Wednesday, August 29, 2012

Dear Greta

I feel so bad for forgetting your birthday this year.  I feel even worse that I didn't even realize it was approaching and didn't have time to make you a gift.  Well, the minute I realized this I headed down to the basement with an idea in my head.  I reached into my exotic wood stash and pulled out a piece of very nice, exotic hard wood.  Now I know what you're saying, 'uncle Chad this looks like Black Walnut that you probably found in your back yard'.  I assure you its not.  I believe it's Dark Mesquite from South America but I'm not 100% sure.

I decided to make you a top.  These are minutes of fun for all kids, how could I go wrong.  I turned the piece and applied about 10 coats of a cyanoacrylate finish.  I went through a 9 step sanding process up to 12,000 grit then buffed it with plastic polish.  It shined like a mirror, except for a nasty sanding mark... dangit.  This was unacceptable.  I sanded off the finish in the offending location, re-sanded the wood up to 600 grit, and went through the whole finish process again.  This time it shined like a mirror.  I then proceeded to drop it on the concrete when removing from the lathe.  This left another unsightly mark that I needed to buff out.  After a few choice words it was finally complete.

It was well past midnight at this point.  Fortunately my lathe is quiet so everyone else was fast asleep.  I was super excited for the trial spin of the beauty.  I cleared some space on my assembly table and gave it whirl.  I was expecting this thing to spin until morning.  To my dismay it didn't.  The dumb thing fell over after a few seconds.  It turns out this thing doesn't spin well at all.  To be perfectly honest, this may be the worst spinning top ever created.  It's bad.  I should have done some top research on Google before starting, who knew.


Regardless, I'm out of time.  I am going to send this to you anyway.  It's very shiny and fun to hold.  Perhaps you can put a string through it and use it for a Christmas tree ornament.  You can use it as a bottle stopper when drinking a bottle of Coke.  You could show your friends pictures of the top and make up stories about how fun it is.  Use your imagination.

Happy belated birthday Greta, can't wait to see you again.




1 comment:

  1. This left Greta...speechless. I was reading it to her and she wasn't quite sure what to make of it. :)

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