Project Pipeline

This family is keeping me busy with projects! Or is it just me trying to make most out of the sizable collection of woodworking tools i have amassed over the last few years? I am not sure, but i do know that Home Depot and Lowe's have been taking big bites out of my paycheck every month over the last 6 months or so. Maybe this explains our hole in the budget that C has been trying to fix desperately.

Besides the plexi glass easel and various repair projects at J's school i have been ordering supplies to rewire our phone lines, replace the station protector and add a DSL splitter to put an end to our spotty DSL service once and for all (thanks to 'linksys' there was always backup Internet service available), a small carry-on chalk board for J, and a swing set for J, of which you can see the the first 'A' taking on shape (2 more to go plus a 4x4 post on top and a ladder plus platform, and, if J gets his will, a zip line to one of our trees in the backyard).


The compost bin shown above had been my first big wood construction project (not counting the smaller crafts and cabinetry stuff like J's bed, stool, blackboard easel and doll house), and i learned a few lessons along the way: 1) always paint your work pieces before putting them together if you really want achieve good protection of the wood from the elements, even though this requires a lot more patience and takes quite a bit longer for the project to complete 2) always measure twice and _always_ use a framing square when putting the various pieces together. at that time i did not have a large enough square so i ended up using a metal frame i found in the shed, which worked OK then, however, i did screw up at least one right angle and the trained eye will be able to tell if they look at the bin in person.

what i am proud of is the fact that i got a $89 Ryobi contractor table saw to work for most of my projects (so far). a good table saw has a large table, an accurate miter gauge, a 60 teeth blade, extra material support for cross and rip cuts, as well as a motor that's powerful, quiet and without vibration. while there is nothing i can do about the vibrating, loud motor (except for wearing hearing protectors) or the inaccurate mite gauge (forget angle cuts completely, i figured out a workaround to do so-so 90 degree cuts by pushing the miter bar firmly against the miter slot while performing the cross cut), replacing the 24 tooth/10" standard blade with a 60 tooth/7 1/4" blade allows me make much smoother cuts. i also added a table extension to be able to rip longer boards without having them fall off the end of the table). to be fair, the rip fence works pretty well on this saw, although the range is limited to less than 10".
lesson learned: don't go with a $100 saw if you are planning to do any serious woodworking projects. $500 or more for a good cabinet saw is where you should start looking.

Massive School Cleanup

it should have been a 30 minute stopover at J's school today to deliver the plexi glass easel and hang up a dry eraser board. instead, we ended up spending 3 hours there, while looking for my keys that I had lost somewhere at the school a few days ago.

what happened was that I dropped off J Monday morning on my way to work, but as soon as we had entered the school Ms S was all over me, asking me to fix the plumbing in the kitchen. The weekend cleanup parents clogged up the kitchen sink and had not told anybody before school started again on Monday. Reluctantly, i agreed to take a quick look to see what needs to be done and subsequently called C, the maintenance coordinator, to do the actual fixing as i really had to get going because i was parked in one of the 10 min spots. Soon, i realized that my keys were gone and i could not remember where i had set them down. Did i put them on a table and some kid picked it up? did they get lost on the way in from the car? did they, somehow as C suggested, end up in the trash? patting down the kids did not bring the keys back, neither did a search outside, so i was forced to wait for C to arrive and hand me the spare keys. meanwhile, i had also gotten a parking ticket. not a good start into the week. Oh well.



anyway, while putting the last finishing touches on the easel, Chris turned the school upside down in search for my keys and in the process discovered a lot of junk in the kitchen area, a lot of which we ended up throwing out. inspired by her activities, i went through the tool shed, created a mental inventory list and threw out a bunch of broken brooms, rakes, tools, and other useless items. hopefully, our cleanup effort will help save the school (or at least make it easier for other people to find stuff and get around more easily). As always, J enjoyed playing with all the toys at the school, which for at least a few hours, all belonged to him.

These berries look so good - Mmmmm! J looks adorable in this picture, taken around July 18 while vacationing on 'the Farm'. It was one of the few moments during this 5 week trip were he seemed truly happy, besides the time he spent with his Mama and Papa in the Baby Therme in Lutzmannsburg. I could tell that the time in Austria was difficult for him as he did not speak much German at that time (He still does not speak much and it is really my fault for not taking the time to teach him more!). All three of us have pledged to work hard on his German over the next year so that by the time we go see our family in Austria again he'll he talking like a pro!

The Tainach - SoCal Connection

'What a strange URL for this blog' i can see some people wonder. when it was time to pick a name (and google wants you to do that right away) i wondered what is is about me that won't change over time. the name, of course (although that could changed, too), but i did not want to commit to that (for reasons obvious to the experienced blogger). current residence? will almost certainly change. special interests? too many, and they also tend to change over time (for me, anyways). so i went ahead and picked the name of my home town. the name was still available (i don't think there are a lot of bloggers in Tainach at this time, and if so, you are more likely to find them on kleine.at). Tainach is the place were i grew up, so far have lived the major part of my life (21 years), and the fact that it was called Tainach while i lived there won't change. Even if the residents of Tainach decide to change the name of their town, it will still have been called Tainach when I lived there.



I want this blog to be a site to which i can post a lot of things: tell stories about my past and present life, my family, my favorite home improvement and other miscellaneous projects, as well as tell stories about and from an expat living in southern california.believe me, there are a lot of stories to tell, and if i can find the time, they will start showing up here. Enjoy!