You’re Going To Laugh, I know

So, I waited for a week or so to get the table saw up and running, right. Well today when I went to trim the top and bottom panels for the wall cabinets I discovered that they were too big for my puny little table saw. It turns out I’m going to have to trim them with a straight edge and jig saw anyway.

It wasn’t a complete waste of time. I got a lot of the wood ready for the floor cabinets, and I got the boards split for the counters. I also had a little design review session in my head and made some minor adjustments to the wall cabinets. Basically, I figured that I cut the rails (or is it the stiles) for the cabinet fronts too narrow. You never want to show end grain and the way I cut the fronts you will see the trim on the sides. It’s not a big deal. I just need to cut two more pieces of wood.

I went over to a friends house yesterday to use his band saw to split the joists to use on the counter tops. Man alive, he has got the wood shop that is to-die-for. I figured that he spent more on his table saw than I spent on my table saw, router & router table, miter saw, mortiser, and planer combined! If you throw in his plunge router and router bit collection you could pretty much replace every tool I own!

Yes, I buy crappy, low-end tools and he buys really nice stuff. His will last much, much longer than mine there is no question about it. Still, it is tough for me to justify such pricey toys. For one thing, there is performance anxiety. If you own a $1,000.00 table say you had better make some pretty nice stuff. You sure can’t blame it on crappy tools anymore. His work area is nice too. It is in the basement but his lot has a severe slope to it so there are 2 big doors in the shop that swing open to the back yard. Lot’s of light and air. From a woodshop prospective It was…can I use the word "Romantic"?