Dear Sir or Madam, will you read my book?
It took me years to write, will you take a look?
It’s based on a novel by a man named Dave
And he needs a job
So he’s gonna be a tabletop maker…….table top maker….
Tabletop maker is a sawdust story of a sawdust man
And his brilliant wife who doesn’t understand
He had a job working for the rats
It’s was a steady job but he’d had enough of that
He wants to be a tabletop maker….
Tabletop maker

I cobbled up a table from that ‘patchwork quilt’ of wood bits yesterday. It looks good. I am no fine-carpenter but it would look ‘at home’ in any remote Siberian village or, perhaps, some inbred, poor section of Appalachia. My aesthetics are crude, my skills are lacking and my standards are a smidge low, I have to admit to all that.

On the other hand, I am now almost done with the obvious, trip-over-it projects still sprinkled willy-nilly about the place – for this year, anyway. There are no more in the workshop (save for saw-blade sharpening). I have a couple more shelves to do for the new shed. And I still have 18 lengths of logs to pull up and stack. Plus a boat roof to f’glass soon. Plus, plus, plus….but…..

Every year there are plus-plus-plus projects that do not get done. They get ‘held over’. They will be amongst the list of things to do when the weather/season improves. I have a five month reprieve before the pressure starts to build again (such as it is) and that means more like 6 months before anything actually gets done. Still, Thanksgiving is generally regarded as a seasonal shutdown date. Give or take a week, depending on the weather.

Last night we had the all-out, fantastic and traditional Thanksgiving turkey dinner with our older neighbours. She’s hampered by a gibbled hip and he is 81. Still, they came for dinner, enjoyed yet another Sally feast and, after the evening had carried on socially for awhile, they got ready to leave. But it was a-howlin’ outside. Black, dark, rain-a-pelting down they trudged back to the dock in full-weather gear and set out in their 17 foot boat. It was blowing maybe 25. I left the outside lights of our house on because they provide a reference point for a boater when you can barely see in the dark. We watched them disappear into the night as the wind cried Mary.

In and of it self no big deal……but….consider the facts. A limping Septuagenarian and her Octogenarian husband trekking through the woods in a storm to get to their boat so that, through the pelting rain they could slowly buck and plunge their way home through the ice-cold seas.

Oooooh, c’mon….ya don’t get that kinda fun in the cul de sac!

And the wind screams, “Mary”

Will the wind ever remember
The names it has blown in the past?
And with this crutch, its old age and its wisdom
It whispers, “No, this will be the last”

And the wind cries, “Mary” (Jimmy Hendrix)

The workshop is cleaned up. There is still much to do but walking in and being intimidated by the array of tools, materials, glues and such, all higgle-de-piggeldy everywhere is over. Sal hit it like the HER-icane of order that she is. I helped, of course, but Sal seems to have an inner software program when it comes to tidying up. God, it feels good!

I confess that, after we had cleaned up and stopped for the day to drink wine, I got up and wondered back out just to gaze on the sheer beauty of a tidy workshop one more time. “You should forbid me from ever going in there again, ya know…..I make an unholy mess….”

“Can’t do that. It is your workshop! You make stuff. You fix stuff and I now know where all the crap is….knowing you, you’ll claim you don’t know where anything is and will try to make me do it!”

She’s smart, That Sal. That thought had already crossed my mind…..

In most ways, we did OK this summer. A ton of guests. Got all the wood in, did some much needed maintenance, built a new shed and put everything away. Water system is great! I have a whole tool maintenance regime to get going on; a slew of sawblades to sharpen, a few things to fix, more logs….you know, an OTG’ers work is never done. Except for the naps and wine-drinking, of course.

But, in a few ways, we did badly. Lost John. Didn’t see the grandkids. Living a Covid life. Gettin’ old. There have been some ‘downs’. There have been some ‘ups’. But losing John coloured the whole year black and it still weighs heavily on us both.

UAE’s J & H visiting was a great treat, however. So were all the old gang that usually come to visit – and did. My grandsons are reportedly going gangbusters – growing and happening and doing it all happily and with joy on their face. There was huge loss but there was positive gain, too. It was NOT a typical year but ‘typical’ might not come along much anymore. I cannot see a path-to-normal anytime soon.

