Kaleo’s Workshop

So for those of you that are on Twitter you know that recently I had absolutely no desire to go into the shop. I kept telling myself all day, SELF: you need to go into the shop and get some stuff done. I’m still in the middle of making the box for the podcast. I’m trying to make a few stands for some pottery to be displayed on. Just recently I had a friend of a friend find out that design and make furniture. So I think that there might be a few projects coming my way.

But even with all the stuff that I could and should be doing in the shop, I had no desire to go down there. Have any of you ever had this experience? I mean I love it when I am down there. And because I know that I will love it when I get down there, I usually make myself go. Well I learned my lesson while at school. There were just some days that I felt like not doing anything. And those were the days that I should have stayed home.

One such time was at the end of a long day. It was crunch time, a project was coming due at the end of the week. We were all putting is some really long days. One night I was taking the clamps off the project. I had glued corner blocks onto some construction paper and then onto the carcass. This was to be able to clamp the miter corners. Well the clamps came off and the piece was looking good. It was about 10 pm and something told me “that’s enough for the day”. But I wanted to get the corner blocks off and get all the construction paper off as well. So I proceed to pop off the blocks, and thought I’ll sand off the paper. I started to sand a quickly figured out that it was going to take forever to do it this way. So I grabbed one of my chisels and proceeded to pair away the paper. Oh did I mention that this was a veneered piece. Well needless to say, my eyes grew tired and my hands and my brain weren’t communicating. The chisel got away from me and I took out a nice chunk of veneer.

Now I did end up being able to fix it, so that it didn’t look that bad. But of course to me I will always see that flaw first whenever I see that piece.

The lesson is follow your gut. I have found that those time when you do not feel like being in the shop are the times that you shouldn’t be in there. Things just go wrong, you might mess something up that you have spent hours and hours doing. Or worse yet, you might not be thinking straight and end up hurting yourself. So if you don’t feel like it, then take a break and watch some cartoons with your kids. If you don’t have kids, then just watch the cartoons anyways, I just use my kids as an excuse.

I mean only you can prevent woodworking accidents. Like everyone else in the woodworking world this week, I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about safety. There has been and will be ton written on this subject over the next few days. With an all encompassing desire to write about something different, something that no one has thought of before, I continued to think. I thought all day long. While I framed in a bath tub. Even while I mindlessly cut filler blocks to put between joist where the kicthen cabinets are going. Then I got home and still nothing new or earth shattering had come to me.

As I sat down and stared at the computer screen, I felt my eye begin to tire. My body was telling me to go to bed, or at least go lye down and relax. And then it came to me, nothing mind blowing and nothing revolutionary. But ureka I had it.

The biggest and best tip that I could possibly give is this:

THINK

That’s right, think about it. When you go into the shop you need to stop and think about what you are about to do. Think about the processes you are going to go through. Think about what could happen, think about what you want to happen.

I have found in the last few years that taking the time to stop and think has made all the difference. No matter what machine or hand tool that I was going to use, I would stop and think about it. Think about the forces involved, think about the true purpose of the tool, know it’s limitations. Don’t push the tool farther than it is meant to go. Because a game between you vs. Machine, machine always will win. (except in the cause of MEGATRON)

I saw a guy in one of the forums the other day that said he was deathly afraid of all his power tools. I think that is a wrong attitude to have towards your tools. This is because when you approach something in fear, you are tense, you need to be relaxed and confident. If you know your tools and think about what you want them to do, then you will make the best decisions.

I hope this post makes sense, remember this all came to me while my mind was telling me to go to bed.

PS. This is MEGATRON as if you didn’t know