. He was panting so hard! When he got back in the truck he layed down and just panted and drooled. I stopped at 7-Eleven and got him some cold water - he drank an entire small bottle! Then we drove straight home where he went to bed, laid down, and panted for another half hour! Poor Buddy!

Today I was alone at the office for most of the day. Craig, Debbie, and Fay were in Tampa having lunch with Beltram. Craig thinks the meeting was productive because they had jobs for us to take off or to fax to us to quote.

At lunch I went home and ate the last leftover stuffed pepper from dinner lastnight. I told Buddy that I was not going to walk him immediately when I got home -- we will wait until things cool off outside alittle bit.

Tonight I want to start cutting that new piece up maple up into the frame from the router table. Two sides will be 22.25 inches long and two sides will be 17 inches long with the corners mitered. There will be a .25 inch x .25 inch dado plowed 1/2 inch down from the top. This dado will hold a similarly sized tenon cut on the phenolic-coated plywood table and the tabletop will "float" in the frame. That idea came to me while walking the dog last week. I think that will be the best way to assemble the table.

I expect my mobile base for the tablesaw to arrive this week. With the saw on that base it will be easier to move it out into the room for use and to push it back against the wall when I need to park the truck in the garage. Plus, the tablesaw legs will probably last longer without all of the dragging.

Next payday I want to order lumber and work on Christmas presents. I hope five months is enough time to get them done!

Friday!!!

And there goes another week! A very strange week with a holiday in the middle of it. Sales were a little down this week, and the phones were alittle quieter too. Orlando sent in $254k in new orders, so not bad for a short week!

This afternoon I was sitting at my desk surfing the Internet when I saw an egret slowly walk up to the bushes and slowly walk inside the bush... suddenly his neck moved quickly and he trotted out with a lizard in his beak! Gulp! Gulp! He swallowed it whole!

On Monday I will be by myself while Craig, Debbie and Fay go to Tampa to have lunch with the people at Beltram. I am actually looking forward to being left alone!

When I came home I started taping newspaper all around the bathroom and laying paper out on the floor. I am going to spray the drawers down with satin polyurethane and I am going to paint the carcase. I need to get this project DONE already!

Right now the laundry is running. Tomorrow I will clean kitchen and bath floors and run the vacuum. If there is time I will dust - I really need to dust!

Thursday

Uggghhh...

Yesterday was a busy day for me. I went to Home Depot, BJ's Warehouse, and SuperTarget. While I was in SuperTarget it began to down pour. All of the dry stuff I got at BJ's was soaked.

I brought everything inside and put it away. Then I ate a Lean Cuisine meal and bathed Buddy. After that I layed down and took a much-needed nap.

After taking Buddy for his walk I took a quick shower to get the sweat off of me and I dressed in an olive green t-shirt, black shorts with belt, loose white collared shirt, and sandals. I got my cheesecake out of the fridge, put Buddy into his crate and closed the gate, and turned his music up some.

Stopped at 7-Eleven to get cash from the ATM and then took the 408 downtown. The streets were already blocked off because of the fireworks. I found my way to the Pine Street Parking Garage via a serpentine maze of turns. It cost $5 to park there, but it was right across the street from the back of The Waverly.

So, cheesecake in hands I made my way around to the front of the building and hit the buzzer. The door man let me in and I went to the elevators to hit the secret code that lets you ride up to the 22nd floor penthouses.

I was the second guest to arrive. John owns both units on the 22d floor - he rents one of them out but the renter was out of town. So he set up tables for all of the food and drinks in the hallway!

The views from his apartment are spectacular! Floor-to-ceiling windows frame views that go out to the horizon - about 15 miles. Really wonderful views and I knew the fireworks would be special!

The AC was not working very well and with 100 people in the apartment, no balcony and only two windows that open, it was shaping up to be a scorching night!!

I saw a few people I recognized and met alot of nice people at the party.

After it got dark you could see the various fireworks displays all over Central Florida from up there -- Winter Park, Altamonte Springs, Apopka, Ocoee, Claremont, etc... when it came time for the Orlando show John turned off the big screen TV and put the lights down very dim to cut the reflections.

