Has it been that long?

Since I last posted. Time flies when you are depressed. It all becomes a big blur.

Still hating second shift.

Things are still unsettled at home.

I don't know where my daughter and grandson are.

Other than that, there's not a lot to report.

Mrs A is going to see a counselor today. I offered to go along, but she didn't want me to go. I hope it helps her.

I know everything will turn out OK in the end, but it sure is hard getting through the middle part.

An Uneasy Peace

For me, anyway.
There is no peace between my wife and daughter. They go their separate ways, and although I wish we could all live together in peace, it is not to be. It would be foolish to try to do anything about it at this point.
I think I handled everything about as well as a man can. Neither my wife nor my daughter is mad at me. I have maintained my neutrality very well. I love them both, and they know it. It's just that they should never attempt to live under the same roof.
I helped R move most of her stuff. She is handling things as well as can be expected. She is pissed at the abrupt was things were handled, but recognizes that she and Mrs A are never going to see eye to eye. According to her, she didn't want to move in here because she was afraid that things would turn out badly, but ignored the little voice in the back of her head. That voice is there for a reason, and you need to pay attention. It is your subconscious telling you something that your reasoning mind isn't aware of. I know for me it is almost always right.
I keep telling them I don't care who said what to who, It happened, and I am not interested in placing blame on anyone. We just need to work our way through things in the most painless way possible.
But it is nice to come home to peace and quiet and not feel like there is a smoldering fire that threatens to burst into flame at any moment.
God, I miss my Grandson.

Around the Mountain........Again

Mrs A firmly believes that everything that happens to us of any significance is a part of a bigger plan. When there is a potential lesson to be learned, if we miss the point, it will come around again, and again, until we "Get it".
I'm not sure how to interpret this considering the latest round of crap.
Two months ago, against my better judgement, we allowed R to move in with us. Understand this: It was not my decision. When she called up and talked to Mrs A, she said she was going to have to go to the homeless shelter, because the Universal Sperm Donor had started hitting her. She had the bruises to prove it.
So she and "i" moved in. For the most part it went pretty well at first, but there is a history there, and I was pretty sure it would not last.
Let's just say that our lifestyles didn't mesh well. Mrs A and I work, R does not, and stays up until two then sleeps until noon. Nothing wrong with that except that she and "i" are very noisy, and Mrs A is a very light sleeper. I bought her a "White Noise Generator" which worked reasonable well, but not well enough. She missed out on a bunch of sleep. She got grouchy.
So she and R got into it last night. Screaming and obscenities.
The cops were called.
I had to leave work and go home and straighten things out.
No blood was shed, no blows were exchanged, and no one went to jail, but R left and won't be coming back, except to get her things. I changed the locks today.
I talked to R, and she went off on me, pulled every guilt trip known to man. I felt like shit, but told her it just wasn't working out, and she went off on me. I was in tears when I hung up on her.
Mrs A went down to the Regional Justice Center with the intention of getting a Protection Order.
Once again I am stuck in the middle, and no matter what I do or say, it will be perceived as betrayal by either Mrs A or R. Since I have no choice in the matter but to take a side, of course Mrs A comes first.
It breaks my heart to throw my grandson out, but if I don't I can kiss my marriage goodbye.
Shit, shit, shit.
All I want is for Mrs A and I to be left alone. We have a great relationship when people just leave us the hell alone.
Mrs A needs to learn to stop trying to help people when she can't help them.

More Glass

These are the other two pieces I made in my Glass Blowing class.
They came out reasonably well.
A couple of vases/votives.
My other eye continues to get better. I am sitting here typing this without wearing glasses, something I have never been able to do. I can also read without my glasses, which is very neat. I worked on the computer at work last week without my glasses, although I had to bring the monitor pretty close.
I have to use eyedrops four times a day for another month. Then eventually I will be able to get new glasses.

On Sunday, my Nephew got married. He got marries at the Edgewater Inn, on Pier 67 in Seattle. The very same Edgewater inn where The Beatles stayed when they were in Seattle, and fished out the windows.

