Wednesday, October 11, 2006

Building Progress Thus Far (OJG)

Hey everyone,

Well it is raining again so the gargantuan effort to get Henry’s cabinet built grinds to a very slow pace, but on the plus side, it does gives me some time to update the blog.

So… to get your first set of questions out of the way: yes we are still in Perth; no the cabinet is obviously not yet finished; yes I am working hard on the cabinet and the end is in sight; once it is finished there is also about one further day’s worth of stuff to do (ha, one day!), no we have not yet seen any more Perth tourist things (except for the Royal Show which I will post separately). I think that covers most of them.

I feel the need to put up 2 diary lists to better explain firstly our delay in this build, and secondly to explain the long gaps in the blog.

Build Diary:
  • Day 1: Buy tools, make sure tools work, attempt to get workbench setup.
  • Day 2: Buy more tools, buy wood, get workbench working. Cut supports to required lengths.
  • Day 3: Change design (due to new fridge). Re-Cut supports to new required lengths, assemble mini structures.
  • Day 4: Rained Out
  • Day 5: Cut panels to size, assemble mini structures together, add panels to structure.
  • Day 6: Cut, route, chamfer table top, fix hinges, add rails.
  • Day 7: Cut rear shelf, sand cabinet, sand table, add further supports to cabinet.
  • Day 8: Rained Out
So, there are still several things that need to be done: “Make good” the cabinet so that it is ready to be painted; Paint cabinet; Cut table leg; Build drawers; Install fridge and connect to Henry’s battery; Screw in Rear Shelf; Bend and rivet new curtain rails; Cut and attach passenger shelf; Connect and cover new speakers and cable … and several other smaller things. So that is what we are doing right now, and what we are likely to be doing for the next few days.

Now for my second diary list, trying to find a sane way to write the blog!

Blog Writing Diary:
  • Day 1: Drive for 1 hour trying to find a local Internet Café, no luck.
  • Day 2: Use slow home modem connection to search for a local Internet Café, no luck.
  • Day 3: Decide to use slow home modem to write blog, after 3 painful hours blog is written and images uploaded.
  • Day 4-6: Break.
  • Day 7: Someone tells us of a local Wireless Café, we search for it on our bikes, no luck.
  • Day 8: I find a library with Internet access miles away and write blog stuff there.
  • Day 9-11: Break.
  • Day 12: We find a Gaming Centre, we write blog stuff, machine crashes, all lost.
  • Day 13: Frustrated by loss, no progress.
  • Day 14: Try to use home modem, but machine keeps crashing with CD (no usb).
  • Day 15: Try home modem again, it works, again very slow and painful.
  • Day 16-18: Break
  • Day 19: Go back to the Gaming Centre, it has moved, we search for another hour for a new one, no luck.
  • Day 20: TODAY, try and use home modem again … arghhhh
So, my point is this. Please do not think that we have abandoned the blog, or even that we are not trying to add stuff, we are forever trying to find a pleasant way of doing this and just keep hitting brick walls. I suspect we might end up buying a 3G PC Card which will give fast access wherever we are … well that is what the brochure says anyway, I suspect it will only be fast in cities, but even that will be a step in the right direction.

Right, so that is quite a lot of whining on my part, what other jolly things can I tell you all about! I know, the weather! Actually it is a positive thing, of sorts. I have noticed that weather forecasting here is incredibly accurate. I mean seriously accurate, even the 5 day forecast will get the fifth day accurately predicted right down to the hours when they expect rain and when it will clear up again. Obviously being used to British weather, I only ever took the forecasts semi seriously. Here you can completely rely on it. I doubt it has anything to do with the size of supercomputers, but much more likely that the weather patterns are much easier to predict around Australia.

Well that is my shout for today, I will also post tomorrow the fun day we had at the Royal Show!

Oly

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

hello from Ben.
sounds like your luck on henry's cabinets are alot like my those on my box:
1. mum changes her mind from jarrah cladding to mini orb, (another day set back for planning).
2. rule and cut all wood using a bent try square ( go back and correct that with a true one).
3.get all happy about everything and go out and by some 90 degree brackets (very happy with mysrlf at this point), get home start assembling and glueing and guess what THEY WERE TWISTED.
4. so here i am.

Good Luck :)

Anonymous said...

well oly, there's not much i can say about your activities. it sounds like a man thing! hope the end result wll be satisfying. you've done a lot of banging an screwing! emelie sounds worn out, i get worn out when i watch brian working too!! keep up the good work.

Blog Directory Blog Directory & Search engine
Add to Technorati Favorites