On a roll...

Bill Lantry

Member
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Inside the Beltway
Hey, folks,

Well, I blew up yet another project, a nice cherry bowl I was making for a colleague's birthday. So I CA glued it back together, and went on turning. Then I blew it up *again*! So I glued it back together. And guess what? ;)

You guessed it! So I glued it back together, but this time, instead of putting it back on the lathe, I just placed it next to it. I need something to hold screws and stuff, so what the heck? ;)

Then it was time for another colleague's birthday (they come thick and fast around here... ;) She'd always admired a painting I have in my office (as you can imagine, given my place of employment, we have some pretty substantial archives in the basement of the library, and they often lend them out to people who they know will take care of them. There's even a joke going around that my office is a satellite branch of the archives. ;)

Anyway, this particular colleague brought down a couple young staffers a few weeks ago, while I was out. She mentioned the painting over and over and over, and then happened to mention her birthday coming up. Geez... ;)

Needless to say, later that day, I found myself cornered by two lovely young lawyer types saying "would you pleasepleaseplease give Peg that painting for her birthday, if she promises to take care of it?" To which I replied, quite honestly: "Sorry, but I'm just not *that* nice!" And even if I were, my deal with the archives wouldn't let me do that...

So instead, I got one of our digital media guys to take a really good picture of it, and printed it up on a high quality color printer. It's amazing what you can do with a twelve magapixel camera. Another young woman who works around here has a mat cutter at home, so last night she made a mat for the picture, and called with the outside dimensions. So I went out to the shop, took the beautiful piece of burly maple doorlink wouldn't let me use for her cabinets, and made a frame. Finished it with lacquer, and added another coat this morning. Then I cut the plexiglass, and cut some luann for the backing. We assembled the thing around 10 am, using the back of my car for a workbench, and gave it to her at noon, with the fresh lacquer smelling up the restaurant... ;)

Of course I rushed it, so it's not perfect, but at least it hasn't fallen apart. Yet... ;)

Thanks,

Bill

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lantry_painting (Medium).jpg

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Ps. Larry, I'm just not that good with photoshop. The photo is as I found it... ;)
 
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to the mods:

I accidentally uploaded an old photo, of a motor spindle, and can't figure out how to get rid of it. Not a big deal, but if you know how to delete it, that would be cool...

Thanks,

Bill
 
Nice idea on the framed print, Bill. :thumb:
to the mods:

I accidentally uploaded an old photo, of a motor spindle, and can't figure out how to get rid of it. Not a big deal, but if you know how to delete it, that would be cool...

Thanks,

Bill
Got it handled for you. :wave:(Not sure what I did...I opened your post to edit it, and the spindle pic was gone. Saved your post, and it was still gone. Must be the super admin powers...I must be sure to use them for good, not evil.) :p
 
Bill the pic is nice, but your frame is REALLY nice! :thumb:

BTW, I did delete the pic for you, but, so you know, you click on the paper clip icon, this will bring up a drop down menu listing you pics attached to the post, you then click on "Manage Attachments" and a new window will open, in that new window you will see, near the bottom a list of the pics you have attached, beside them is a button labeled "Remove", if you click on a "Remove" button......... you guessed it, it removes the pic.

If you are not sure which pic you want to remove, click on the name of the pic, and it will open in the same window for you to view.............. or that is the way FireFox deals with it all.

VERY nice present to your coworker, very thoughtful of you! :clap:
 
Nice idea on the framed print, Bill. :thumb:

Got it handled for you. :wave:(Not sure what I did...I opened your post to edit it, and the spindle pic was gone. Saved your post, and it was still gone. Must be the super admin powers...I must be sure to use them for good, not evil.) :p

You are just getting slow in you old age Vaughn :D :rofl: :wave:
 
Stu and Vaughn,

Thanks for your help...

Stu, I thought you might like the picture. If anyone's curious, believe it or not, in parts of Asia they don't see a man in the moon when they look up, but a woman and a rabbit. There are many versions of why, but here's the scoop:

Chang'e was a beautiful young girl working in the Jade Emperor's palace in heaven, where immortals, good people and fairies lived. One day, she accidentally broke a precious porcelain jar. Angered, the Jade Emperor banished her to live on earth, where ordinary people lived. She could return to the Heaven, if she contributed a valuable service on earth.

Chang'e was transformed into a member of a poor farming family. When she was 18, a young hunter named Houyi from another village spotted her, now a beautiful young woman. They became friends.

One day, a strange phenomenon occurred -- 10 suns arose in the sky instead of one, blazing the earth. Houyi, an expert archer, stepped forward to try to save the earth. He successfully shot down nine of the suns, becoming an instant hero. He eventually became king and married Chang'e.


The version I originally heard, and still prefer, branches off at this point. As a reward for his service, the gods give him a pill which will make him immortal. But they instruct him to meditate for a year before he takes it. Chang-e gets wind of it, and when the year is just about up, sneaks in and swallows the pill. This makes her husband furious, and he chases her across the landscape. A goddess takes pity on her, picks her up, and places her on the moon.

King Houyi tried to shoot her down with arrows, but without success. Her companion, a rabbit, is constantly pounding the elixir of immortality in a large mortar.

The moon is also inhabited by a woodcutter who tries to cut down the cassia tree, giver of life. But as fast as he cuts into the tree, it heals itself, and he never makes any progress. The Chinese use this image of the cassia tree to explain mortal life on earth -- the limbs are constantly being cut away by death, but new buds continually appear.

Meanwhile, King Houyi ascended to the sun and built a palace. So Chang'e and Houyi came to represent the yin and yang, the moon and the sun.


you can find other versions here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chang'e_(mythology)

Thanks,

Bill

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