The fireworks were very impressive from that height. Most of them did seem to be right outside of the window. A few of the shells were up above the building and we had to tilt our heads down to see them.

During the show someone brushed my butt and I reached back to find that my wallet was gone!! Then I thought about it -- I had to get my wallet out to pay the lady to park. Maybe my wallet was in the truck. After the show I went to the truck to get my wallet and my cellphone. I text messaged my friend Marty. Marty was in the same building watching from the 16th floor.

I met Marty on the 16th floor and brought him up to John's apartment for a while. He had to get back with his friends because they had his car keys and his ride to his car up on SR 50. He wants to see me again sometime soon!

Around 11:35 I left the party to get home - I knew I had to work today. My head hit the pillow at 12:02 am. The alarm went off way too early!

My butt was dragging this morning. Got to work about 20 minutes late, but the phones were pretty quiet all morning. I started to feel better in the afternoon. Thank God tomorrow is Friday!

After taking Buddy walking I am going to the garage to lightly sand my project case. I am going to start painting it black this weekend. I had "Black Suede" satin enamel mixed up at Home Depot. Slowly but surely getting that project closer to done. I have started working on my router table wing extension for the tablesaw too. I want that project done before the end of the month so I can start working on Christmas presents.

Monday? Thursday?

Because the money did not get deposited until Saturday morning and I did not plan well, I did not get groceries this weekend. However, I did get my Lynn's Jig finished and I attempted to test it with some cheap pine scraps.

The first thing I discovered is that the 6-inch dado set I have is not tall enough to do work on wood in my jig. I need an 8-inch dado set. I went ahead and tried to work with the regular saw blade knowing that it cuts a 1/8-inch wide kerf. Well, this did not work out so well. You make a cut, then 2 turns (1/8 inch), make a cut (1/4 inch slot), then crank 6 turns (2 to get past the just-sawn kerf, 4 more to get past the finger), repeat. Even if I did the cranking sequence just right, the joint was too tight.

The nice thing about this jig is that you can vary the number of turns to make the joint looser or tighter. But I need the taller dado blade. Then I can just set up a 1/4-inch-wide dado blade and the number of turns will make the fingers wider or thinner.

In the afternoon I got Buddy into the truck and we went out. It was very hot. I went to the Skycraft store up on Fairbanks. This store is full of surplus electronic stuff. It was amazing! I want to go back! I got about $16-worth of switches and junk. I even found some old rubber "feet" that I am going to use on my media cabinet as stops.

Back onto I-4, we went to Woodcraft next. Here I got a router baseplate for my router table project, a sanding drum for the drill press, a t-shirt, and a few other doo dads. When I got out to the truck Buddy was so hot he was laying on the seat panting. So out next stop was 7-Eleven to get him a Slurpee.

Actually I got a fruit cup and a bottle of water. I ate the fruit and then poured the water into the little bowl for Buddy to lap up. He drank the whole bottle!

We went directly home. At home Buddy went to bed and laid down. I went back out to the garage to mess around. I got the primer lightly sanded on the cabinet carcase.

On Sunday I worked with the finger joint jig some more. I think it would be cool to automate it with a stepper motor and Basic Stamp microcontroller. Take a pass across the table, push a button and let the controller count the screw turns and advance the carriage, beep loudly when done, and push the sled across the blade again... you would never lose count of the turns!

It was too damned hot to go anywhere or do anything. So I didn't. In the afternoon we had a powerful thunderstorm.

In the evening I set up the dado blade on the tablesaw and I chopped the maple boards I set aside for the router table frame. I cut a 3/8-inch wide dado 13/16-inch deep. The plywood will sit in this ledge and the maple frame will be bolted to the table saw frame.

Today was a good day for orders. I processed $110k in new orders today. Fay had to go and pick her daughter up at the airport at 12:30 and Evelyn came in at 12:30. Evelyn installed a guest cable on the network router and then ran telephone cable from the file room to my office to relocate the fax machine to my table in the front. She is coming back later this week or next week with a new fax machine for Fay.

Having July 4 in the middle of the week will really make this an unusual week!