Weekend Update – the gods of lawn maintenance are displeased

August 18, 2014 / Matt Talley / Leave a comment

We had a national holiday in France on Friday and I made the most of my 3-day weekend.

Instead of the stuff I needed to do I did this:

1. Got up at 7:30 on a holiday
2. Went up into the mountains with a group of Expats for a hike and a picnic – got some great pictures and had fine food
3. Worked on a design for wooden wine box/kitchen cabinets
4. Completely filled my Leuctterm1917 design sketch notebook – took 2 years
5. Watched a girlie movie with my sweet wife
6. Started a new notebook – a Rhodia Webbie this time (I like the paper better)
7. Spent too much time on the interwebs
8. Started formal permit process for garage shop and apartment above at our place in Seattle
9. Sanded, sealed and painted the “T” supports for the workbench/buffet table
10. Rough turned 4 oak bowls from a piece of tree blown down in a storm
11. Sent some e-mails out that I had let sit too long
12. Coated the bowls in wax and will let them cure for a year.
13. Cleaned and organized GROP – oak shavings were EVERY where
14. Composted the shavings with some grass and kitchen scraps
15. Sharpened all my lathe chisels
16. Brained myself on a low hanging bike – said f-word more than once
17. Went to a run along the river
18. Called my Mom and talked for a bit
19. Checked on the kids
20. Cut first 5” top sections for Cornebarrieu Workbench
21. Need a proper circle saw… the 18v battery saw is out of it league on 1.5” beech
22. Worked on the small cabinet rosettes for our neighbor – he also asked me to install a shelf while I was at it…
23. Played with the puppies – while Stamps-With-Foot had a girls night
24. Got sucked into Pinterest
25. Updated website a little (here and Tumblr)
26. Watched a little too much TV/YouTube
27. Took puppies for a walk around neighborhood a couple of times
28. Rode my bike about 10 miles – muddy
29. Cleaned and tuned single-speed bike
30. Played with puppies
31. Did some grilling with beer in hand 
32. Got up Sunday morning and worked for a few hours, – because I thought it was Monday. Damn it!
33. Closed office door and did not return for 24 hours
34. Told wife her hair was very pretty
35. Went for a walk with wife and puppies
36. Made a small parts organizer out of a broken wood bowl
37. Got glue on my favorite shorts
38. Wrote some snail-mail
39. Surfed the interwebs until I fell asleep with the iPad on my chest…
40. I did not mow the yard again. The gods of lawn maintenance are displeased with me.

Outdoors this summer with my son

July 31, 2014 / Matt Talley / Leave a comment

A summertime fixture for my son’s summer visits has always been some time outside. We have canoed, hiked, ridden bikes across international borders, camped, road-tripped, National/State Park hopped, etc… This year was no different except we did those things in France.

We canoed along the Canal du Garone in my 2014 Father’s Day present – a Big green 3-person canoe. The Ruminator learned about the magic of portaging and that stinging nettles should not exist on this earth. We hiked into the Ariège Pyrenees, climbing 5900+ feet in 4.5 hours. That night we slept in an high alpine Refuge (his first), ate great food, and saw the most amazing mountain waterfalls, wildflowers, streams, and lakes. There were high green fields dotted with cows, sheep and goats before we walked above the tree-line and blue ice floating in the deep alpine lake at the base of the Refuge. It is a memory that I will carry with me for the rest of my days!

There was bike riding, lawn mowing (had to throw that in!!), soccer, long walks and one attempted swim session. He got turned away because he showed up with swim trunks to the pool and here in France you have to wear Speedos – no really, I swear. We also visited one of the prehistoric parks in the area (there are three?!) and got to throw spears at targets as part of one of the interactive displays. There were deer and bison 3D archery targets out in the field along with paper animal targets and we only learned that the 3D ones were just to look at and not to aim at. This information only came after one of my spears sailed over the bison’s neck, clearing it by 2 inches from 50 yards away. I got a stern warning…

Being outside with my kids is one of my true pleasures in this life (My daughter HATES backpacking and sleeping on the ground and is more of an RV girl). I look forward to many more years of it and the inclusion of more children and grand children.

A trip to the Taoist temple of Mount Qingcheng

May 17, 2014 / Matt Talley / Leave a comment

While in China near the city of Chengdu, my co-workers wanted to show me a Chinese cultural site and planed for this crazy hike up a mountain to see the Giant Buddha of Leshan. I opted out as I was crazy jet-lagged and was not geared for a mountain hike on this trip. The alternate plane was to visit the Taoist temple of Mount Qingcheng, which is one of the the most important sites of Taoism/Daoism in China and is the historical center of the Taoist religion. I like temples, so I said “sure”

I wore jeans, a button-up shirt, a sweater and wingtips. Instead of climbing one mountain, I got to climb two, in the rain, wander through a cave and hike 10+km (~7 miles) in those awesome wingtips. I think that “I don’t want to hike up a mountain” was somehow lost in translation. They meant well. The temple complex was very cool and the food at the top of the mountain was yummy, but super pricey – as they have zero competition.

Driven Outside

Tag: Hiking

Weekend Update – the gods of lawn maintenance are displeased

Outdoors this summer with my son

A trip to the Taoist temple of Mount Qingcheng