Shop Notes & Rambles
Welcome to the quieter corner of the shop — the place where sawdust settles, thoughts wander, and stories take shape. These rambles capture the rhythm of the work, the lessons learned, and the craft that holds it all together.
Shop Ramble Mailing List
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Shop Ramble Mailing List 〰️
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What Woodworkers Really Do When the Power Goes Out
When the power goes out in a woodshop, everything changes. Machines stop, lights fade, and the whole crew shifts into cleanup mode, safety mode, or story mode — because a power outage in a woodshop isn’t a break, it’s a whole different way of working.
Grandpa’s Toolbox
A story of heritage tools, basement shops, and the hand plane passed from Grandpa to father to son. This Ramble explores vintage woodworking, generational craft, and the memories held inside an old plywood toolbox.
Shop Life
Shop life is a mix of smooth mornings and sudden chaos — lost tools, kickbacks, forgotten plans, and the small moments that shift a day from normal to “oh, fuck.” This Ramble looks at the humour, frustration, and timing that shape a working day, and the quiet skill of knowing when the day is done.
The World Runs on Pencils
Pencils disappear in every shop — buried in dust, stuck behind ears, dropped in tool piles, or sharpened down to nothing. Yet nothing starts without one. This Ramble follows the hunt for the perfect point, the belt‑sander sharpening ritual, the borrowed pencils that never return, and why the smallest tool in the shop quietly holds everything together.
How to Arrive at Perfect
Perfection in woodworking isn’t what you think — tear‑out, stubborn grain, and the mindset shift that turns imperfection into the soul of the craft.
The Power of Lazy
“In 1988, my autobody teacher taught me the smartest lesson I ever learned: lazy workers do the job right the first time. Four semesters restoring a Canadian‑built Pontiac Parisienne proved him right — every bolt, every panel, every mistake avoided. That mindset followed me into woodworking, into life, and into every project since.”