It was 2005 when I decided I wanted--no, I needed a compound miter saw. I had gone to spend a couple weeks with my parents, and I helped them begin the conversion of their garage into living space. We started with a multi-purpose room, a place to house craft projects and a dog who needed frequent access to the outside. It was cutting two by fours for the stud walls that introduced me to the wonders of the chop saw. It was so easy to use, and it felt so much safer than a circular saw or table saw. I came back from that construction vacation, raving about it and suggesting to the man that we needed one. I have asked several times since then, and he has always come up with some excuse or another, along the lines of "we don't need one, we have no place to store one, we don't want to take up space on the next moving truck." Whatever. It's always the tool I think is cool that is one tool too many. Since I started asking, other big power tools have come along. Doing a tile project? Get a tile saw. Mold on the house? Power washer. We have our own cement mixer, for ..goodness.. sake! I guess I'm going to have to negotiate more seriously.
If you haven't guessed today was a carpentry day. I have these periodically. I'm not very experienced at it, but I do well enough to make myself happy. We still use the DVD racks and rustic table I made. Unfortunately the adirondack chair made from the old fence isn't sturdy enough to be anything other than decoration. I'm utterly terrified of the table saw, and I won't use it without a buddy. (This is the same table saw that tried to eat my man's thumb. I might be guilty of singing "Frodo of the Nine Fingers" at him once or twice.) So today, after a week of psyching myself up for it, I used the circular saw to cut the skeleton of my project. Seven out of eight tries, I kept having the same thing happen. The last half inch of board refused to cut, no matter what. I am certain this was user error. I think it was a function of the way I was pushing down on the boards between the chairs I used as saw horses, that made the blade stop and buck. I also broke out the jig I bought the day I splurged on seeds. I went from no idea what I was doing to reasonable proficiency very quickly. By the time I was done for the day, I was feeling quite confident in my skills. I haven't started assembly yet. I still have some kinks to work out of the design. Tomorrow is going to be fun.
I was glad to have the extra sunlight this evening. It gave me time to get a whole lot more done around the house. Everyone else seems to have been complaining about losing an hour this morning, but I seem to have adjusted well. I went to bed an hour early, and felt no ill effects. In fact, we played in the sunlight this morning. Nothing like a little refracted light to attract some playful black and white units. I love starting a day listening to a certain needy girl's funny, barking chatter. That never gets old.
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