here’s life

This morning I went over to my small group leader’s house, and after breakfast, we started making a garden in their backyard. We didn’t have a tiller, so we used shovels to turn in the grass. A couple robins stopped by to find the bugs that we uncovered, and we would toss them grubs, which they would carry away in their beaks. By noon we had a three-cornered lot about fifteen feet by ten feet. It is going to take some work to get the grass dead—especially the wiregrass (thankfully, there isn’t much of that). Next step is to chop up the grass as it continues to grow, and once it is sufficiently dead, and the clods broken up, we will plant some stuff. Not sure what to plant yet, probably some pepper plants and tomato plants. Some beans would be good. I’d like to dig up some small spots elsewhere in the yard and put in some winter squash. Probably put down gobs of grass clippings. We do need to gather grass clippings, but that doesn’t seem to hard. This afternoon I got about a dozen bags—they are in my car, waiting to be transfered to the backyard. I hope they don’t permanently make my car smell…

This afternoon, after a nap, I went and played volleyball with some people from work. We had a good time.
I’m thinking that gardening is going to help fill my need to dig things and do things, and I may not have to build a house. Like it would be possible.

Thursday I drove south instead of home after work. I followed this aproximate route. Mulvane is on the line between Sedgwick and Sumner Counties, and Udall is in Cowley. Udall is about 30 minutes from work, while Mulvane is only about 17. But, driving around down there, I began to question if I actually wanted to live out in the rural areas, so far from my (few) friends and other things of interest that cities provide. The significance of the counties is that Sumner and Cowley do not appear (at first glance) to have building codes, so I would have more freedom to experiment with unconventional building methods. It would mean a lot more digging than I did today—my hands are sore, and almost blistered in some places. It seems like a cool idea, but then I realize that I can’t seem to find the motivation to wash my dishes or clean up my house, or even finish building a piece of furniture—what makes me think I could keep at something like building a house, and then living with the results?
Meanwhile, here is a cool modular home company.

Here is my kitchen floor.

And here is my living room.

I’m in the process of building another piece of funiture. If it suceeds, it will be really cool. If I actually spent much time on it, I’d be done by now, and the mess cleaned up. And now it is after 11, I need to put in some bread, and go to bed, and I have something of a sore throat.

Many moons ago, I found a Rice Cooker. The buttons and LCD display was in some Asian language, and it was missing the pot part that goes inside. So, rather than washing it out and using it to cook rice, I put it in my closet, figuring I’d do something with it someday. Well, that day finally came.

This after noon I was washing my Philodendron plant, when I figured I should repot it. Maybe split it up, so I had one I could take to work an put in my cube. I looked through my extensive collection of pot-like items, and came upon my rice cooker. At first I was going to strip it down, removing the electronics, but then I thought, Why not make the display usable? After much finagling, I got it workable.

I don’t want to cook my plant, nor start a fire, so I unhooked the main heater element. Unfortunately, when I plugged it in, the wake-up sequence failed because the electronics noticed that the heater was “broken”. At least I’m pretty sure that’s what it was thinking—I don’t know Kanji. So, I replaced the heater element with a resistor. It was necessary to use a very high resistance one so that it didn’t get too hot. But, the circuitry was satisfied with even a 1,000,000 ohm (brown-black-green) resistor. But if I take out the heaters, what good is the display on a rice cooker? Especially if it is full of dirt! Well, it has a clock.

In the picture above, you can see the display, but the big numbers are not the time—that is the time when the rice will be done. I’m not sure what what I’ll do with that function, however. Mostly I’ll want it for the clock:

There’s the clock. Yeah, it took me into the evening to get it done. But, now that I know how, I’d be faster next time. Next time I need to make a planter out of a rice cooker.
I’ll take it to work and spread the Philodendron arms around my cube. Then I can tell how much time I waste watering my plant.

You’ve been in a gym. They have those bright, white, lights in the ceiling, right? Well, I picked up a couple at the SStore a month or two ago. I’ve gotten these before and made end tables out of them. The ones I got recently were special because they are made of glass—-the bell of the lamp is a huge piece of ribbed glass. Yesterday I was talking to my brother about making stuff, (he was working with wood) and I decided I should do something cool, since it was Saturday.

So, I took one lamp apart and started working on turning it into a table—I don’t know what else to make, even though the world, and definately my house, have enough tables. I went to a thrift store and picked up a glass plate, and was trying to use it to connect the bell to the feet. I didn’t have a diamond tipped drill or even an abrasive bit, so I was using a regular bit. It really didn’t cut very fast, even with the bits of glass powder as aggregate. That is, until, you get the friction to start heating the glass red hot. Then it goes through like through hot, umm, glass. But, we all know that uneven heat and glass don’t mix very well. I got two holes drilled, but the third one caused big cracks to form in the plate. Maybe I pushed too hard, or not hard enough. Or both.

