Wednesday, October 31, 2007

Spray Painting



Last week we got Carol set up with a compressor and spray gun. She has a project due for a charity auction next week, so it was time to get cracking.

I did a fair bit of research to figure out what to get. I also talked to our friend Matt who has an amazing woodworking shop in his garage (3-car garage with room for 0 cars). There is a "new" spray gun technology called HVLP (high volume, low pressure) that produces far less overspray and is therefore more efficient with paint and also less likely to coat the whole workspace in paint mist. But most HVLP guns require a very high capacity (i.e. expensive) compressor.

I finally figured out that there is a special type of HVLP gun called a "conversion gun" that "converts" a normal compressor for its use. A pretty strange terminology since you don't do anything to the compressor. We bought a Wagner HVLP conversion gun and a "normal" compressor. I chose the Makita MAC2400 because it runs at lower RPM than other models so it's quieter and lasts longer. The cooler temperature also means less condensation in the compressed air. And I like the compact shape because it takes up less room in the garage.

When I was trying to get everything set up I went to Fittings Inc. to get air hoses and the fittings I need to plumb for air from the garage to the studio (so Carol won't have to listen to the compressor while working). I thought air fittings were universal, but no. There are apparently 22 different styles of male fittings! It took two trips, but I got there. Fortunately another customer who was waiting there for his order gave me some good advice - use "universal" female fittings everywhere and then it doesn't matter what type of male fitting you use.

For now we've been painting in the garage. The gun is indeed very efficient with paint. It has a 1-quart canister that we would fill halfway. Putting a coat on the entire table and chair set only used half of that. And there is very little overspray.

The past two nights Carol has been working in her studio painting the details on the table and chairs. I wanted to take a photo of her working there but the camera battery is dead. Next time. She's loving the space. It's heated, has good lighting, and I bought Carol an iPod speaker system for her birthday so she has music to work by.

I'll of course post photos of the table and chair project when it's complete.

Saturday, October 27, 2007

Honorarium for Scottie



I started road cycling as a serious hobby in 1998. I'd been a pretty serious mountain biker throughout the 90s, but I kept getting injured. In the summer of 1998 I moved to an apartment in downtown Seattle. That made mountain biking less accessible as well as hazardous. So I bought a road bike. I think I rode my mountain bike about twice after that. I immediately liked the speed and smoothness and the more sustained workout one gets from road biking.

I rode mostly solo for several years. In 2001 or so I decided to try some group rides and went on a few with the Cascade Bicycle Club. I love the club and am a member, but I found their organized rides annoying - the rides I went on stopped way too often to regroup - negating the aforementioned sustained workout benefit. But on one aborted ride I met Greg Scott and we made up our own ride. We became instant riding buddies and rode together almost every weekend and some weeknights for a couple of years.

After a while, Greg asked if I wanted to try a Saturday ride he knew about that left from the Eastgate area of Bellevue. We joined in that day and I've been riding with the Saturday group semi-regularly ever since.

The Saturday ride is organized by a fine gentleman named Scott Sensenbrenner. Scott sends out an email in the middle of every week reminding people of the ride and suggesting the start time (earlier in summer, later in winter). The ride goes almost every Saturday year round. The only reason it's usually canceled in advance is a forecast for snow or ice. Scott's been doing this for something like 20 years.

Scott's the friendliest guy you could hope to meet. We often pick up strangers on the ride. Scott gets their email and they become a permanent part of the list. Everybody feels welcome. The group has a wide range of riders, from those who are new to cycling to current and former racers. Every year we talk about getting club jerseys. But the group is so informal that we can't even agree on a name, much less a jersey design.

I've made many good cycling friends from the Saturday ride. It's with people from this ride that I ride STP and the MS Bike Tour and all the other local annual rides. Many of my best days on the bike have been with this group. In the summer when everybody's in their best shape we have some fantastic paceline riding.

A few weeks ago, fellow member Dutch sent out an email organizing a collection. He wanted to give Scott a token of our appreciation for making this ride happen every week for so long, and being responsible for so much enjoyment by so many people. Dutch got a pretty good response. When he went to buy the gift certificate at VeloceVelo in Issaquah, they knew Scott and kicked in some more. Then Dutch waited for a week when he knew turnout would be high. This week he announced that today was the day.

Indeed about 20-25 people showed up on a cold, foggy morning to witness the gifting and show their appreciation to Scott. The "ceremony" such as it was contained the usual amount of sarcasm and ribbing. But it was clear that we all feel gratitude toward Scott.

Then we headed off for a 40 mile ride to Issaquah, Maple Valley and Renton. Fortunately it warmed up a bit after the first 10 miles or so and our fingers came back to life.