I believe the Mothers of Invention also stayed there, also fished out the window, where they caught a fish, and penned the immortal "Mudshark".

A semi-formal affair. Good food, free booze, and and dancing. Doesn't get much better than that. I bought a good suit for the occasion, and Mrs A got a new fancy dress.

Well, I need to go get ready for work.

Eye Surgery

They did surgery on my other eye on Monday. Lense replacement due to a cataract. They also did a vitrectomy at the same time. Since I had a Macular Hole in the other eye, there was a statistically significant chance I would develop one in my left. As long as they were in there doing the lense replacement, they did the vitrectomy as a preventative.
I am struggling a little with the recovery. My vision is of course, blurry right now. but that's not the source of my struggle. The damn thing itches.
This is not helped by the fact that I went back to work on Wednesday. Also aided and abetted by the fact that I forgot my eyedrops. When I got up Thursday morning my eye was bright red. It is gradually clearing up, but it still itches. Just a sign that it is healing.
When I went back to work on Wednesday, I reported to second shift. I am not a happy camper. My boss may be the single most ineffective, harebrained individual I have ever worked for in my entire career, and I've worked for a couple of real characters.
So I am shopping my services around at the Lazy B. I have a couple of good leads, but it may take a while to work any transfer. One of the other people in our organization is also upset enough that he has already put in for a transfer.
Part of the trouble is that I will be swapped back and forth between first and second shift nine times in the next eighteen months. That just ain't right.

