I am an amateur wood worker. I’ve never taken any classes or workshops on the subject, but my learning style allows me to learn by reading, and so I’ve read quite a bit on the subject and I regularly look at the articles in Fine Woodworking Magazine. I also have watched a lot of the woodworking how-to shows on television, including “The Woodwright’s Shop” (no power tools) and Norm Abrams “New Yankee Workshop” (all power tools).

Since I live on in one of the housing subdivisions on the Ridgetop, I don’t have a lot of space for a shop. I built in two work benches in my garage, one of which houses a radial arm saw. I have an old chop saw. I have a nice router with a router table. I have a biscuit joiner. I have a belt sander and a finishing sander.  And I have a circular saw and a jig saw. And I have a friend who occasionally lets me borrow his surfacing planer and a small joiner/planer that he owns. It’s not a plethora of tools, but it covers most of what I do.

My woodworking projects have mostly been simple furniture. I don’t do any wood turning and I haven’t done any gift items like boxes. I just did my first cutting board this month to replace the bread board that came with the kitchen cabinetry of our house.

This table has been my most ambitious project to date, and the one that I’ve felt best about as well. It’s made up mostly of figured maple from the Olympic Peninsula, with walnut legs.

After doing this project, I decided to try my hand at doing a dining table. It will be of similar design, again using figured maple boards for the top. But this is where my project bogs down. I have three maple boards that are six feet long. One is about 10 inches wide; the other two are more than 15 inches wide. I need a pretty heavy duty piece of woodworking equipment to prepare the edges that will be glued together to make the tabletop.

So here’s my question. Do any of you know of a place where I could get access to a wood shop around here? Olympic College doesn’t have one. I once understood that they had a woodworking shop for Bangor residents, but I don’t have base privileges.

Do any of you know of a local wood workers cooperative? I’ve heard that in some places, a group of woodworkers have gone in together to purchase equipment for a wood shop and then they share the cost and each has use of the shop. But I’ve never heard of something like that around here.

Any help would be appreciated.

— Jeff

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My caller ID told me the call was coming from a local business. The caller identified himself as representing an organization that supported Central Kitsap Kids, and asked me if I was willing to take two minutes to answer a couple of questions. I said I would.

“If you had a chance to grade the Central Kitsap Schools, would you give them an A, B, C, D or F?”

“The Central Kitsap Schools will be seeking voter approval for a levy replacement on the ballot in February. Would you support the levy renewal, oppose the levy renewal, or are you not sure?”

I gave them my answers. I’d be interested in hearing yours. Are you happy with the performance of the Central Kitsap Schools? Do you plan to support their levy renewal in February?

Let’s have a discussion.

— Jeff

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It’s not every day, or every year, or even every decade that a community has a chance to create a major park. In this case, the park will be about 1,000 acres in west Central Kitsap between Newberry Hill Road and Seabeck Highway. For more details on the park, check this previous blog entry.

Now that the county has secured the land for the park, it’s time to start planning how the park will be developed. Thursday’s meeting is part of a rare opportunity to be part of the creation of a large park that will serve the public for many years in the future. Hope you all make maximum use of this opportunity and make your voice heard on the park’s future.

— Jeff

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I called, and we had a nice conversation, but then the subject turned to the news of the day, and the initial reports about the shooting at Fort Hood in Texas. Sounds like a terrorist attack, he said.

From what I had heard, it was a shooting on a secure Army base. While the shooting suspect had been named, and the name sounded Muslim, I did not assume that it was an act of terrorism. But my friend did. The fact that I now know the suspect is Muslim, and opposed our involvement in the war in Iraq and Afghanistan, still does not lead me to conclude it was an act of terrorism. It sounds like the act of a really disturbed individual.

Just as I don’t conclude that the multiple murders in Cleveland were a function of suspect Anthony Sowell’s religion, I don’t conclude that the killings at Fort Hood are a function of Nidal Hasan’s religion. But apparently many people do … there were reports this morning of hate e-mails being delivered to mosques in different parts of the county.

What happened at Fort Hood is a tragedy. We shouldn’t be making it more of a tragedy by making assumptions with no basis in fact.

— Jeff

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I also keep up with my Facebook friends, and pretty regularly post my status and comment on other people’s posts on that social networking site.

On election night, I posted something expressing some of my feelings about the election, and what the results seem to be saying about the mood of the electorate. I’m pretty sure that post generated more response and comments from my friends than just about anything I had ever posted on Facebook before.