I guess you could summarize the year with that old refrain, ‘take your victories where you can’.

I never subscribed to Facebook. From the get-go, it seemed a dysfunctional thing for me to do. It just never appealed. To be fair, the initial description I received when querying was something like, “Oooh, it’s great! I sent all my friends pics of me having breakfast!” ……..and that didn’t seem like a really fascinating pastime to me, either as a sender or a receiver. I never signed up. Call me anti-social.

But my resistance to peer-group pressure was not absolute. In a moment of weakness, I joined Linked In and, in a quickly dawning awareness, immediately dropped out of it within hours. But, once in, it is not easy to get out. I still get L-In crap and I have never participated in it save for rarely contacting a few friends who, like me, never use it either.

I came to this slightly suspicious feeling of joining social gatherings/groups honestly enough. One day in the 60’s, I passed a storefront featuring a pair of tin cans attached to what looked like a lie-detector sitting alongside a few toy frogs and an assortment of books. Some guy named Ron Hubbard, it seemed, was selling science…..something to do with frogs…and tin cans. I went in to find out. Got a Scientologist sales pitch and left. I received Scientology crap for twenty years!

Despite my anathema to joining and cults, social media is here to stay and the fact that Facebook (likely) got hacked today is some kind of harbinger. Something is up. And that something will continue, escalate, erode, corrupt, pollute or otherwise add more rot to the already eroding system. And make no mistake, Facebook is a huge system within a huge system. Lives are engaged in, involved with, dependent on and vulnerable to social media and especially Facebook. Politics, business, communication and even countries are reliant on Facebook for a lot of their activities. Mark Zuckerberg is worth billions and it is all because of exploiting the human need to ‘belong’.

Fact: belonging to Facebook is NOT really belonging to anything (possible exception: Team Lemming). We have a ‘fake’ membership in a ‘fake’ community and there are a bazillion bad people with weird agendas trying to take a pot-shot at you and your ‘friends’. Why would anyone see that as a good idea?

I understand, of course, that it has it’s appeal. It’s kinda like being able to lightly and quickly chat with dozens of ‘friends‘ who ‘like you‘ but well, I have sheds to build, oysters to chase and logs to chop. Facebook is an illusion of community. Key word: illusion.

And my community is smaller now that I am feral and it has even shrunk somewhat more lately. Covid kinda did that. I certainly have fewer and fewer friends nearby who like me (I think Wim is the closest and he’s in Belgium)! I have also kinda rejected ‘chatting’, too, now that I think about it. Chit chat in any form is basically a waste of time to my way of thinking. But remember: my way of thinking is in it’s twilight. I am old. I have less time to waste and now I have fewer people on whom to waste it.

Nature has a way……

OMG, the time I wasted as a high-school teen listening to ditzy girls saying giggly-gibberish just on the remote chance of maybe having sex with them someday makes my head spin! I have wasted way too much time. And I no longer have it to waste.

Long way of sayin’: Facebook ain’t my thing and I am glad I stayed away. I think more and more trouble will ensue from social media and I think Facebook being hacked is just proof that there is something to be immorally gained at the expense of the ‘membership’. Be careful out there, guys. It feels like the Matrix is heatin’ up.

I guess it is time to make some changes in our lives. It feels as if we should. Minor changes, to be sure, but some changes nevertheless.

We are well into Fall and winter feels close-on-it’s-heels (we’ve even been setting a morning fire this past week). A feeling of routine is settling in. Normally, after a busy season, that feels comforting. This is usually the time of year when we ‘plan’ our winter. We will be doing Xmas off-island, of course, so that part of the plan is in place – but it is less than a week.

Then we usually go away somewhere sunny and warm for a bit and then we come back and then we do Spring set-up chores, plant gardens, gather logs for later chopping and then there is the summer season…and, well, summer is a whole new-kind-of-busy and so it goes. Every year, mostly; same but different. Even tho it is all an adventure, it is a predictable, seasonally based adventure…..for the most part.