Dynamite

My mother's side of the family has traditionally held a family reunion on the Fourth of July every year.
I have always enjoyed getting together with the relatives I don't see the rest of the year and see what everyone has been doing. Not the same people show up every year, so there is always someone different to talk to.
It is always potluck, with everyone bringing something they make especially well or are proud of (not necessarily the same thing). It is pretty much a traditional Fourth of July.Except for the dynamite.
My Aunt and Uncle live on the South end of Vashon Island, where they have a sizeable chunk of property. It is a very rural setting. The land is mostly second growth timber and brush. At the time, because they were clearing land, they could buy dynamite (for agricultural purposes only) at the Co-op.
Anyone who has spent time on the business end of a muck stick and prybar trying to get a stubborn stump out of the ground can really appreciate the pristine beauty of a couple of well placed sticks of dynamite. Not to mention the fact that it is a heck of a lot of fun to make things go BOOM. Both the relatives on Vashon and my family in Idaho had obtained and used dynamite for a number of years.
For the family get-together, people would usually start arriving around noon, and start out with the veggies-and-dip, and chips and snacks. Around the same time the first fireworks would show up.
The policy towards fireworks has never been consistent in the State of Washington. Heck, it is not even consistent from block to block. It is literally possible to buy fireworks, walk a couple of blocks and be arrested for setting them off. It is not a policy designed to to build a great deal of respect for the law and its enforcement. To complicate matters, the Indian Reservations are only subject to Federal Law, so you can get a lot more of "The Good Stuff" from the Indians, including some stuff that is outside Federal guidelines.
Every year, McCord Air Force Base in Tacoma holds an Airshow to celebrate the Fourth. They generally flew North out of the base and turned around at the North end of Vashon. During the day we would see all kinds of Aircraft from fighters to cargo carriers, to bombers. We would hear them coming and rush outside to see if we could identify the type and model of the plane.
The fireworks would typically start with the younger kids lighting snakes and smoke bombs, then progress through lady fingers, regular firecrackers, bottle rockets and the usual small fireworks.
Since we had to take the last ferry back to the mainland at around 7:00 we never got into the more elaborate airborne displays. We spent the afternoon and early evening, when not occupied eating, inventing new and more elaborate ways of blowing things up.Firecrackers were placed under tin cans.Holes were punched in tin cans to pass the fuse through, and then the cans pushed down into mud or soft sand. The idea is to see how high in the air you can blow the can. My personal favorite was an Old El Paso chilies can inside a regular soup can partly filled with water. If you didn't get the fuse wet, it was good for at least a hundred feet of altitude.
I suppose that it was inevitable that we would someday come to the conclusion that since we had dynamite, and there were stumps to be blown, there was no reason we couldn't blow stumps an the Fourth of July.
We didn't do this every year, just when the urge was irresistible.One year after sending cans flying as high as possible, we started speculating how high in the air we could send something if dynamite provided the propulsive force and we could find something sturdy enough to not disintegrate.
First we took an old wellhead, dropped a lit stick of dynamite down it, followed by a section of madrona. It made a satisfactory BOOM, but the wood disappeared completely. We never saw it after it left the pipe.Next we saw a car wheel laying out by the barn. Perfect!We put the car wheel on a flat place over the top of a stick of dynamite, lit the fuse and got back.
BOOM!
Totally unsatisfactory. The wheel, spinning madly went about thirty feet in the air. Heck we could blow tin cans a lot higher than that. The problem seemed to be that the force of the explosion needed to be focused. Not an insurmountable problem. Having experienced the benefits of the fact that water is not compressible, we decided to dig a pit slightly larger than the wheel about a foot deep, fill it with water and try again. And since one stick of dynamite didn't provide enough propulsive force, three ought to do the job!
We finished digging our pit and filling it with water. Actually, but the time it soaked in, it was more like thin mud than water, but we were pretty sure it would do the job. We had waterproof fuse, so we didn't have to worry about the fuse going out. We set three sticks of dynamite equally spaced in the pit, and dropped in the wheel. We lit the fuse and got the heck out of there.
Just as we lit the fuse ad retreated, we heard a thumping noise on the horizon. It was a flight of six helicopters. Surely they wouldn't be coming anywhere near us! But they kept on a course that would bring them right overhead.
OH SHIT!
We looked at the wheel with the dynamite under it.
The fuse got shorter.
No one was willing to go near it to pull the fuse. A mistake would probably be fatal.
The helicopters came closer.
The fuse got shorterCloserShorter
BOOM!!!
We had succeeded in our plans, for the wheel flew a couple of hundred feet in the air.Right into the view of the helicopters. They must have seen it, because the formation split apart and headed away.
We figured we were in huge trouble.
The first thing we did was put the dynamite back in the powder shed.
Then we all went in and watched some sporting event on TV and prayed nothing came of it. Every time a car went by, we figured it was going to turn in the driveway, filled with guys in grey trenchcoats and black fedoras, but we never heard a thing.
I always wondered what the Flight Leader reported.
I don't think he would want to report that they were under attack by car wheels.
Maybe they never said a thing and that's why we never heard anything.
The only thing I know for sure is that the next time we went to the Co-op to buy dynamite, they wouldn't sell us any.

What a day

Today could have gone a lot of different ways.

I got up feeling OK. We decided to take the dogs and go on a road trip. his would be Monk's first road trip. Molly is a road vet.

This was the first road trip in the Westfalia, the first time we have had it on the road since I fixed the gas tank, the first road trip since putting in the new engine, so I approached it as a "Let's hit the road and see what happens."

When you leave the house and hit the road, there are ten things that can happen, and nine of them are bad. None of the bad things happened. Lots of good things happened.

We headed over Snoqualmi Pass to Eastern Washington, or as we put it here in Pugetopolis "Over on the Dry Side", and I decided I wanted to go over to Roslyn and then up thru Ronald and Salmon le Sac, and then up into the mountains.

I have a special place to me. Take the road from Salmon le Sac up into the mountains at a place called the Scatter Creek Campground there is a camp ground where the view is so heartbreakingly beautiful that you just don't want to leave.

One of the reasons this place is special to me is that for my fifteenth birthday I asked my family to drop me off at Scatter Creek and leave me for a week, along with my cousin Kelly. We had a blast, hiking and fishing and exploring. It is one of my fondest memories of growing up.

When you grow older you have a lot of times you want to return to some special moment or memory, and when you try, nothing is the same. The present cannot live up to the memories.

