The Anal-Retentive Handyman™ Speaks
December 5th, 2008I’ll Just Get my Protractor and Line up These Wrenches
I am amazing.
I was reading my router table book–I bought Bill Hylton’s router table book–when I realized the garage was still a mess from all the stuff I did yesterday. So I went out and took all the screws and anchors out of their little packages and stuck them in drawers in the wall organizer thing, and I put a P-Touch label on each drawer! I should put a gold star on my forehead.
The book is very good. In the front, it says Bill Hylton was an editor before he wrote the book, and he only did it because he couldn’t find anyone else to do it. Maybe that explains why it’s a good book. He knew what bad tool books were like, because he used to fix them.
The woodworking table I am trying to build magically flattened itself overnight. I guess the pressure of the two-by-six I screwed onto it wore it out. I checked the flatness from front to back–the other direction–and damned if I don’t have another two-by-six to install. Oh, well. That should be easy. I think I’ll put one short board on either side of the router, to compensate for the weakness caused by cutting the hole for the lift.
It turned out I had some parts for my Grr-ripper I had failed to install, so I put those in, and I took the leftover stuff and put it in a little drawer in my electronics cabinet, marked “GRR-RIPPER.” I am too cool.
So far I mainly use tools to make things to help me use my tools. But eventually, I will work on something not tool-related. And then you will all go down on your knees and give me my props. Oh, yes. You WILL give me my props. Or at least one. Prop, I mean.
December 5th, 2008 at 9:07 PM
Why would you need a prop, when you have an excellent workmate? Oh, yeah.
December 6th, 2008 at 7:22 AM
Build a book shelf, or build a cool open cabinet for bird stuff man.
Just think of something you want and make it. The aboslute worst case is you screw up and have to do it over. Its no big deal, everyone messes up.
Red Oak is cheap (sorta) and fun to work with for me.
December 6th, 2008 at 8:33 AM
Make sure you leave enough room to install the lift. If you are anything like me, ADD kicks in and things get ahead of themselves…
On my way home I decided that I have been having so much fun in the garage lately that it is time to build storage bins and get my cluttered workbench organized. I doubt I will get to the P-Touch stage, but that is because I have to take a few trips to goodwill. I need a truck – so do you.
December 6th, 2008 at 10:36 AM
I needed a bathroom cabinet for my home that was not available in the size/style I wanted. Some red oak planks, a router, a stile and rail bit and a glass cutter for the cheap mirror that’s lasted twenty years.
But projects don’t come along that frequently.
The occasional shelf…
December 6th, 2008 at 10:39 AM
“I checked the flatness from front to back–the other direction–and damned if I don’t have another two-by-six to install. ”
Of course, next it will bow or warp in the middle.
December 6th, 2008 at 2:27 PM
It’s well-known that the highest use of tools is to make other tools. Also, the more tools you use in any given project, the more “successful” you can deem the work.
My own term for this is “the rule of the face-down roller cabinet”, specifically applying to automotive type work. To elaborate, “you aren’t going to get the job done until you’ve about emptied the tool box and roller cabinet, so you might as well begin by dumping the whole thing on the floor”.
December 7th, 2008 at 12:52 AM
Prop? Two, three or four blades?
Cheers