But this year feels a bit different. This year is kind of a deja vu – a watch it all over again kind of year. By Xmas, this past year will be Covid year #2. No travel. No change. Two years of lock-down. Mostly. I mean, admittedly it is kinda hard to tell a lockdown with us. We are living OTG and are semi-isolated anyway. Throw in a restrictive pandemic and we have been ‘out of it’ for some time. We are no longer in any loops. No longer hip! And my sociability index has been waning for some time, too. Diagnosis: long-GOMs. Extended grouchy old man syndrome coupled with a pandemic and a world gone mad.

I love people, ‘specially my chosen peeps, but, well, I can love ’em from a distance, too. Email is also good. I just kinda feel like I gotta get away, right now. Go, go, go. I feel like going somewhere different, somewhere foreign….. I feel like gettin’ out of Dodge. ‘Cept for one very basic thing: I really do not feel like traveling.

It is hard to go somewhere without moving. That little mental conflict presents quite a conundrum, don’t you think? Of course, I know that I cannot go somewhere without moving so which is it? Do I go or do I stay? Why is that even a question? Shouldn’t I know whether to go or stay? Have I lost my ability to make executive decisions?

Or is this just another manifestation of that pervasive ‘state of confusion’ I have been talkin’ about? It is NOT ambivalence. I still have feelings. I just have the opposite ones, too. I still have wants…I just don’t know what they are, currently. I feel the pressure to move but I have not decided where to go. It’s a crazy state of being. What does it all mean? Is it just the aforementioned long-Covid mixed with Long Goms in a-state-of-flux world? Or is it all just in my head and everyone else is focused and ‘going forward’ (as they say ad infinitum)?

Let me summarize this drawn-out angst: The economy does not seem to know whether it is coming or going; the Canadian electorate just erased the purpose of an election by voting to not change a thing (in a world needing huge change); the Covid-virus is still the BIG story and seems to be planning a whole new season of fun and games all ’round the world; a lot of people have stopped working but do not have the money to do so; school is in…then out….then back in…well, who knows where the school-thing is these days? House prices? Food prices? Aging? Tic tock, tick tock?

And millions still support Trump, anti-vaxxing and all sorts of incredibly stupid Bubba crap. How does any of this make any sense? I am open to hearing a logical outcome…..

When I first came here and couldn’t really do much of anything OTG very well, I kinda compensated for that by working hard and doing as much as I could as fast as I could even if it wasn’t all that good in workmanship or even function.

The theory behind such madness was this: “I am not very good at this so I will at least be quick. And we will at least have something to shelter under….then, probably, it will stand for awhile, later to droop, tip and eventually fall over. By then, I might have learned enough to fix it properly.”

Planned obsolescence? Basic rationalization? Realism? I dunno….But one thing is clear: starting stupid is not a good plan. I did not know what I was doing back then and I am no expert now. And now I am a lot slower.

Turns out the magic is in the pace…….

About four months ago, I was stumbling around my workshop and wondering why everything was so messy and I could hardly move. (Part of the reason is that Sal is a bit of a neat freak and anything she deems unsightly gets put in my workshop). That is nowhere near the entire truth or reason, however. The bulk of my excuse lies in my tendency to work until I am tired and then, when I go to clean up, I am too tired to do it right and things are just piled up on the bench….and then I have to pile some of it on random shelves or open spaces and then….maybe the floor and…then…well, I begin stumbling…..

It is kinda pathetic.

Anyway, one of those stumbles prompted me to declare the need for another building in which to store some of the larger items currently stored in the workshop. Of course, it had to look like it was part of our other buildings, the construction ‘family’, and so board and batten was going to be the style. It would be small (8 x 8) because it was just for storage (hard to fix stupid) and it should not take too much time. That declaration was four months ago. We still ain’t done. But we are so close, it is ‘close enough’ to warrant a blog.

This one is mostly just pictures.

Every day I add another few hooks, a shelf, clean up some tools, lube a few things, organize some more, put stuff away…you know…the usual…..but, at the rate I am putzing and fiddling, I have a good week ahead of me before I am done. Just sharpening saw blades takes forever. Some things surprise me, tho….like I have 3 containers of chainsaw bar oil, I have two and have containers of jack oil (for jacks) and more cans of weird stuff than I ever realized. And oh, man, do I have glues and adhesives!

Sal is somewhat amused by my ‘process’. She tells others that, “Oh, he is just outside, walking around, staring at space and thinking up what to put there. Then he goes to look at what he has. Then he thinks. Then he comes in for tea”.