Instead of glass, I cut the bottom two inches off a thin stainless pot I had found, and bent the edge over so it wasn’t sharp. I backed this up with some wood, and fastened it all together with drywall screws and tapered disks of wood.

I have not yet caulked the glass top down, I might want to put some lights in there first—-I drilled a hole through the base so I can run some wires if necessary.

What do you think? Should I light it or just let it refract and reflect ambiant lighting? I also need some ideas of what to put inside it–I need something to cover up the ugly wood disk that holds down the glass.

After slacking off for several months, I finished the Ottoman/table.

Specs:
Height of table: 27″ to 32″
Height of cushion platform: 16″ to 20″
Horizontal dimensions: 24″ by 23″
Table to Ottoman conversion: 6 seconds
Ottoman to Table conversion: 10 seconds
Weight loads: Don’t sit on table.

So, the other evening I slapped together another coffee cup table because my last one seemed to be such a hit. Only this time I did it right. Except that it looks alot like the vapor that it is made of. And now I get to go home for a while and visit my family.

Here are some pictures of the computerized table system. The mouse is under the saucer, but is really annoying to use. But, it works and I can click the buttons. The keyboard is handy until I get everything mousified. But, what do I run on it?

It seems to mostly be a proof of concept sort of device.

But I do have an extra optical mouse now, so I might redo the input system. Plus I have another wireless router that I could use to get this table beyond the limits of my (short) network wires

Thanks to a suggestion by the winner of the 41 Scholarship, and declaration of it’s impossibility by aduma, I am attempting to make a table that runs linux. I have mounted the computer and monitor, and now I just need to wire it all up and get some cloth to put under the glass top. The next hard steps are picking out the cloth at walmart, and getting the computer to boot without a keyboard–I didn’t make allowance for the cables.

But I don’t think that now is the time to go to walmart, so I will go to bed.

Here is the monitor in the table, which is on a lazy-susan bearing thing, so the whole thing can rotate for flexibility in viewing direction.

Coffee Table:
A simple coffee table with elegant angles that you could easily build with minimal tools. A lively center piece for any room, this low table will hold chips and controllers–or books and tea with equal endefince.

Total: $41
or less if you choose the smaller top. You will have plenty left over of everything but wood, should you want to do another project.

Ingredients:
2 8 ft. 2×2’s $4.38
1 4×4 sheet 15/32″ plywood $13.78 add $0.75 for cut
or
1 2×4 sheet 15/32″ plywood $7.88
1 2.5″ drywall screws, lb. $4.47
1 varnish/stain (Polyshades), quart. $9.87
4 oz. wood glue $1.18
1 wood filler (natural color), tube $1.96
1 foam brush $0.57
1 100 grit sandpaper, pack $1.98
1 220 grit sandpaper, pack $1.98
1 stir stick FREE

If you prefer a larger table, choose the 4×4 sheet of plywood and have them cut it at 32″. Use the strip leftover as a shelf under the table. You can also express your creativity with a top made from oak plywood, glass (shown), plastic, bamboo, ice, etc.

Tools:
Saw: hand, circular, table, etc.
[if you have a table saw available, buy a 2×4 and cut it in half instead of using 2 2×2″s]
Screwdriver: preferably power, but hand will do
[if you have a drill, pre-drill the holes for the screws with a bit the size of the shank of the screw (smaller than the threads)]
Square (preferably a Speed-Square)
Pencil
Tape measure
Drop-cloth and rags
String

Directions:

First you will cut the boards. Cut one end of a 2×2 to a 45. Measure down 29 inches from the tip and cut another 45, creating a parallelogram. Repeat. Trim the angle off the 38 inch piece left over. Now you have turned an 8 foot 2×2 into:
2 29″ parallelograms \———–\
1 36.5 (or so) stick |—————-|

Repeat with the other 2×2, cutting it in the same way that you did the first.

Now you are ready to start connecting the wood.
Lay the parallelograms side by side with the angles sloping the same direction. Measure 13.75 inches from the tip of the top, using the square to make a mark all the way across each one.
Take a pair and flip one over the other, creating an X, (complete with serifs–the top angles align , and the bottom angles do too). Line up the marks you made so the other board is on the bottom side of each mark. While holding these straight with your feet and the square, pre-drill two holes at the intersection (preferably), sink the screws. Get the screw heads to sink about 1/8″ below the wood, so you can hide them with wood filler. If you have a larger drill, countersink the holes. Next, disassemble the two boards and put wood glue between them. Reassemble, being careful to keep them at 90 degrees with the square. Wipe off the extra glue and repeat with the other pair of parallelograms.

