Rambling Quickie #3 - Managing Time

Time is a cruel task master. While most things happens in its own time, I remember reading that man has this obsessive need to compartmentalize it into many segments. Milena, centuries, decades, years, months, days, etc. It's been 3 hours since I had dinner. 16 days to the 5th year anniversary of meeting my wife. A sidereal day is 23 hours, 56 minutes, 4.09054 seconds long. My cousin is getting married in 1 month and 3 days.

A month! Where does the time go? Too bad in our obsession to compartmentalize time, we can't actually put it into a compartment to save it for a rainy day (to quote a cliche).

Having a baby girl arrive in your world will make time seemingly move faster. There's more to do and less time to do it in. Between work, spring cleaning, night time meals and actually trying to spend some quality time with family, it doesn't leave a lot of shop time available. Not that I'm complaining. I'm very happy to have my daughter added into my life.

So, I need to start making more progress on the clock project that I've been working on as a wedding gift. While time is marching onwards, I can still finish it without compromising on the quality.

Today, I managed to get into the shop after getting home from church. That is, after an unanticipated nap and a check on how the grass seed is fairing in the spot that used to be covered by part of an old deck that was ripped out last year. My wife and daughter were out for the afternoon to go to the Art Gallery of Ontario with her sister and mother (hence the ability for the unanticipated nap).

This project is actually progressing nicely. I sanded all of the slats to 180 grit and did a dry fit of all the parts. The lower 3 slats were too long and had to be cut shorter and the tenons cut on one end again. Better too long than too short I say! With those 3 parts re sanded, I can begin applying the wiping varnish tomorrow. There was just too much dust in the air today.

So I laid out the parts and begin the hurry up and wait game tomorrow. Dust settled? Apply a coat, wait 1 day, apply a coat and wait a day. Yes, wiping varnish dries quicker, but I have this thing called a job during the week. If I can sneak out at lunch time, great. Or maybe before work in the morning if I'm not needed by my daughter.

In the meantime, I'll learn patience. At least until they invent the box that I can store time in.