The nicest thing about Island Time is that their is a huge time and space allowance…I just may be able to get something done…..

Interesting combination, doncha think? Howzat all gonna show up by next spring?

People have been slowed, isolated and/or locked down for well over a year and not-so-much because of official mandates from the authorities – people just kinda shut down on their own. Even the anti-vaxxer, disease-flaunting, deniers of authority and logic have been somewhat shutdown simply because so many others are. And every time they open another restaurant, school, a stadium or a motorcycle rally town, the numbers just climb higher.

The USA has suffered over 600,000 deaths since Covid arrived and still adds over 120,000 new cases every day. Canada has had almost 28,000 deaths in total and gets 5000 new cases every day. And the governments continue to relax restrictions! That is unnerving, to say the least, and portends a bleak winter by simply projecting the numbers.

But what does it really mean? What happens when the world runs on fewer cylinders? It would seem that food and energy imports are amongst the first to feel the increased demand when supply chains are already reduced and labour is mostly AWOL. So, those prices go up and those inventories are strained. Example: (two weeks ago) my daughter and wife went to the neighbouring island, split a sandwich and had a milkshake each, before coming home. The bill was $30.00. Earlier in that day, my daughter sat at a coffee shop and had a toasted bagel and a Chai tea. The bill was $20.00.

Covid is going to get more expensive.

And fewer children are attending schools. More children at home means more parents at home. More unemployed. More debt. More handouts. And that means less GDP. So currencies will likely drop in value as does the country’s economy.

The above two paragraphs suggest stagflation – reduced growth or even shrinkage of the economic output while prices are still going up on the fewer and fewer who can afford them.

Mind you, real estate is still going up in value. New cars cost more. So, it is not all linear, predictable or logical. In fact, it is kinda crazy, if you ask me.

If you dig a smidge deeper, nurses and doctors are fading. Some are quitting or restricting their output and still others are going on ‘leave’. The healthcare line of defense is weakening. Already normal operations and other pressing health issues are being affected by the demands of Covid and the staff are burning out. That is not good. If our healthcare professionals are our first line of defense, then we are truly in trouble because we do not really have a second line. Well, there is Ivermectin and Hydroxychloroquine but, for most people, those options are unacceptable. Same for injecting bleach…..

But I must say, I am encouraging of Trump to hold more rallies and hope he continues to advocate for injecting bleach. Preferably in Sturgis, Florida and Texas. Maybe a guest rally in Alberta? Free bleach and Ivermectin!

But solutions aside, what other impacts are we gonna feel over this continuing Covid problem? Well, taxes have to go up. Trudeau and the other so-called leaders have been spending big-time to ease the viral discomfort as they try to keep the ship steady-as-she-goes but that bill is exorbitant and we could not afford that kind of largesse even that one time – twice will be impossible.

Anything else? Well, the effects of Covid (and our response to it) are continually surprising us so more surprises is a logical prediction. The desire to deny science and to favour conspiracy theories and false orange-hued idols is also a trend that is unpredictable. How can that madness manifest more in the future?

Put more succinctly, the Covid Party is not over. In fact, it is just getting started. When it started (early 2020), I predicted the USA would suffer 750,000 deaths. They are not there yet but I fear my prediction was overly optimistic. I also suggested that, surprisingly, Covid might be our TEOTWAWKI (the end of the world as we know it) and that is even more of a possibility now.

What do we do? Well, Sal and I will carry on carrying on. We are just finishing the new shed. See pics next blog. We won’t go to Costa Rica or Thailand this winter. We’ll hold down the fort again and hunker-in-the-bunker. Right now, it does not feel inviting in any way to go anywhere.

Do you think that will change anytime soon?

Erin O’Toole moved a smidge left. Annamie Paul has to move out. And Maxime Bernier can’t move at all. Poor Jagmeet Singh is still just running in place and our darling princeling has a new lease on life-as-only-he-knows-it. Elections Canada (which may take up to four days to count all the ballots) has given the interim results of the latest election and it is clear: Canadian voters are matching wits with Floridians. And losing!

