Hair Cut - (and a social tip)

So I finally cut my hair which is the most interesting recent event so I'll write about it, both the intent and what actually happened.

So... I wanted short, stylish, respectable, not boring. Difficult combination I dare say, especially with curly hair. I decided to go kind of fringe (see this looking at the second set of pics), kind of caesar (with hair sweeping forward) and kind of faux hawk... all at the same time. I decided against leaving the blond rattail.

Mom cut it and it more or less went according to plan, and I like it. Exception being the fringe only half worked. Bangs are kind of too short. But I'll try again in a month and we'll get better I reckon. Good start though.

Also note I'll be seeing Prisca this weekend so if she's any sort of real photo major there will be documentation coming soon.

PS As a general rule that I've had reason to think about recently, "your hair looks so much better that way" or any compliment that compares the current appearance to past appearance isn't really a compliment, especially if the person liked their previous appearance... a rule I will always remember to apply especially when dealing with women who tend to read lots of extra details into your words...

Board building days 7&8

Here comes the top of the board! I'm saying days 7&8 because I'm not really documenting the days of... polyurethane in the morning, flip board, more in afternoon, flip, again before bed, again morning.... that I've been doing all week. I've built up a super thick layer on the bottom and sides, and some on top as well. Finally a 3 foot roll of grip tape came in. It's like a big sand paper sticker, so I drew the pattern on the backing and cut it out with an exacto knife, peeled off the backing and stuck it on.

I then rough cut the main piece and taped it in place. I removed small pieces of backing at a time to make sure it stayed placed well since it's super sticky.
Then I used a rasp to begin grinding the edges. You can see the shape of the board begin to appear.
Then I cleaned it up with the exacto knife.
Now I'm just putting more polyurethane (I'm sick of that stuff) on the exposed wood which will help keep the edges of the tape from peeling up as well. Hopefully it's done tonight! I plan to do a photo shoot with it at some point with some of my Argentina paraphernalia that inspired it. Maybe some mad photoshopping when I get around to it.

later,

Board Building days 5 & 6

So these pics are in reverse order... I hate blogger sometimes. I finished glueing the "guarda pampa" design together, and stripped the paper guide off the back. I then pulled of a strip of plywood down the middle with a chisel as seen in the last picture. I clamped and glued the pattern in the gap (super tedious to provide compression to the whole thing), and then sanded it all flat. I added a strip of cherry around the whole border. I added the first layer of polyurethane which also makes the colors richer and glossier. Many more layers to go. I just ordered the grip tape so I expect to be done by next saturday.

Board Building days 3 & 4

Now I had to take my pieces of walnut cut to size and line them up before sanding them like mad to make them all identical. I then did the same with some birch. I'm hoping I made enough to finish the pattern I want to make. After way to much sanding, measuring, and sanding again I was satisfied and started gluing the pieced together. Once I have a big block I'll glue it to the board as one unit. I realized they weren't all actually the same size but I think it looks alright so far anyway. We'll see what happens. I don't really know what to expect so I'll be optimistic and careful =)

Board Building day 2

So after cutting a paper guide in the shape of the board, I traced it onto the wood and cut it out with a jigsaw. It looks like I did it in a dump but that's our driveway and we're having construction done so it's kind of a wreck.

Here's the corner of it. you can see how nicely those layers glued together leaving only one board where there was 4 before.
After sanding the edges I used a chisel to cut out the shape of the trucks, just deep enough so they will sit in the board instead of on top of it. I chisels the one side too far so had to glue some scrap wood in to fill... but there will be grip tape on top so the cosmetic blunder won't be visible.
I put in the screw holes and the a big hole in the middle to put the jigsaw in as a prepare to cut out the traced section below.
And there we have it. It's hard to make the cuts smooth... oh well.
Here it is assembled and ready to test run. Turns out when I turn, the wheel bites into the wood so I had to do some more cutting but now we're good. This whole process went twice as fast as with my last board. I reckon I'll do more today and tomorrow so we should have more posts up pretty quick.

Board Building day 1

So my wood got here and I started right to work building a killer longboard. It was a slice of black walnut, a slice of cherry and 3 pieces of 1/8 x 24 x 30 baltic birch plywood, three layer's thick. usually a layer is 1/8 but these layers are 1/24th! As you can see I cut them into strips of 11 x 30 and glued them together with titebond III. I put weights on it to bend the board. When the glue dried the bend (camber) remains. Only the wood was super strong so even though I did two layers at a time and put 75 pounds on the middle it still hardly bent. That means I will in no way be able to snap this board once I have all four layers together (see tomorrows blog entry). I also began using a razor blade to cut the walnut. It will be used for inlays later. I'll talk about that another time.

A lovely Evening

- Sun shining through the Rain -

oh Snap those are all Ties!

So I got some old ties from my grandpa... a LOT of them. That's my bed covered from head to toe.

New Longboard

Coming soon - I'm hoping to do that pattern with inlays of mahogany and black walnut on a background of Baltic Birch from Russia...

The wood is in on route to Pittsburgh this moment. (also board shape will be different, I got this photoshop template off the internet and the added the pattern from illustrator)

The Pattern is called "Guarda Pampa." It comes from an Indian tribe in Argentina called "Mapuche" and the pattern is meant to resemble the Andes Mountains covered in snow as well as their reflection in the lakes below. It is blocklike because it was often woven into fabric.

I think I'll have a similar design on the top of the board too, carved into the grip tape.

Question is: Do I buy a router now that is expensive to do a good job and have for the rest of my life? probably... we'll see. I have to build the board itself first...

more later,