Sawdust on the Floor

Writers are always looking for that special word or phrase.  You know that single one word that without further explanation describes  an event, place or thing.  Most of the time that word is special, something that came from a thesaurus. A word, so special that one remembers it, and tries to find a way to get into their vocabulary. After removing the bar, in our daughters family room and wall behind it, and then cleaning up the area, I went looking for that word to describe the family room.

Without the bar and the wall the room opened up.  Even with the poor lighting, it appeared bigger and brighter.  And that special word, uttered by our youngest grandson, was “WOW”.  Now I know that you may have been looking for a more meaningful word, but “WOW” really describes how much of a change the removal of the bar and wall made to the room.

Prior to that point, we had kicked around some ideas around some ideas of we wanted to do with the space, but once the bar and the debris was removed, we soon saw how short sighted some of those ideas had been. To resolve the issue of what direction the room should follow, we followed an time honored tradition of Corporate America, we brained stormed the idea.

If you’re not familiar with the term, please let me explain. Having personally spent the past 37 years in corporate America, and the participant in countless meetings, brain storming is an item that comes up in almost every meeting. It’s where a group of people get together and shout out ideas. Someone from the group is responsible to record these ideas. In the end, the best of these ideas are presented to management.  Please don’t ask me what happens to them after this. That part is still fuzzy to me.

Our brainstorming session was less serious, it took place in the family room over lunch and soft drinks.  Some of the ideas had real merit, some more almost laughable. The youngest, Jake suggested that we put in a swimming pool.  This despite the fact that Jake, can’t swim.  And if I’m not mistaken, he is afraid of the water.

In the end, Jake’s idea was vetoed, no pool.  Although, during last year’s visit by Hurricane Irene and tropical storm Lee, areas of the basement did resemble a small pool.  We have come up with a fix for that, but that’s a story for another time.

The final design for the room takes the area and divides it into four areas.  One area will be for the wide screen TV.  Every family room has to have a big TV.  Another area will be turned into a ” gaming area”.  This area will have a smaller TV, and all of the gaming consoles will be connected to it. The third area will be turned into a computer area.  In this area we will build a computer work center, with enough room for all of the PC’s in the house, plus a printer. The last area is being called the quiet room.

I’m not sure about the name, but what this room will be is an office area that can be closed off from the rest of the room.  This quiet room will be the only one that has solid walls and a door.  The others will use furniture and built ins to define the areas.

With the design agreed upon, it was time to get to work and make some sawdust on the floor.  The area at the bottom of the basement stairs has been designated as the TV area.   This western facing wall currently has no electrical power in the wall, also the TV cable is currently in the eastern wall.  Both items will have to be corrected before we can move on the upgrade.

Moving the cable from the eastern wall to the western wall wasn’t an overly complicated task.  The guy who had installed the cable ran the cable over head into the utility closet. (see attached drawing that shows the layout of the basement. I have included it to help you and me keep track of what I’m trying to say!) From there he ran it along the baseboard to the TV. To move the cable, I brought it back into the utility closet and then re directed it overhead to the new TV area.  The ceiling in this area was opened up when we removed the bar.  I installed a box in the wall to house the cable connection.  By electrical code, this box wasn’t required, but it looked better than just having the cable laying on the floor.

Adding electrical power to this wall wasn’t quite as simple.  Talking about the electrical wiring in the basement is a story for the next time we get together.

A couple of weeks ago I posted an article about the unexpected pleasure I found when I allowed my two grandsons into my shop to build their Pine Wood Derby cars for the Cub Scouts.  Well the races were held last week, and I felt I should give you the results of the race.

While both boys built cars for the race, only Jake, the youngest one, was actually allowed to race his car. Big brother, Joey isn’t a member of the scouts, so they didn’t allow him to enter the race.  He had made his car just for the experience of making it, which was just fine with me.

Jakes car didn’t do too well. He finished third in a group of four.  I was concerned that he would feel bad about where his car had placed, but he didn’t.  As I talked to him to make sure that he wasn’t too down, he reminded me in the way that only an eight year old can do, that he had fun making the car, and spending time in my shop, and oh yeah the race was fun.  This was followed up with, “When can we go back to the shop and make something”.

Building something new with the boys wasn’t in my immediate game plan.  In fact my shop time currently is consumed with building a cabinet for the boy’s basement.  But, and this is a big but,  since I had invited the boys into the shop and helped plant the woodworking seed in them, I can’t really tell them no, can I? Didn’t really think so.

The hard part of this whole adventure was keeping my hands off of their cars.  The lines were not cut as smooth as I would like them to be, nor were the cars sanded enough, and the paint jobs left a lot to be desired, but the looks on the boys’ faces when they showed Mom and Grandma what they had made, told me that I had made the right decision when I let them do the work, only offering advice when they were in danger of hurting themselves or my tools.

So I want to thank the cub scouts and the Pine Wood derby for proving me with an opportunity to spend time with my two favorite new woodworkers.