Mill Nearly Here

The milling machine is eight minutes late.

I can’t stand it. Oh, the suspense. And the dread. What if my measurements are wrong and I can’t park in the garage after this?

This morning I realized I should have bought T nuts to attach my vise to the machine. I have a clamping set, so I’ll be okay, but I should have some studs and nuts that are dedicated to the job.

Now it’s nine minutes late.

I wonder what the day holds for me. A lot of cleaning, I would think. This machine may be slathered in cosmoline. I hope there are no problems with it. If these people take seven weeks to ship a mill, imagine how long they take to fix one if it’s busted.

Ten minutes late.

I’ll have to tram it. That will be my first real challenge. After that, I install the vise. Then I may throw some metal in the vise and see if I can square it up.

I’m really pathetic. Last night, I went to the marina with my dad to try to get his GPS working. It turns out that Garmin GPSs are extremely finicky about power supplies, and a lot of people have problems because of it. The sloppy guy who installed this one has it on the same circuit as at least two other pieces of marine electronics. The Garmin tech said we should run a wire to the battery, just for the GPS. Right. That will only take five hours and forty feet of wire.

Here is the pathetic part. Someone had left a big tubular aluminum thing near the trash. Maybe an antenna. Naturally, I grabbed it. Hey, five pounds of free aluminum, and several feet are anodized. Black. Very pretty.

Fourteen minutes late.

Mike will be here tonight. Maybe I’ll fix a Costco prime rib eye for him. They’re very nice, but truthfully, the choice steaks I got last week were so good, I don’t think there is much point in buying prime for everyday dinners. The prime jobs are better, but not way, way, WAY better.

Fifteen minutes late. I better go out and look up and down the street. Just to be helpful.