But some times, some rare once in a while, it is not just the same, it is better. Today, when we turned into the campground, it was pretty much empty. I pulled in in such a way that the view was obscured. Then I took Mrs A by the hand and said "turn around and look behind you" When she did I heard her catch her breath, because behind her was this incredible view that belongs on post cards and calendars. Not something you can just drive up and see. In the foreground is the river coming out of the lake. In the mid ground there are the winding paths of the lake, which are accented by all of the wild rice, which is this brilliant green. The far shore is a much darker green of pine trees, the purples and dark greys winding up to the blacks and brilliant blue of the sky. Not a cloud anywhere.

We stood in the stream, me in the front her behind, hugging me, the incredible view in front of us.

Some times you CAN go back and capture a magical moment. Sometimes it can be even better if you bring someone who can appreciate it as much as you can.

yeah, I'm still here

I have been a very bad blogger lately. Too much going on in the daily world.
We were supposed to go to Idaho for a family reunion of sorts, and didn't make it. When I filled up the Westfalia to to top for the first time the other day, it overflowed a pint or so of gas. It also smelled of gas whenever I went around a corner, so my first day of vacation was spent dropping, fixing and reinstalling the gas tank. There was a broken fitting going to the overflow tank. Reinstalling the tank I managed to pull a muscle in my back, so I missed the reunion. I won't drive when I'm taking muscle relaxers and pain killers.
So I am in day four of a five day vacation. The farthest I have made it is about four miles to the Movie theater to see "Salt". Pretty good flick. Non stop action with enough plot twists to keep you guessing.
I thing we are going to pile into the Westphalia and head for the mountains today. Just to get out of the house.
R and "i" are still with us and will be for a couple of months. She is undergoing court ordered drug treatment. Since she has treatment three days a week and attends NA twice, there is no way she can hold a job at the same time. The court ordered drug treatment is because she tested positive for Pot. The State has issued the proclamation that the police relegate marijuana offences to the least priority, but there are some judges that continue to pursue prosecution as a sort of personal campaign. Rose has cooperated, but as a result she pretty much has to stay with us while she is in treatment.
Mrs A does not well tolerate another woman in her house. It has led to several arguments between us. She treats Rose like a servant girl. Lots of do this and do that. Since she is living here rent free, I guess she has a right to expect some help around here Sometimes it's not what you say, but how you say it. I try to keep my nose out of it, but it is impossible for me to ignore completely.
My sister Suzie and her kids were in town. For the most part I was too busy to visit them very much. I managed to drop by and see them one afternoon after work, but that wasn't nearly enough. I would have liked to have them over for dinner on the weekend, but when you are working seven days a week, it is hard to work up enough energy to do much of anything.
Oh well.
TTFN as tigger would say.

Glass Class

Here are some pictures of my first projects in my glass blowing class. I am pleased with them as first attempts.

The fluted bowl came out pretty much as I planned, except I wanted more red at the bottom. Doing a full red to orange to yellow color shift as you go upwards. I cut the globe too close to the bottom or something because very little of the red came through. I guess I should have gone for one more dip in the red. Oh well, pretty darn good for a first attempt.

Of course I had lots of help from the instructor.

The two paperweights were made using a "Blow and Suck" technique.

Hey you in the back of the room! I hear that snicker......cut that out right now!

You basically blow a small globe, and then suck in all the air, causing the globe to collapse, then cover it over with a layer of clear to create the globe.

The floppy bowl was a lot more technically complicated, but I had a lot of help from the instructor. There are only two people in the class, and the other on couldn't make it, so I had three hours of private instruction.
I'm not sure exactly what to expect. It was a lot hotter than I expected. The rule was more or less "First degree burns are expected. Second degree burns are bad, third degree to be avoided at all costs" I suppose over time you must develop thick skin or something. I had to back off several times when I thought I had too much heat, but I was fine this morning, although I noticed that all the small hairs on my hands are pretty much gone.
I'm not sure what to do next. Probably a vase and some votives.