Admittedly, few want to change horses in the middle of a pandemic. I get that. Most people get that. But Trudeau didn’t and he is our dear leader. Mind you, Trudeau does not get much of anything, really. So, basically, it is the same ol’ status quo with the same old imbecile at the helm. What a fiasco!

On the other hand…….? Well, Canadians voted for ‘same ol’, same ol’ and that sorta says something…doesn’t it? Satisfaction? I do not think so. It could mean, “Hey! We’re busy trying to survive here and the clown Prince wants a show of affection? I am not gonna do that. I will just vote ‘my party’ and let it go at that.” It could also mean, “Well, Trudeau is no good. O’toole hasn’t won my heart. Jag is typically NDP oriented. Nothing new here. In any of them, really.”

The only conclusion I can draw is somewhat similar to my previous observations about the greater confusion in everything. These are confusing times. We have no dreams. We have no overarching goals. We are all just ‘surviving’. There is no grand vision.

And, of course, my usual old saw, “Political leaders are not real leaders, anyway. They are followers. They don’t have courage, vision or competency. They are figureheads for the backroom crowd.”

Do I care that prime grade sheep lead us? Not really. Sheep are generally harmless. They ain’t gonna take you anywhere but the field is nice, the shepherd is kinda blank and the grass is plentiful. What’s not to like?

But, if we are faced with real challenges or need to make real changes to the system, well, we need real leaders, real people, real doers, real thinkers. Sheep won’t do. We are woefully ill-equipped in the right-stuff department and worse, we actually do have real challenges right now. Covid is a problem. Climate change is a real challenge. And look at how the leaders of the world have addressed that.

Only Angela Merkel in Germany showed real social leadership on climate change and she is quitting. She’s tired. She has to be. And she did not accomplish all that she set out to do. For me, that is very discouraging. The good ones couldn’t get the job done, the bad ones stay in power and where’s the future in that?

I almost always write about what is currently mostly on my mind. But not always. Sometimes I sense readers need a whale or a raven tale, an intrepid Sally story or maybe a ‘holy cow’ chore like wrangling a forest of logs. You know, setting and character development-type stuff?

Of course, my mind naturally inclines to politics, economics, construction and sometimes an amateurs examination of the human condition. I love living OTG but some of what I love is that it is relaxed and stress-free. And relaxation (and napping) is not the usual fodder for writing much of anything. Living OTG is fabulous but is not a story every day. And the older I get, the less I do, and the less I do, the less OTG’ing there is to report……ergo I may have to change the title of this blog to Napping OTG.

I just do not have much for you lately……

Some of the summer folk are readying to return to the city. I find that odd. Who would want to rush back? Still, there are social obligations and habits, not to mention a dark and gloomy season ahead out here. By the end of the month the summer ‘force’ will have basically left. By the end of October, it will be getting dark earlier. Already most of the marine traffic has stopped. Summer is definitely on it’s last legs.

On the plus side, plenty of water is now back in the ‘giant sponge’ semi-swamp which is our water source way back up in the hills. That natural sponge keeps us in water all year long and even during the heat dome times, it was was still trickling. That is a huge natural blessing.

The whales finally came back. Not so much in the early or mid-summer but, in the last few weeks, we have seen them more frequently but that is somewhat offset by generally seeing less of all kinds of other wildlife this summer. This year was not a banner year for wildlife encounters.

It was not a banner year for our garden, either. We have cherry tomatoes up the wazoo and volunteer potatoes like never before but so much of the standard kitchen produce was underperforming this year. Mind you, we had giant cucumbers – a real surprise. But lettuce and broad leafy stuff was way down.

Fish and shellfish were also down but that’s mostly because I can’t catch fish and can barely catch oysters (they are quicker than they look). We kinda rely on the kindness of friends to give us fish in exchange for Sal’s baking. But this has also been a less than social year. Covid, ya know?

Sal got off the rock and went to Victoria for family a few weeks back but I stayed behind. I haven’t been off the rock in a long time. Maybe three times in the last 18 months? And I am perfectly OK with that. So is the rest of the world.

