Sorry Grandma, But I’m Proud of That

I read a column about “professional blogging” the other day that mentioned a blog is the one place in journalism where it’s accepted practice to start with an anecdote about your grandmother. So here goes. I was raised that it was wrong, wrong, wrong to ever brag, boast or call undue attention to yourself. Grandma Osborne’s favorite phrase was “pride goeth before the fall”. Grandma Lang liked to say “no one likes a braggart” and my dad’s pet phrase was “always expect the worst and you won’t be disappointed. You might think my mom would be the single ray of sunshine, but she liked to ask me “what makes you think you could do that?” Okay, so I have more issues than the Popular Woodworking Magazine 2000-2009 back issue compilation disc, but generally I get along okay. And once in a great while I’ll even show off.

That’s the dry fit “bent” arm in the Morris chair I’ve been building. I still need to smooth everything out, chamfer edges and add little details like pegs and corbels, then clean up and finish it, but it’s looking like a chair. In fact it’s looking like a pretty good chair. Most of the time I look at the things I’ve built and can only see the flaws, but now and then things come together and work out as planned. This is one of those times where I had the right hunk of board and the time and patience to do the work well. So I can take some time for the holiday and feel satisfied with a job well done. Then I can come in next week and goof up the finish.

If you want the whole story about building this chair you can read about it in an upcoming issue of the magazine. If you’re a subscriber, you’ll see it in your mailbox in a couple months. If you’re not a subscriber, you can fix that in just a few mouse clicks. There’s a link in the upper left corner of this page, or you can Click Here to Subscribe to Popular Woodworking Magazine.

–Robert W. Lang