New Friends

As I was tied to my kitchen table working on report cards on Monday, I noticed a flutter beside me.  We have new friends!!  Two blue jays came by for a visit.  They hung out on our deck and in the cedars for a bit and made a few quick stop-overs to our bird feeder.  Well, that's our excitement for the week!

The New Woodworking

Take a little boredom.
Add a little extra time.
Take some old cupboard doors (from the kitchen)
Take a coffee table (from Ikea?)
Add a new dart board
And a little recovered interest in an old hobby...

And this is what I got!

The Latest Artwork

Here is the latest work of art that Dave created on my blackboard.  I started a new program in my class called Gracious Goodness (which I am frequently caught calling goodness gracious instead...) and it encouraged the students in my class to do nice things for eachother.  So Dave came up with this great winter scene that does an excellent job depicting working together.  The kids loved it and so do I!

Maybe the next one will be about the Olympics???

Makeshift

I thought I'd show off my makeshift table saw 'tables':

Which, in combination with my new heater! (thanks Dad for installing the electricity!)

Resulted in This new contraption in our laundry room!

Through the Looking Glass and What Alice Found There

Well... Steph and I are in the swing of things now!  Which is really to say that our lives are busy with a lot of the monotonous things in life.  Monotonous of course, when broken into its prefix, root word, and afterthought means "mono" - single, "tono" - tone, "ous"- to be of.  Which means little of nothing of extravagance  (Extra = lots of, vaga = to be vague, and nce = inconsequential)

Anyways, since we're just in the swing of things, and nothing peculiar or spectacular has been going on 'round here... I thought I'd put up a little excerpt of what I've been reading lately - seeing as what I've been reading lately would be highly applicable to any particular mother/father with any young children out there with imaginations and who like being read unto.

(By the way - the reason I'm reading this particular book is for two reasons -- 1) theres a movie coming out soon; and 2) Stephen Leacock enjoyed referring to this particular author in his own writing)

Sooooo, here's it is, and please, enjoy with particular attention to the particulars....

The Red Queen broke the silence by saying to the White Queen, `I invite you to Alice's dinner-party this afternoon.'

The White Queen smiled feebly, and said `And I invite you.'
`I didn't know I was to have a party at all,' said Alice; `but if there is to be one, I think I ought to invite the guests.'
`We gave you the opportunity of doing it,' the Red Queen remarked: `but I daresay you've not had many lessons in manners yet?'
`Manners are not taught in lessons,' said Alice. `Lessons teach you to do sums, and things of that sort.'
`And you do Addition?' the White Queen asked. `What's one and one and one and one and one and one and one and one and one and one?'
`I don't know,' said Alice. `I lost count.'
`She can't do Addition,' the Red Queen interrupted. `Can you do Subtraction? Take nine from eight.'
`Nine from eight I can't, you know,' Alice replied very readily: `but -- '
`She can't do Subtraction,' said the White Queen. `Can you do Division? Divide a loaf by a knife -- what's the answer to that?'
`I suppose -- ' Alice was beginning, but the Red Queen answered for her. `Bread-and-butter, of course. Try another Subtraction sum. Take a bone from a dog: what remains?'
Alice considered. `The bone wouldn't remain, of course, if I took it -- and the dog wouldn't remain; it would come to bite me -- and I'm sure I shouldn't remain!'
`Then you think nothing would remain?' said the Red Queen.
`I think that's the answer.'
`Wrong, as usual,' said the Red Queen: `the dog's temper would remain.'
`But I don't see how -- '
`Why, look here!' the Red Queen cried. `The dog would lose its temper, wouldn't it?'
`Perhaps it would,' Alice replied cautiously.
`Then if the dog went away, its temper would remain!' the Queen exclaimed triumphantly.
Alice said, as gravely as she could, `They might go different ways.' But she couldn't help thinking to herself, `What dreadful nonsense we are talking!'


------ from Chapter 10 of "Through the Looking Glass" by Lewis Carroll (1871)

So - if your child can understand all that, then perhaps he/she will enjoy reading the two novels by Lewis Carroll - "Alice in Wonderland," and "Through the Looking Glass."
But it really is quite a bit of nonsense.

Our Excitement (yes, we're really this lame!)

We finally have a bird!!!!  Actually two little birds found our bird feeder today (yes, it's really taken that long)!  So hopefully tomorrow they'll bring all their little friends.  Well, that's the only exciting thing that's happened here recently.....maybe the new week will spice things up.

"My high score is 106" ~ A Discourse on the Finer Methods of Shuffling

Lately, I have been blessed with a certain amount of free time.  This has been a good thing.  And yet, I spent a day making a bird feeder.  A whole day.  So one can imagine the kind of free time I had today when I'd run out of wood supplies for any more woodworking projects.  Mind you... Steph kept me kinda busy.

On my mind, has been the thought that there should really be more information about shuffleboard on the internet.

By shuffleboard, I mean, Sjoelback or however the dutch speel it.  And by information I solely mean the strategy that I have developed for playing this game, which I feel the world is entitled to hear my input.  Whither they whant it or nhot.

Now.  Ask many of the amateurs of the game and they will tell you that their strategy is to whip the puck down the playing surface in the hopes that if it doesn't go in the hole, it will rebound far enough that they will be able to reach it and get it back to throw again.  I will admit that this works for an amateur.  If you adopt this strategy there are two things you should know.  One: The trick to getting the puck to bounce the entire way back is to RAISE the puck.  The puck will hit the wall above the opening and have the greatest chance of not being deflected about in any random direction to get stuck in the middle somewhere.  Two: Well.  You're a fool.  This strategy will not get you a high score.

So.  Studying this game for all of this past month.  I can inform you that there is a time and place for whipping the puck.  It is not in the first few throws.  Nay, the first few throws are meant to place the puck, in very specific spots.  Preferably right in front of the opening you were aiming for.  If it does not land in the very spot you wanted, then you should use your next puck to gently tap the puck on the side, so it barely moves over and in front of the opening you wanted it in front of.  The benefit of this is that very often both pucks will stop in perfect line with an opening. 

If you must.  Then now is the time to whip a puck.  Not at the openings, but at the puck that is lined up in front of the opening.  It works every time.

But it takes skill.  Which is something the amateur has neither skill nor patience for trying.

Eventually you will have screwed up so incredibly that the entire board seems congested with pucks.  Don't worry.  You haven't screwed up just yet.  The important thing to do here is to balance the pressure you place on the pucks.  In other words.  Don't waste pucks and time by shooting at one particular opening.  Instead balance your throws across the board.  Aiming for each opening in turn.  The pucks will find their way in provided that you have applied sufficient force to your throw.

One more tip - it often works to deliberately place a puck half way down the board in the center.  Then whip the next puck at the first puck and watch the first puck bounce in.  I don't know why, but the angles just seem to work...

Happy Shuffling!