Say What?

I spent a good deal of the weekend (yesterday and today) cutting and grinding glass for the next panel above our entertainment center. I'm making much quicker work of this window than the first one by using a more systematic approach. Rather than doing one section of the window at a time, I'm cutting all like pieces in one sitting and working the window as a whole rather than individual sections. Tammy will pick up where I've left off by applying copper foil to the edges of each piece before positioning them on the work table. We make a good team. I'd tried to take photos of the first window with my Pentax SLR but I didn't have much success. Wherever there was blue glass the camera saw white. I gave up after two rolls of film. My brother mentioned that I may have better results with my digital camera. I usually avoid using my digital camera for shots of stained glass because it never fails to come up short when compared to film. What did I have to lose? I stood ...

I'm a bit of an adrenaline junkie. I satisfy most of my adrenalin related cravings on my bike but riding Power Tower at Valley Fair does a nice job of providing me with a fix too. I remember the first time Tammy and I rode the ride together nearly ten years ago and how she began having somewhat of a panic attack as we slowly climbed higher and higher until the ride came to an abrupt, clunking halt at the top. We were suspended there for about 8 seconds as we took in the view while hanging on tighter than we needed to in preparation for when the ride would send us shooting safely down toward the ground. The keyword being "safely". You never have anything to worry about on these sort of rides 'they say'. The drive to the amusement park is much more dangerous. I love the rush a ride like that gives me. I think I'd enjoy parachuting but to be honest, I'm not sure you could convince me to jump from the plane once I got into position. I don't know what ...

Charlie is on a first-name basis with our Congressman, John Kline . I had the pups out for a walk this morning and we came by John's home as he was walking out to his mailbox. He bent down to pet the pups and s aid "hello Charlie" as we crossed over to his side of the street. I'm impressed as he's only met Charlie one other time and that was a few weeks ago. With all the new names and faces John encounters any given day or week it must prove difficult to remember any of them. I can only assume that Charlie made an impression on him. Would you pay to upload videos to YouTube? It may come to that unless they somehow begin to miraculously start raking in enough cash to cover their costs. Apparently, YouTube is struggling to remain viable and the only reason it's still up and running at all is because of the deep pockets of its parent company, Google. I've got a Flickr account that I pay $25 a year for. There's a free version as well which has some l...

We hung the panel on Thursday. I tried to get some photos of it but I had a difficult time getting the blue glass to show up as anything other than the color white so I won't post a picture. Instead, I have a video of the final assembly phase and our initial view and reaction to it after the install. We're very pleased with the outcome and intend to begin cutting more glass tomorrow for the next panel. Here's a link to the video in HD. For those who'd rather not watch the full six minutes, skip forward to the 5:00 point in the video for a look at the final result. It's been another full weekend and I'm looking forward to slowing things down over the next few weeks. I wonder if that's possible? We took Mom to see The Thorn at North Heights Lutheran Church last night. The play replaces the Passion Play they've done for years. You can't help but be impressed by all that goes into the production and the play itself. It's based on the Gospel of t...

I got half of the panel soldered last night before I had to put it away and leave for dance class. I took some video of it before I began soldering and decided that I'll video the next panel from start to finish to give people an idea about what goes into the making of a window. I'll pick up from where the design phase leaves off. I took a sick day on Monday and spent part of the day working on the back-lighting for the window. It's up and ready to go. I'm working the all-night shift tonight and hope to have the rest of the panel soldered tomorrow afternoon after I catch up on some seriously needed sleep. I came into work this morning on four hours of sleep and figured I'd go home and crash after work but that didn't happen. I took off two hours early and went riding instead. What can I say? I'm an addict. The plan was to do at least 30 but probably no more than 50 miles. So much for the plan. I got to Northfield and decided to head east and work the ...

The words of the prophet Isaiah in chapter 53 always cause me to pause. Consider when you read them that they were written about a savior who wouldn't be born for another 700 years. Isaiah 53 Who has believed our message? To whom has the Lord revealed his powerful arm? My servant grew up in the Lord’s presence like a tender green shoot, like a root in dry ground. There was nothing beautiful or majestic about his appearance, nothing to attract us to him. He was despised and rejected— a man of sorrows, acquainted with deepest grief. We turned our backs on him and looked the other way. He was despised, and we did not care. Yet it was our weaknesses he carried it was our sorrows that weighed him down. And we thought his troubles were a punishment from God, a punishment for his own sins! But he was pierced for our rebellion, crushed for our sins. He was beaten so we could be whole. He was whipped so we could be healed. All of us, like sheep, have strayed away. We...

I'm surprising myself by continuing to work on stained glass this late into the spring. I hope to have the first of six panels for our entertainment center done this weekend and with that, either relief or disappointment. I've never been entirely sold on the colors we've chosen and won't know if they'll work until I get the panel hung. I got home from work yesterday afternoon as Tammy was getting ready to take the pups to the dog park ten miles to the southwest. I was heading out on my bike and told her that maybe I'd see them as I biked past the park. Our timing was perfect as they were rounding the perimeter by the highway just as I was coming by. I got off to chat for a few minutes. As I took off down the road, Toby tried to run alongside me. I felt bad leaving him behind because he was running so hard to try and stay with me but I kept pulling away. They love their walks around our neighborhood but nothing compares to the park where they can be off-leash...

I was driving past my mom's townhome while chatting on the phone with my sister on the way to work this afternoon when I heard a car honk. It was Reid, my former trainee. He'd spotted me as he was heading home to get some sleep after working the day shift before heading back for tonight's all- nighter . He wanted to talk. My phone beeped a few seconds later and I told Jackie that I'd call her back. "Hey, what's happening" I asked him as I switched over to his call. Before he could answer I told him that I heard he'd gotten a little fired up at work the other day over some nonsense. I let him vent for the next six miles as I continued my drive. We last spoke a little over a week ago when he was telling me about his previous week in San Diego. He'd had a blast and was taking life on with a new, refreshed attitude. Just the sort of thing a vacation is supposed to do. I couldn't help but wonder how long it would take for our beloved employer ...

I took some time the other night to watch The Town that Dreaded Sundown ; see the last part of my previous post . It had been more than 30 years since I'd seen it so I figured I should probably make sure it's how I remember it if I'm going to recommend it to others. I'm not sure what to think after watching it again. One thing that stands out is that it wasn't as chilling as it was the first time I saw it; not nearly as scary. I'm sure that speaks to the desensitization I've gone through in our 'civilized' world the last few decades. Human decay and violence have never been more acceptable as entertainment. Back in the mid-1980s, my parents opened Landmark Rental , a videotape rental business in Michigan's Upper Peninsula. My dad was going over a list of movies from which to purchase for their inventory and in the list was a series of videos called Faces of Death  of which I remember voicing my disapproval. What I knew of the shows was that t...

Focus FAA published a couple of rebuttals yesterday to Frank Whiten's venomous screed from last weeks edition which I blogged about. They didn't print my submission but I was happy with their choices nonetheless. (note: I think Frank's last name may actually be spelled Whiten and not Whitten. I'll leave both spellings here so the internet search bots will be sure and find his name no matter how it's spelled in the query. Frank deserves to have people know the kind of guy he is and I'm happy to do my part. This blog will be here for years. Sorry, Frank but you need to own this one and I've yet to receive any sort of apology.) Leading And Managing I was reading through the posts of “Your Two Cents” last week, and I couldn’t help but wonder about the entry by Frank Whitten (see “A Supervisor Responds”). I’ve always been told that there are those who lead, and those who manage. I’ve never been completely confident in the difference between the two, but I th...