Maybe a mug.

Winding Down

Back home.
Didn't particularly want to come back, but it was time to move on anyway. It would have been nice to go a couple of hundred miles South and spend another week someplace else. But I had things to do at home.
The "Service Engine Soon" light has been on in the truck, so I needed to figure out how to make the light go out. The Westfalia has an electrical problem, and I need to figure out what it is. And Frankenhealey Beckons.

V*A*C*A*T*I*O*N

In the summer sun.
The kids from Utah arrived last weekend and stayed with us most of the week. On Friday Mrs A and I dropped off the dogs and headed south for the beach.
For those of you that care, the place we are staying doesn't allow pets, so we couldn't bring them. they are staying with L, and last I heard, living it. Out of the city, big yard. They may not want to come home.
We are staying at the Rockaway Beach Resort. It is about half way between Cannon Beach and Tillamook, which will not mean a lot to most of you. Mrs A and I came down first. When I went to register for ourselves and our kids they said it was too many people.. Although this room has sleeping accommodations for eight, they only allow six (they claim it is fire code), so we had to rent a second room. Since we are owners, we got the second room for $50 a night. Not a bad rate for really prime accommodations right on the water. It's no big deal because I can afford it. If course it pissed off The Easily Irritated Mrs A.
It was actually fine with me. I was concerned about having everyone crammed into one room, so now Mrs A and I can have some privacy, just in case something comes up.
So I am sittin here eating apple spice pancakes, typing on my laptop, looking out at the Pacific Ocean. At the moment it is low tide the sun is barely up and there is not a person in sight on the beach. The sky is a light overcast, but no rain is predicted. Expected temperatures in the high sixties to low seventies.
So far we have no plan. We may go up to Cannon Beach and do the tourist thing, maybe just walk the beach. I want to hike the Tillamook Spit, take the kids to the Tillamook Cheese Factory for ice cream, Maybe the guys will want to go to the Air Museum.
An.d maybe I'll just read a book. For my birthday Mrs A got me "The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest" by Steig Larsen. The third book in his very excellent series. I just got the new prescription for my glasses on Friday, so this is the first time I can see out of both eyes correctly since January, I just finished reading "Ender in Exile" By Orson Scott Card, the latest in the Ender series. If you have never read them, and you like Science Fiction, by all means read them. The first book in the series is "Enders Game". Read it.
So most of the knots in my head have smoothed themselves out and I am content with everything.
At ease
light em if you got em

Vanaru? Subagon?

I had an experience last night that very few people have ever had.

Going uphill...at 70 MPH...passing people.....in a Volkswagon Vanagon Westfalia.

Of course I had just gotten it out of the shop where I had them remove the piece of c%@# 80 horsepower engine and replace it with a Subaru 2.5 litre fuel injected counterballenced four cylinder 175 hp engine from a 2004 Subaru Forrester with 40,000 miles on it.

The Westfalia has always been praised as a versitile, fun vevhicle with one glaring problem. The Engine. It was severely underpowered even in it's plain jane Vanagon version. When you add all the camping gear and pop-top it is not just anemic, it is embarrassing. The Subaru engine is the perfect answer to all of the problems. No more cringing as people flash you their "approval" while you return them the peace sign minus one.

The modern engine comes complete with a computer engine monitoring system, and utilizes the stock guages. However I did have them install a digital display that feeds you all of the information from the computer.

So what do you call such a creation? I like Vanaru since it looks a lot like a stock Vanagon, with a little bit of Subaru on the end, since it is rear engined.

Fourth and last day off.

