A bit distracted

I'm a bit distracted today.

Yesterday just before I left for woodshop, I received an email from my dad, mentioning that my mother had had a "scary gall bladder attack" last week, and that she likely will have it removed in the very near future. Knowing my dad, my translation of this is that he was scared silly and too distracted, and things were changing too quickly, for him to update us. I think I might've mentioned that my mother had appendicitis last year, resulting in its removal. And now another one?! This does not seem like a good pattern.

I spent half of woodshop stressed and distracted. Not a good thing with power tools around, I know; plus, as M went through his instructions for the next few steps, I realized that I'd have to do my splines (thin cherry pieces that slide into slots at either end of the cutting boards) over again because they were too loose in their slots. They were only going to be held in by pegs and not glued in, so there'd be a gap -- not good. This of course was a bit disappointing -- though the old guy in the class (who likes me) cheerily sympathized, because he'd done the same thing and had had to make another set too. So I spent the first part of class doing measurements on the big long block of maple that is to be my candle holder, and then was the third student to use the drill press with the big 2" wide bit in it to make the six deep holes for the candles.

Or I would have, but unfortunately the bit had been working so hard for the first two people that it was very hot, and getting hotter with further use. This is bad because if drill bits get too hot, they lose their temper, then become dull much faster. So M said that I should use the other drill press, which was equipped with a 1/4"ish regular bit, to drill out some of the wood within those big circles, to make the 2" bit's job easier. So I did that -- there was no stopper nut on that particular press (it had wandered off) so we put a piece of tape on the bit and I had to crouch down to make sure the tape didn't go past the top edge of the wood; I didn't want to go *through* the holder, just help make the depression. That worked out fine; the 2" was a little easier to use after that.

Anyway, to make a long story short, the holes went fine, I cut myself a new piece of cherry to make a new set of splines with, and I stayed after class to get the splines milled. I did that, then cut each one into two pieces (3 cutting boards, with one spline in each end = 6 splines). Turned out that the fit in my smallest board was *still* loose because it had been cut on a different day than the others, argh! Fortunately M dug into his veneer collection (really, really thin slices of fancy woods used to cover up more practical or lower quality construction) and found a couple of scraps of padauk that he said I could have, which fit into the gap exactly. Whew. So the smallest board will now have a thin, decorative stripe of dark wood at each end. Yeah...I meant to do that, shhh.

Before we left, M said he'd noticed me helping out the other students and appreciated having the second set of eyes, and would I be interested in hiring on with the school as his assistant in class? I'd get to attend for free, and of course have time available with him after class to work on stuff if I wanted to. I said that the idea appealed to me, because M is in the habit of changing his class project every quarter, which is more appealing to me than having the opportunity to build a table over and over (which is what the other class does). And that I'd think about it and get back to him.

I had a hard time getting to sleep last night.

And I'm a bit distracted today. I wonder how my mother is doing, and if I should fly down and visit. It certainly seems more useful than anything I have on my plate at work.