What I did on Margaret's (Sort of) Spring Break

Last week Margaret attended the CCCC in Portland, Oregon. This is a big convention under the auspices of the National Council of Teachers of English. I took three vacation days to accompany her; while she conferred, I did some sightseeing on my own and visited Gary Rogowski at his Northwest Woodworking Studio. We also visited with my old friends Chris Murray and Shannon Riley.

Here are some pictures.

How Long is Your Doughnut Hole?

My "retirement package" can be accessed at 62, and I have some "emergency savings" to live on if I ever am out of work. If my emergency savings continue growing, and my age continues to approach 62, I should have an ever-decreasing "doughnut hole," the time between when my emergency savings would run out and when I reach age 62.

I am sure I'm not alone in thinking that once the doughnut hole is gone, continuing to work is optional rather than a life-or-death necessity. And so I like to keep an eye on the size of the doughnut hole. When things are going well, I only check once a year or so. When things are miserable, I check slightly more often. Twice a day maybe. It would be nice to develop a bit of software that would display the doughnut hole "countdown" style on my smartphone. Or not. After all, that leads to a mindset of wanting "this part" of my life to be over so I can be living in "that part." Which of course is illusory thinking; the only part of my life I can ever live is THIS HERE NOW.

Still. It's nice to have something pleasant to think about, so here's an online calculator that will tell you how long your emergency savings will hold out. Add that to your current age, subtract the sum from 62, and you know the length of your doughnut hole.

You're welcome.

Doughnut Hole Length Calculation Helper

Set Your Car to Nookie Mode

Worth reading. Based on the concept: what if human nature remains about the same as "driverless cars" become commonplace?

https://medium.com/hidden-in-plain-sight/concepts-in-autonomous-mobility-80732bc4a44d#.bjjnykj1a

It's really quite simple

Just done with a weekend of teaching at Highland Woodworking. Saturday was "Surfacing Lumber in the Small Shop," and Sunday was "Tablesaw Basics." I've been doing a lot of teaching lately, and there's nothing like teaching for learning. I get reminded of things I've known all along, of course, like "Practice on Scraps!" but I also learn new things too. On Saturday I got better at flattening the second side of the board, and bringing it into parallel with the first (or face) side when I saw how David Charlesworth's "stop shavings" give a surface the shape I used to think of as "gravy lake" when I was an 8-year-old playing with my mashed potatoes.

Writing that sentence made it quite clear to me I'll need to add photos to explain this. Just now it's late at night, and I'm nowhere near my camera, or a roughsawn board, or a workbench or a scrub plane. So it will have to wait.

Modes of Authorship in Woodworking Discourse

Drafting a proposal for an essay about woodworking discourse.

Having done some drafting on the proposal, I'm now thinking of writing about two different "authorial positions" for woodworking writers, one of them best described as "authoritative" (authority derived from technical mastery and long, successful experience) and the other as "ethical" (an ethos of "passion" and curiosity that seduces the reader into vicarious experience of the author's series of discoveries). The "ethical" author also invites the reader into a dialog; the Internet makes a truly Bakhtinian dialog, in which readers become writers instantaneously, possible. Both authorial modes studiously ignore the involvement of the mechanisms enabling woodworking discourse (print, video, internet) in the same economy of production and consumption that drives us all to feel we need to escape via hobbies.

Only with lots of examples.

Kevin Davis, RIP

This afternoon I went to Decaturish and saw this on the front page. It was a sock in the gut to realize that the Kevin Davis referred to worked behind the counter at Sawicki's.

The killing happened while I was out of town for the holidays. In his obituary I learned that Kevin was a fellow Wisconsinite. 

I am not just a customer of Kevin Davis's employer. I am an enthusiastic fan of Sawicki's, and Lynn's employees are among the reasons. Kevin knew his stuff, was unfailingly friendly and helpful, and seemed to be an all-around good guy. I can't say he was a friend, but whenever I stepped in to Sawicki's to pick up a sandwich and he was behind the counter, I knew I would be taken care of.

I think I'll have more to say on this wrong. For now, let me say that of the dozens of places in the metro that Margaret and I have eaten in together, Sawicki's is in a very small group which are special not just because of the quality of what we eat there but also because of the love you see in everything the people there do: love for people, love for good food, love for the mission of bringing good food to people. On that list: Sawicki's, Sobban, Duck's. We are eating at Duck's tonight. I will pour out a libation for Kevin.

http://www.decaturish.com/2015/02/dekalb-sheriffs-office-clarifies-its-response-in-kevin-davis-case/

Jeff's High School days

Jeff didn't have it easy in high school, and classmates didn't always make it any easier for them to learn anything. Carl found this video the other day while looking at You Tube videos on/about/from DHHS:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ImHwtzO48g

Jeff can be glimpsed occasionally behind the girl on the left in the green jacket.