Christmas time...

Christmas is a holiday to commemerate the birth of the Son of my heavenly Father. No Winter Solstice, Happy Holidays, Season's Greetings...just a warm, sincere, Merry Christmas, celebrating the light of the world coming to earth.

While getting a Christmas card at Safeway, I noticed there were NO cards for fathers. Not that there were none available, but none at all for fathers. I saw cards for mothers, brothers, sisters, aunts, nieces, nephews....none for fathers.

So here is my little dedication of sorts to my own Dad and what he has done in my life that makes Christmas special.

With the hot toys of this year and years of past, I remember the hot toys back in my day. One year, the lion Voltron was the hot toy. My dad knew my brother and I liked it. We knew my dad got us the Lion-bot(also known as the Japanese rip-off imitation of Voltron) and we liked it and don't believe we complained about it being an imitation.

I recall my dad one day when he got home from "work," he got the REAL Voltron. Probably what happened was after work, he went over to Toys R Us to look to see if they had Voltron in stock. He said, he saw customer with one in his shopping cart and immediately asked where he got it. Upon being directed to the aisle, my dad grabbed one of the last remaining ones for us.  I think he was even happier than me and my brother when he got home to give us the news. Awesome...now we have the Lion-bot AND the real Voltron. It was pretty sweet.

I'm thankful of my dad for the sacrifices he made to make my brother and me happy. Merry Christmas Dad.

Awesome products

Some things that are way too awesome. Went to a general store by Skyline and saw this product on the shelf. Amazing!!! If you can't read the back, here's what it says
  -Honey and ginseng root'll get you whack ass soft
  - Pops a cap in dirt's ass
  - Freakin wit da silk amino acids, know what I'm sayin'?
  - Lemon and Bergamot scent for your fruity ass
  - For senorita mofos, too!
Just tooooo awesome

Here's another item that's pretty dope. You can get this one at http://www.post-jdm.com/products.html

Rolling backpacks...

So a post was made by a friend with a small tidbit on rolling backpacks and you can find it here: Bread Please 

I believe every generation thinks the next generation has an easier life than the previous. Is that true? From a technology standpoint, I agree. From an career opportunities aspect, I'd say this is false.

So comparing me and my dad,

- My Dad had to walk to school. My parents drove me
- Telephone, television, CDs, remote control, microwaves, computers and calculators sure beat the 8-track, rotary dial, black and white Zenith, and the abacus (ok, kidding about the abacus)
- High availability of food, clothing, everything vs. things are hard to get

Comparing this next generation and me
- Rolling backpacks vs. carrying it on my own back
- High speed internet, Intel DuoCore, iPods, Xbox 360 vs. 56K if you're lucky, 486 was revolutionary, walkmans, Atari 2600

So life from a kick back and relax stand point is getting easier. But what about a career opportunities perspective? I think it's harder now to get a jump start than it was when my dad started looking for a job. Given my experiences and education, if I entered the job market when I lived during my parent's time, I'd be soaring. I think the next generation will be even harder. I believe the workplace is more competitive now and will get even more so for the kids these days.

I've rewritten this too many times and my mind has drifted so I'm gonna stop here.

It's merely a flesh wound

For those that don't know where that's from....PLEASE go watch Monty Python and the Holy Grail.You might pee in your pants from laughing.

Anyhow, a minor setback with th poker table. While using the router (not computer router, but one for wood work) fixed to a router table and guiding a piece of wood along, towards the end, the centriputal force of the router threw the piece of wood towards the bit along with my hand. My middle finger got chewed up by the router (still spinning) and I got a pretty deep gash in my tip of the finger. What goes through my mind immediately is, "I can't tell Lisa."

Blood's gushing so I go to the outdoor hose to wash it to access the situation. Pretty unsightly. Go inside to the restroom to wash and get some napkins. I'm thinking I might need some stitches. Lisa passes through two times while doing laundry. By now, I realize I'm gonna need her help, so I tell her I hurt myself. We tape it up tightly to stop the bleeding and it works.

Some interesting things I've learned from all this and makes me wonder why I think the things I do

- Worried about telling Lisa. She's always telling me to be careful about using the power tools so I didn't want ot bring her bad news
- Worried I needed to get stitches and was thoroughly against it. I guess I kind of "pride" myself that I've never needed stitches(except for oral surgery) and never having broken bones. I didn't want to wait in the ER for hours for something I could just heal itself.
- Not having the use of just ONE finger is a big pain in the butt. Since it's on the tip of my middle finger, I'm modifying the way I type so I don't hit it on the keyboard.
- Showering and making sure the finger doesn't get wet means not getting the whole hand wet. How do people who only have one hand, one arm, or no arms do it?
- Since the wood I was using got "thrown" the bit messed it up. Was very annoyed at that. One thing for me to be injured but I need to do some extra work now. What a pain.

Poker table...operation downsize

My friend Dave visited and offered some "tips." Also, looking in my friend's pics of his poker table and even on the "My Boys" (TBS show, not that I watch it) commercial had NO ONE uses the chip holder. So....change in plans. Lisa really wanted some arm rests from the beginning but never had the space. But now if I do without the chip holder place...I have room, but too much room. Also, the poker felt portion should be a sunken pit with the level of the armrests above the pit.

So....what does this mean to the grand scheme of things?

• So time to give that outer octagon a little bit of a haircut. Previously the space between the inner and outer octagon was 8 inches. I cut off 2 and a half inches on all eight sides to make the space 5 1/2 inches.
• Which means...also having to reshape the cup holders to size.
• Raise the cup holders and armrests through gluing 1 1/2 inches of scrap to the bottom. This is done by using the two layers of scrap plywood one on top of another.
• Buying 1 inch thick foam and pleather for the armrests.

With making these armrests, this is the first time I've ever made upholstery of any kind. Not too hard to do. A little staple gun action here and there and it's done. Here are some pictures. I took out the inner octagon and put felt on it and set it aide. Don't want to get sawdust on it. My visual mind is thinking this thing's gonna turn out NICE!!!