May Day.

Sussex: Week Two

Day One
Here's a tip from the course, the maxim of cabinet makers everywhere (a rule which is, I would add, a bit of a pain):

"Sharpen often, more than you think you need to."

We've spent the day planing various bits of wood into shape, hopefully getting them to do something useful at some point. By the end of the day, I'm slightly battered and bruised (digits still intact, more or less) and it feels like someone has been hitting me with a big stick. I seem intent on impaling pink fleshy bits on sharp metal (although there was less spurting blood today), so much so that I've now earned the nickname "May Day" on the course. If there is an accident, chances are I was involved.

Day Two
More planing and sharpening, with a little break in between to make some biscuit joints. The biscuits are awfully cute, and the joints invisible. However, it also requires quite a substantial investment in more kit.

I don't mean to whinge (not a lot anyway), but my little arms are terribly sore from all that planing and feel like they are about to drop off. Add that to the collection of nicks and scrapes I've picked up in the last week and you have one not very happy bunny. I have to admit that the last couple of days have had me doubting my choice of a career change. Its not that I am not enjoying it, but the practicalities of it all (the difficulty of earning enough dosh to support myself without having to flip burgers in McDonald's; the risk of self-mutilation; etc) are weighing heavily on my mind. Would it be a cop-out if I went back into the law, and just did this as a hobby?

Day Three
There is no end to the planing and sharpening. We learnt a bit about mortices and tenons, which will be put into practice tomorrow.

Day Four
I am running out of steam. Have been to bed at 9.30pm for the last couple of nights because I've been so tired! Today has been fun though with only a marginal amount of planing (plenty of sharpening though), with some sawing and putting together the mortice and tenon joints. This table might just be taking shape.

Note to self, if when you're doing something a little bell goes off and you think there must be a better, more accurate way of doing it - there probably is! Trying to mark out tenons using a scalpel and a steel rule is just not a good idea - a mortice gauge does the trick 10 times as fast and much more accurately.

Day Five
Learnt about dovetail and bare-faced dove-taily joint thingies today, plus putting all the bits together to try to form a table.

If I was completely honest, this has been the first time since I've set out to do this that I've felt like I've failed at the task set before me. There are all manner of bumps, protusions and imperfections in the table I've put together. I know its slightly irrational to expect the very first table I've made (especially with little prior experience) to be perfect, but there is a part of me that is ever so disappointed that its not.

I had a chat with John about Scotland and whether I should have given up my day job. He thinks I should give it a shot, and that I haven't done too badly. Just need to practice more (10,000 hours!) and always sharpen my tools. Its a shame John doesn't take international students on or I would have been very keen to do the long course with him, as he is an excellent teacher - he goes into the theory behind why things are done in a particular way and is very happy to impart little tricks of the trade which just make things that little bit easier. I find this particularly helpful as this means I am learning the skills of a cabinet maker which can be applied as and when I do decide to potter about on my own, and not just learning how to make a particular table (all the other courses I've been on to date have been task specific).

So at the end of my two-week sojourn, you have one slightly battered and used Mae, with a little of the wide-eyed wonder knocked out of her.

Dove tail joint next to a mortice

Plan view of the table joints coming together

My very first table all done