Since I had Oral surgery on Friday, I had the day off. Then the weekend, and then today off because the holiday fell on Sunday. It was really nice having the time off, although the weather wasn't anything to celebrate. The sun finally came out this afternoon.
Saturday, it was Vinnie's birthday/graduation celebration. He raked in a fistfull of cash. The main reason I went was for the food. Dewi is a very good cook, and always has some unexpected dish. Saturday it was hard boiled eggs halved and covered with a red sauce that would set your face on fire. Plus the standard egg rolls and rice dishes.
Rick and Rachel and the kids showed up from Utah on Sunday. I made some killer spaghetti, and we sat around visiting and munching all evening. It was nice catching up.
Today, I took advantage of having another male around by getting Frankenhealey running. I needed help pushing the car out of the driveway so I could work on starting it in gear and breaking the clutch loose. It worked, and I spent the rest of the early afternoon giving rides. At the end of the street there is a very steep and twisty stretch of road. I love going down to the bottom of the hill and tearing up it as fast as I can go. Everyone (except me) comes away a little wide eyed and breathless.
ARISE FRANKENHEALEY!!!

Another week gone by....

Not only that, but it is JULY. Yes you heard me correctly, it IS JULY!

How the hell did that happen?

Thursday I went to see the optometrist, to get a new prescription, then to the dispenser for a new lenses.
Much to my surprise, they still carry the same frame style, so all I have to do is get one lens cut. I have the other eye scheduled for cataract surgery on August 30th. Around the end of September I will be able to order new glasses. I'll sure be glad when it is all over and I can go back to just taking sight for granted.

V's graduation party is tonight, and I guess I will push myself to go. I had three dental implants put in yesterday, and am in a quite a bit of pain. I have vicodin, but if I take that, I shouldn't drive. I think I will see if I can't get by on 600 mg of ibuprofen.

The kids from Utah are on there way here. So Mrs A will have to stay behind and wait for them while I go to the party. What, me unchaperoned at a party?

Guard the women and the booze!

A day off!

I didn't have to work today. At work that is. I worked nineteen days in a row.

So what did I do on my day off?

A couple of weeks ago we moved my mom into an assisted living facility. So she is selling her home. We all got together today to clean the place out and do some yard work. The job of cleaning out the garage fell to me. We had already gone through the tools and good stuff, and mainly what was left was junk.

I also wanted her kitchen table. It is 40 years old, and in excellent shape. It also came with six matching chairs. The framework of the table and chairs are made of real sturdy chrome plated steel. The chairs need some TLC, but Mrs A is a whiz at recovering chairs.

One trip with the table and chairs and a dresser for R. One trip to the dump. One trip bringing an upright freezer over for L to come over and pick up next weekend. Back over with the lawnmower, mow the lawn, then back home. Five hours just evaporated.

Oh yeah, and I pulled a muscle in my back loading the freezer in the truck by myself.

I swear, I am going to take tomorrow off. But then there is Frankenhealey needing attention, the paint on the Z needs rubbing out, the table and chairs need to be cleaned up........

Big Doin's

V graduated from High School on Tuesday. I presented him with a sizable check, went down to the bank with him and set up a checking account and debit card. He turns 18 on July 1st, so he will go down and get my name taken off the account as soon as his birthday gets here.

Today, he is moving out and moving in with his dad. So I will be out of the business of raising kids after 35 years. They never stop being your kids, but you don't have to watch out for them every second. I am working, so I hope everything will be done by the time I get home. This is day 13 of 19 in a row I am working. Things are getting a little raggedy around the edges.

I get off next weekend, so instead of taking it off, on Saturday we are all getting together and cleaning out my mom's place. It shouldn't be too difficult. There will be a big dumpster out back, and pretty much anything left will go to the dump. There is an upright freezer I am going to snatch, and some dining room chairs and a dresser.

Monday the Westfalia is going in for a heart transplant. The underpowered Wasserboxer engine is being replaced by a 2004 Subaru 205 Liter engine. The engine fits into the same home like it was designed to go in there. You use the Subaru engine wiring harness and computer, and set up a dash display for all the monitoring stuff. Close to double the horsepower. Mind you, it will be no stoplight racer, but it should be able to make it over the pass without downshifting into second......

Tuesday, off to the Eye Doctor for a checkup. If everything looks OK maybe I can have a new prescription cut for glasses for the interim until I can get the other eye done.

