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Today's fun was working on the next two retirement plaques for our two longest-tenured employees who are both retiring at the end of the month, one of whom just happens to be my boss (John). They have 86 years of federal service between them. Anyway, I'd been working on a concept for him for a while, wanting to make the plaque something that would be unlike anything else that someone would receive. When Jackie, our Community Planning Liaison Officer, I seized an opportunity to talk to a friend who is the Director at the Naval History and Heritage Command in Boston, MA. For those that don't know, that's the group that is responsible for the maintenance and upkeep of the USS Constitution. So last week I took a few hours off one morning and drove down to Charlestown to pick up some raw materials that they were kind enough to give me. The hardest part of the day was spent machining copper that was taken off of the hull of Constitution during her overhaul in 2015. I decided to use a sheet that had significant patina and try to preserve that by engraving off a small portion to reveal the name of the person that the plaque will be for. I used a diamond tipped drag bit, I'm pretty happy with the results. My mill is unexpectedly struggling when trying to plunge into soft metal, I don't know if I've got the plunge set too fast or if it's an issue with my tooling, regardless it was way more of a hassle than it should be. Next up was using a piece of ash that was taken off of the ship recently. The maintenance detachment actually is pretty much working on the ship year round removing rotten wood and replacing it with new. Most of the ship is white oak, still grown in a specific forest in Indiana, but this piece of ash was pretty cool in that it had finish on two surfaces and had pegs that had been used to join it to other, adjacent pieces. Overall w/ one coat of finish Edge detail, w/ original finish. The top recess will get a command coin in it and the bottom pedestal will support the name tag. I've made two matching plaques which is appropriate since they are holding the retirement party together on Thursday and I figured it'd be weird if I made one substantially different than the other. There's not much left to do on these aside from apply a bunch of coats of finish. The end grain in particular is obscenely thirsty. I'll try to post finished pictures but I tend to be terrible about taking pictures of projects when they are done.

got the second batch of transformers from SumR. Now the filament voltages are 14% too high, but transformers run cool. 7.3448 volts on the 6.3v line (zoom in) in other news the 300v regulated power supply with the appropriate fixes works great.

I should have added Chobani. It's is excellent as well.

Oat is my standard. For steaming I honestly like the Chobani extra creamy the best.

Carbide 3D released two in-house products under the name McEtcher (teehee) so I picked up the combo pack, conveniently one day before they announced it as part of their black Friday sale - insert *sigh* emoji. It takes some tinkering, and I'll be interested to see how it does on standard brass. I've got a sheet that arrived yesterday that I need to engrave for someone. Too many fricken people retiring this year.

Everyone's favorite hyperactive, high-pitched tech dropper reviews a pair of overpriced and underperforming air pods.

I love oat milk. I don’t drink regular milk any more.

^ This.

That is so fucking cool.

Spent the day trying to finish some additional storage today that will go under the SawStop. Trying to keep it very saw-like with cast iron and black finish but was not able to get the cast iron drawer faces (with leveling feet pulls) on today as I cannot get the finish I want yet.

Not nearly as exciting as some of the other entries here but I got the east coast ping pong table back up and running today, with integral dust extraction, for another retirement plaque. The plaque itself probably doesn't look all that impressive, but the multiple layers/depths, and clean up to have it look decent represent about 2-1/2 hours of programming - and that's after finishing the design. Upside is that I taught myself some stuff, downside is that I've got two more projects to complete this weekend due to the number of people retiring at work. I'll post some details on those soon enough as they use some truly incredible materials. Intermediate phase of cutting Raw (unfinished, but sanded) product

I may have to give this a try over the holiday season. Thank you, tyrion. HS

I just realized I’m going to have to either rearrange or get a bigger table once I have the Smart Espresso Profiler, to accommodate the tablet I’ll buy for it (this may be an excuse for me to get a new iPad). I guess I wasn’t kidding when joked I was going to need a bigger boat.

That’s awesome, Nate! What drag bit did you use, been so differing picking one up instead of outsourcing to a trophy shop.

That looks awesome Nate! Great job!

A Scottish story in four parts:

Digging this with some morning coffee... HS

Business side of the cutting board. Figure it will have a long life serving charcuterie to Marin’s finest.

Steve and I got the miter station cabinets mostly built today. Essentially the entire back wall will be work space and storage in addition to the miter station. We still have to add a ¾ plywood top, two shelves on the right hand side for wood storage, and I am still deciding about the cabinet space to the left side of the saw. And the Kapex is actually on a temporary shelf because I didn't have enough ¾ ply and we wanted a photo op. When complete, we are going to do a face frame and drawer fronts in maple, I think. We have decided that the only miter fence needed is the Kapex fence, which maximizes the work surfaces on either side of the saw. I have ordered a Woodpeckers Stealth track system that will be inset flush into the top on both sides of the saw with flip up stops and track to mount clamps and such. It should make for happy chop sawing.

The 45 of “The Last Train to Clarksville” was a 10-year-old me’s first physical recording. 😪

Frank was life president of our running club - Abingdon AAC - and used to run with us back in the day. He was a real nutcase runner, and used to take his drivers for a run around a F1 circuit so they could "understand" the circuit better. He was fast! Then, aged 44 and on his way to the Airport in the South of France, focusing on a half marathon he was going to run he next day in London, lost control of the car, broke his neck and became tetraplegic, living the last 35 years wheelchair-bound. He was always very accepting of what happened to him, with a ready smile. Born in South Shields, and a Geordie like me. RIP Frank, you were a real character on all sorts of levels.

A little late with this one but I admired him as a fellow countryman and was lucky to meet once in person in London. He was very gracious and genuine. Obituary: Sir Antony Sher, a giant of the stage https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-58601697

RIP Anne Rice....read some of her earlier books and enjoyed. Couldn't get into as much later, but she basically kicked off a major genre of Romance-Horror. She was also a fan of one of my favorite musicians, Mary Fahl, and chose a song of Mary's to use in one of her Audiobooks. Also RIP to Al Unser....used to watch racing more in the 70's and he (and his whole family) were among the best!

RIP Michael Nesmith 🥲 https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/monkees-michael-nesmith-dead-1270079/amp/