Now, place the two X’s as far apart as the other boards are long. Position the long boards as shown. Be sure that angled ends are correct on both X’s. Tightening a loop of string around the long boards, midway between the X’s can help hold it all together, freeing up a few hands to fasten it. Make sure the X’s are square with the long boards (all four legs on both sides). If the long boards bow together in the middle from the string, you may try loosening it, or using two strings. Once every thing is straight, pre-drill and screw the long boards to the X’s–one screw into each member of the X at each end of each long board seems to be fine. Next, loosen the screws in the ends of the long boards, one set at a time and get glue in the joint, and tighten it back up, countersinking the screw heads, go on to the next set.
If using a wood top, center it on the base, screwing it down with 4 screws, glue, and sink the heads into the wood.
Once it is all glued and tightened up, fill the screw heads with wood filler, smoothing it off slightly higher than the wood–it sands down easily. While you let it dry for 2 hours, reward yourself with some supper or start sanding the top.
Which brings us to the sanding. Use the 100 grit sandpaper to bring all the surfaces to a basic level of smoothness, and then finish it off with the 220 grit. Sanding is somewhat tedious, and should be done outside, to avoid coating everything with fine dust, like I have in my house.
Once you have it as smooth as you want, wipe off all the dust and get ready to varnish it.

You want good ventilation, but not wind, and dropcloths. Stir up the varnish and put on two coats, following the directions on the can. You can wrap the brush in plastic and put it in the freezer between coats so it doesn’t dry out. (or buy a couple, they’re cheap). I have found that dusting it down with steel wool between coats just got steel wool powder on it, but maybe I was not letting it dry long enough. Maybe a “green scratchy” (normally used to scrub pots) would work well–haven’t tried it. You can get away with not sanding it between coats.
congratulations, you have a table! Now if you only had some coffee to put on it.

Prices were gathered earlier this week from a branch of a nation-wide hardware store chain whose name starts with an “L” and rhymes with “rose”. Prices may not total as perfectly in you area or in your store.

I tried to cut a piece of glass to put on the long boards, between the X’s. Glass cutting is dangerous, so I took safety precautions: Safety glasses, leather glove, etc.

After scoring the glass, I tried to break, but it was especially flexible (my first ignored warning) and so I put a 2×4 on edge under it and bent the ends down until they touched the ground, and then it shattered:

Glass is tempered by shrinking the outside layer, through rapid cooling, compressing the inner layers, giving it strength. However, when I broke the balance of forces, the inside was suddenly freed to expand, and it flew apart–mostly expanding lengthwise, not up into my face. Then for the next 20 minutes I could hear it still crackling and popping, like tiny kernels of popcorn in a hot kettle. Good news it that my large sheet is probably tempered as well, giving me extra strength and safety.

I finished my coffe cup shaped table, following a suggestion of aduma’s. The glass and metal are from the 1KW light I got. The handle is a hollow nylon tube that I bent by melting it in the oven seen to the left. I wrapped the plastic in aluminum foil and put it in at 400 degrees until it was soft enough to bend, which was 10 minutes or so. Then I bent it in to shape and let it harden. The crumpled foil helped keep it from burning my hands. It did take me two stints with the oven to get it the right shape. Don’t melt plastic. Death, injury or fire could result.

It sure took alot of coffee to fill this cup up, but it wasn’t like I wanted to drink the stuff.

I picked up a lamp at a yard sale, because it had a beat up lampshade. I made one from fiber reiforced honeycomb. Six tapered pieces held together with stripped cat5 wire. Each twisted pair was hard to unwind, until I found I could put one end in the drill and pull apart the other ends, by operating the drill with my foot. My living room has seen better days, but it has been a while.

Other news:
I spent the day sunday at church where they were hosting a carnival. I was the trash guy, about a half dozen trashcans were all that needed my attention–others took good care of the rest. So it was just enough to keep me from feeling useless or bored. There were games, and big inflatable things, and bands and doorprizes and food and it was all free, YAC-style. Facepainting, popcorn, caricatures and cotton candy were also there. I think it was a success, they were shooting for 400 people and I think they probably had close to double that. I got something of a sunburn, drank over a gallon, and still was dehydrated when I got home after dark.

More pics, posted into the past….