What is on my mind today….? Not much of anything…not really….stunning and stubborn stupidity showing up all over the damn place from Covid to politics, the surprising phenomena of a Trump or a Trudeau succeeding at anything; private space companies headed to Mars; the desperate longing for normalcy for some people to the extent of risking one’s health to attend a restaurant or a stadium? I suppose the thing most on my mind is how little of what’s going on I understand. People protesting vaccines outside a hospital? I am feeling like a student of the human condition failing the course.

If I have anything new to say, it is this: there have been articles about the changing attitudes of those generations coming up (the generations listed below in bold type are the ones most often referred to):

• Baby Boomers: born 1946 to 1964. …
• Generation Jones: born 1955 to 1965. …
• Generation X: born 1965 to 1980. …
• Xennials: born 1977 to 1983. …
• Millennials: born 1981 to 1996. …
• Generation Z: born 1997 or after. …
• Generation Alpha: born 2010 or after.

It seems the writers of the articles have detected a shift toward socialism. The X, Z and Millenials are not satisfied with the rigors of Capitalism (especially when it comes to housing) and they are somewhat less driven to compete. They are a bit more selfish and self-centered but it is showing up mostly as insisting on ‘having a life’ outside the simple pursuit of filthy lucre. Hard to argue with that.

Why mention that? Well, I am not a 100% bona fide socialist. I appreciate the need for incentives and motives and I know that all men and women are NOT created equal even if they should be treated as equally and as respectfully as possible. But ideals are not realities. Greed, ambition and aggression are also human conditions and, without those traits, would we have Elon Musk, the Rolling Stones, Amazon and Costco? Probably not.

I guess what I am saying is: If the planet survives (or better put: If WE survive) then the future generations are likely to be more cooperative, less greedy, more peaceful, less materially driven. Maybe. Or maybe they will just be easier to conquer by the next horde of greedy pigs. Hard to tell.

Politics. OOoohhhh….politics. SSSOOOOooooooooo fascinating…….don’cha think?

Of course it is. Politics is everything, EVERYTHING….except…well, when it isn’t. And this time around, in Canada, it isn’t. It really isn’t. This time around it is really DULL. Canadian politics is dull like the same ol’ bi-lingual, politically correct Pablum it always is….

I mean, ever since the Orange Grinch stole the presidency and then lost it complete with a cast of idiots, a great wall, a porn star as first lady and a dramatic and violent pseudo insurrection, politics has become kinda dull….doncha think?

Where is Trump and his small-but-randy hands when you need him, eh?

But, here is where it becomes interesting again. Politics+pandemic+ignorance+shallow platitudes, mixed with social media and waddya got? Protests, anti-vaxxers, death, depressed medical staff, giant Petrie dishes-in-the-making (schools and football stadiums) and, most obvious of all: hapless leaders failing pathetically in public. Political humiliation writ large. Oh my God, those ‘leaders’ are so incredibly incompetent. Politics has not been addressing the job at hand and, when they do, they do it poorly. Maybe politics never was any good….?

Ooooohhhh, never mind……let us get focused on a sex story, instead…..Oooooh, let’s do yet another on transgenderism……or let’s watch sports…entertainment. Celebrities.

Oooohhhhh, let’s get back to being really stupid! If Trump isn’t being a colossal clown for our entertainment, then, at least we have Monday Night Football. What about TIFF, eh? How ’bout them Jays?

They (the ubiquitous ‘they’ or ruling elite) cannot even save their friends from the cave-dwelling Taliban. They cannot deal with a largely un-Ebola-like super flu. They seem to still wonder if climate change is real (not doing squat if they do know). The economy is coming off the rails and we are rejecting our long-well-fed institutions. We are focused on the minutiae of talking ducks, Kim’s butt and what Angelina fears……all this when the world is coming undone! These doofuses (leaders) are still talking jobs and day care and women’s rights when the world is basically turning uninhabitable.

It is precisely like Nero fiddling while Rome burned.

But, well, we have it locally, too. Stupid is rural as well as urban. People are fussed around here because we cannot socialize. We can’t meet-in-groups. We have limits set on our abilities to spread the plague and we protest that. We assert our right to pass on disease!

The majority of the population are now supporting the right and obligation of the unvaxxed to pass it on to each other…..it is a start.

I am all for promoting the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally, myself.