Thanks, Scott! I know you don't think you do much, but your welcoming spirit and friendliness are the glue that holds this whole thing together.

Wednesday, October 17, 2007

Turning Leaves



I was on a roll there for a while with frequent posts, but then life went and got busy again.

The most exciting news at the moment is that Charlotte appears to want to potty train herself. She sees Audrey using the bathroom and she of course wants to be like her big sister. She's just starting, but she'll point to her diaper and signal that she has to go, and she'll use the toilet! We'll see if it lasts. It would be ironic if Charlotte were potty trained before she could talk.

One day Carol was in a bind about what to do with Charlotte while she took Audrey to preschool. So I took the morning off and hung out with Charlotte. The weather turned out to be more pleasant than expected, so we went to the beach. We had fun just hanging out together. The beach photos of Charlotte and me in this album are from that day.

As I've said, I'm trying not to obsess about Charlotte's lack of talking, but I do think about it. In the end, it'll happen when it happens. It occurred to me that I could go back and look at video of Audrey - maybe I completely disremember where she was at this age. Charlotte has been making a few efforts. She likes to say "yellow".

Audrey continues to spout pearls on a regular basis. One day (I can't remember the situation) she exclaimed, "Great Ceasar's ghost!". In the middle of one night when she came to our bed scared, Carol said, "You'll be OK." Audrey said "I don't want to be OK!" Another time Audrey told me, "I'm just popping a bubble in my bottom."

Some background for the last Audreyism: 1. We often set the kitchen timer to motivate the girls to do something. Examples are "dinner is on the table for 5 more minutes" or "we'll get out of the tub in 3 minutes". 2. The girls don't watch much TV. Audrey gets some time on the PBS kids channel in the afternoon if Carol needs to get some work done during Charlotte's nap. But on weekends they get to watch Disney movies on DVD.

Last Wednesday we bought two DVDs: "Jungle Book" and "Cars". Audrey asked about a hundred times if she could watch them. After hearing the standard answer (we watch movies on weekends) every time, on Thursday Audrey asked me, "Dad, could you please set the timer for Saturday?"

We ordered a compressor and a spray gun for Carol's furniture business. She'll be able to spray the primer coat, background color coat and the polyurethane at the end. Not having to do those three tasks by hand should save her a lot of time. The goods are supposed to arrive tomorrow.

I'll break in the compressor and gun by painting the trim for the studio. I cut it all a couple of weekends ago but was too lazy to paint it all by hand. Once the trim is installed the studio is essentially finished.

When we built the garage, we demolished a couple of sections of concrete block wall that have been here since shortly after the house was build in the 50's. The north fence is now out of sight behind the garage, so while I had finishing it on my list it was out of sight out of mind. The neighbors finally asked us to fix it (it had a dogtooth edge and was also a little unstable due to cracks from the demolition vibration). I tried for a month to find a mason and finally got one to give a bid. It was affordable, but he couldn't do it until December 21! Apparently fall is the busy season for masons; who knew? We couldn't wait that long, so this last weekend I did it myself. Had to disassemble a bunch of the wall end back to where the cracks were, using a demolition hammer to chisel out the mortar. Same for the west fence. Then I used the demo hammer/chisel to clean the old mortar of all of the blocks so I could reuse them. That was some hard work. Then I rebuilt the north fence and provided a clean termination and also closed off the gap between the fence and garage, and put a new clean termination on the west fence. I used a big gas-powered concrete saw to cut the blocks for the ends and corners. It was about 18 hours of labor and very exhausting with lots of stooping and lifting heavy blocks (they're not cinder blocks, they're an old aggregate block that I don't think they make anymore) and flying grit and dust. I now know I don't want to switch careers and become a bricklayer.

Carol took the girls to Richland for five days to visit her parents. They'll be heading south for the winter pretty soon and the girls need time with their grandparents. Carol had the usual relaxing time and the girls got plenty of playground time as well as treats from Grandma like ice cream cones at 10 in the morning.

Meanwhile, My school is in full swing again too. I set the bar high for myself by getting an A in the first of the three semesters of the course during the summer. Now I of course have to go for perfect grades in the whole series. This semester the course is Biostatistics, a body of knowledge that is used heavily where I work (although not directly by me). It's great to learn what the heck those scientists are talking about, but it's also hard work! I spend about 8-10 hours a week studying and doing homework. The mid-term is this Saturday. I should be studying for it right now.

Lastly, I'm surprised by the psychological difference I feel at work now that I'm a full-time employee. Even though I always acted like a part of the team, now I really feel like a member. Plus, the project I'm on at work got especially interesting and I'm learning a lot. So I'm really enjoying going to work everyday. The sense of security, illusory as it is in my business, is nice.