Thursday, to the Periodontist for the final prep for tooth Implants on July 2nd.

Whew! I'm tired already.

Six more days until a day off.

Catching up

R and "i" stopped by last night. Mrs A and I bought "i" a tricycle for his birthday, which was on May 6, but we hadn't managed to hook up. So he got his tricycle. Hasn't quite figured out how to operate it yet, but he was figuring it out.
I am back to working most of the time. Working both days this weekend and am scheduled for both days next weekend. Got to get a bunch of stuff taken care of in the next couple of years so I can retire.
Gotta get my teeth taken care of.
Gotta get the Westfalia restored so we can go anywhere at any time.
Get the house payed off.
All the credit cars and the cars payed off.

On another note, we moved my mom into Merrill Gardens, a Retirement Community. It is pretty fancy. She has a very nice one bedroom unit. They provide meals, organize activities, take care of maintenance. I haven't tried the food, but she says it's good.
We stall have to clean her house, but it is a real task trying to get enough of us together at any one time. Plan B is the weekend after next. I will have that weekend off probably and God forbid I should be able to take a day off and relax.

Back at it

I am back at work today.
254 e-mails waiting for me, people saying "Man are we glad to see you!" and wanting answers to questions before I even got logged in.
Kept me busy all day. Made for a quick first day back.
I still don't have all of my accounts up and running because a couple of them got shut dowm when I went on LOA. Although they knew I would be back today, the LOA people didn't care to get everything set up for me to go back to work. All I can say is their attitude was less than helpful. The one computer account I needed the most, I couldn't get access to. Their attitude was "Oh well, It will get cleared up in a couple of days." F%^&*()ing idiots.
The day flew by.

A New Direction

Well, I went ahead and did it.
I signed up for a course in glass blowing.
I had mentioned a couple of months ago that I might, because Boeing had been paying for any classes you took. Of course the minute I expressed any interest in taking course, they dropped the funding like a hot rock.
It is a little expensive, $275 for three classes, but I decided I wanted to pursue it any way. So for my birthday, I asked for classes. Mrs A wanted to pay for the entire cost, but I told her that was too much for a birthday present, so she gave me $200 and I will finance the rest.
I have a creative/artistic side of my personality that I have allowed to stagnate the last couple of years, as I have been busy restoring sports cars. It is time to take a different path for a while. I love glass, think it is an incredible medium, and happen to live in one of the world's hotbeds of art glass creativity. I have visited a couple of glass shops in the last year, and I am getting the bug.
It will be interesting to see if I have any talent in this medium.

So Far, So Good

Every day the bubble of gas in my eye gets smaller, and the vision in my eye gets a little better. It is really weird. I have no depth perception when I look down because the damn bubble is in the way. Going down stairs is a bit of a challenge. I'm OK as long as I don't think about it, But the moment I look down I lose my depth perception, which makes me dizzy.
So me left eye is just the same as it always has been, but my vision in my right eye is constantly changing, although I can see better up close with my right eye. So I have taken a pair of glasses I had made for hiking, and removed the right lens. No matter what I do, for now my vision is sort of messed up.
If I put on my regular glasses, I can see out of my left eye, but my right is messed up, with no glasses I can see better with my right eye, The best compromise is my hiking glasses with the right lens removed.
Eventually, I will have the other eye done. Then when everything settles down I should have good short range vision, and have to use glasses for long range, like driving.
Yesterday, I spent four hours working outside. It is my fault that it rained today, because I pressure washed the deck. It was kinda a challenge washing the deck when I have no depth perception.
Today started out raining, so I took it easy until the rain stopped, then went out and got Frankenhealey running. Then I got the Westfalia running. I need to get started working on it. I think tomorrow I need to call and talk to the guys that do the engine swaps to put a Subaru 2.5 Litre engine is the Westy. I need to get it finished before August for the family reunion in Idaho. Time goes by so quickly. I have to stay on top of things all the time or it will all get away from me.