If economics is the sum of all transactions and behaviours in the marketplace, what is politics, really? Is it practical philosophy? Is it just a popularity contest? A major scam perpetrated on the masses intended to fool them into playing their subservient role? We pick leaders who do not lead. We pick representatives who represent themselves and their select pack first and foremost. We invest in a system that never seems to work right. Is that politics? Sort of a rigged casino that does nothing but kills time and steals?

And………..now to the point of this rant-blog: politics may be wearing out it’s welcome. Politics may be in the end game of it’s existence. Democracy, anyway. Politics, as we know it, may be over. PAWKIMBO. TEOTWAWKI and PAWKIMBO soon to be playing at a venue all over.

Think about it: we used to get our daily messages from the media and serious, deep voiced men we could trust like Walter Kronkite and the gang of intellects at 60 Minutes. Lloyd Robertson and Dan Rather and Peter Mansbrige, Peter Jennings and Barbara Frum in Canada. The Prime Minister rarely spoke and neither did the President and, when they did, it was a solemn occasion. Now? Now there is a constant chorus of cacophony, a chaos of yapping voices on just about everything most of whom are just opinionators, commentators and talking air-heads (kinda like me). All seemingly saying politically correct nothing. And I am talking politicians and newscasters. They are all agitated lightweights with no practical solutions to offer.

Seriously. Ever since Trump debased the White House, Western style politics has been in the gutter. Even when a leader does emerge, he or she is shot down instantly. They kissed their babysitter or something twenty years ago. We have no leaders! We have anti-establishmentarianism snipers, instead. (C’mon, how many times have you seen that word written lately?)

Now, Afghanistan….that’s another story. REAL politicians. REAL snipers. Mind you, their leaders insist on going backwards but, at least they have agreement on their direction.

…..I am building a shed. Small. Utilitarian. Might not even put on a door………it is basically a storage shed for the larger tools now cluttering up my workshop. You may also recall that lumber prices went nuts just at the beginning of this project and so I started by using re-claimed old wood I had on hand. Old wood has some interesting qualities to it. It is harder, drier and stained-by-experience.

The stuff I had was, originally, rough-cut, locally milled and I had used it for maybe the better part of our time here (18 years) already. I likely rebuilt a section of something, tore down the old something and noticed that some of the wood was still ‘pretty good’. So, I kept it.

The first place to use it was as the floor for the shed. Of course, it is too uneven to be a floor anywhere else but it is fine for the shed. Then I used it for a bit of framing, mostly blocking and such, saving the store-bought wood for the structural pieces like walls and roof.

But, Dave’s carpentry is not all that it should be and so I have off-cuts and mistakes and wood-so-bad I cannot use it all and it was gathering up around the chop saw. Over the course of a season, managing and cutting wood to maximize uses and efficiencies, I still end up with the equivalent of a blue barrel of off-cuts and crap. Basically, that is OK. It is not a lot of waste and the bits and pieces make really good ‘short fires’ in the wood stove one does just to take the chill off on the odd but increasing cold days in the Autumn. When you want longer, all-day fires, you use the larger, thicker chunks of firewood chopped and split for that purpose. But off-cuts make nice ‘warm-ups’.

So, anyway, I am looking at my growing pile of offcuts and, for some reason, think that I should do something better with them. An experiment in wood, perhaps? So, I cut ’em and glue ’em and plane ’em and I make a short, square-ish, rough-looking table top…it takes maybe three hours…..

My daughter came to visit and she has real carpenter interests (and has been accumulating tools for her shop back home – ALL MAKITA!) and, fortunately, she is at a wood-butcher level carpenter and so we churn out the work and make crap together. Whatever we build, it is NOT in the least bit beautiful but it is strong and well built engineering wise, suitable for our style and we are happy whacking away at stuff.

“Hey, Dad, what’s that? It’s beautiful!”

“Too kind. It is just garbage off-cuts glued together. I just wanted to see if I could do something other than burn it. I’ll use that piece for a table and it will be outside. Maybe I move it around with me as a tool rest or put it near the BBQ for dishes and such…I dunno…”

“I want it!”

“No.”

“I want it!”

“No!”

(Repeat that debate ? for maybe twenty exchanges…maybe more)

“Look, I have more off-cuts. I’ll teach you how to do it. You can make your own.”

“Deal!”

So, yesterday, she began her own……