What I noted was the change in voter mood since a year ago. And I’d be very interested to hear your comments about that and what you’re thinking. Please jump on a leave a comment on this blog post about it.

Here’s a synopsis of what I had to say.

A year ago, despite the sinking economy and a pretty gloomy international outlook, the majority of voters responded by choosing to express some hope in casting their ballots. Before you tune out, this is not intended as either a pro-Obama or an anti-Obama piece. It’s really intended to be asking a question about the rest of us.

In the year since the presidential election, the depth of our economic crisis became clear. The statistics confirmed that we were actually in a recession when last November’s election occurred; in fact, the worst recession since the 1930s. I lost my job; people I know, both here in Kitsap and in other parts of the country, have lost their jobs. Luckily, I don’t know anyone who has lost their home to foreclosure, but perhaps you do. And the people knew all this really before the government released the economic statistics that confirmed it.

Today, there are signs that we’ve seen the worst of our economic situation. Many of the promises that were made on the campaign trail during the presidential race last year have been kept, and there is action on many of those issues that have not yet been resolved.

Yet the voter mood as expressed Tuesday was much more sour than the one expressed a year ago, when our situation was actually worse.

That leads me to ask: Are we, as a public, simply unable to show restraint. While there was a degree of euphoria that seemed to come from the public after the election of 2008, there was a degree of real anger and disgust shown in the results this year. Is our situation that much worse this year, or are we reacting to it that much worse?

Are we manic-depressive voters, incapable of maintaining an even keel and of allowing our leaders a reasonable period of time to accomplish what they have promised to try to make happen? Do we insist upon bouncing from one extreme to another, even when the evidence would suggest that things are never as good as we see them, nor as bad?

What does this say about us and our ability to emerge from the political morass we find ourselves in?

I’m asking you, and hoping to hear your thoughts about it.

— Jeff

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There was a pretty dramatic fire in a house on Clear Creek Road last night, but luckily the family that lived there escaped safely.

The news about the black bears in Bremerton has made the Seattle TV stations, but I haven’t noticed any of the critters hanging around in my neighborhood on the Ridgetop. I have enough critter trouble with the family of racoons that keeps coming around and digging up my yard under the bird feeders. So I’m certainly not going to be inviting any bears to come around.

If you’re like me, you get some seasonal depression this time of year when Daylight Savings time ends. I hate it when it gets dark at 5 in the afternoon. I have to say there’s a lot I love about our area, but the short winter days is not on the list. I put up with them because they are balanced by long summer days. But I don’t like them. And the standard way of dealing with them (leaving in the winter to “snow bird” somewhere in Arizona) is not my cup of tea. I find it difficult enough to manage one household; I certainly don’t need two places to take care of and worry about.

But there’s no reason to be depressed today. The sun is shining. I’ve already seen several woodpeckers at my feeder this morning.

Red-shafted flicker

The neighborhood black cat survived Halloween and came by the back door for a treat already today.

Barak Obama was elected president just about a year ago, and last I noticed, the United States has not become a Muslim nation, has not confiscated everyone’s firearms, has not trashed free-enterprise, has not taken over your health care decisions (and, you know, it won’t do that even if there is a public option approved in the health care reform legislation), and has not yet suffered another terrorist attack on our soil. All of those gloomy outcomes were predicted before his election victory. And I guess some believe they will still come true; but I don’t.

Unfortunately, the recession seems  pretty intractable, despite a lot of money being spent to try to stimulate the economy. I still have some friends who are out of work, and I feel for them. Those of us who had money in the stock market through 401k plans or through other investments and who did not panic have seen the value of their portfolios bounce back a little, but not to pre-2008 levels. And for the majority of us for whom our house is our largest investment, the value in that investment is still below what it was in 2008. At least we in Kitsap were lucky to see only about a 10 percent reduction in housing values here, compared with 25 and 30 percent in the areas hardest hit by the foreclosure problem.

But I fear it will be a while before people feel more economically secure and ready to look forward again with some confidence and anticipation.

When that point comes, what will we be thinking? Will we be changed by this recession like people who lived through the 1930s were changed by the Great Depression?

I doubt it. The Depression lasted for almost 10 years. It wasn’t until the nation geared up for World War II that we really climbed out of that hole. In many ways, what we’ve been through is much less traumatic. So the question is whether it will mark our thinking and our economic behavior for the coming years.

I’d be interested in hearing your thoughts on that.

— Jeff

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I strongly believe it’s good for people to have a choice in these elections; and it makes our community stronger to see that people are willing to run for such positions in a competitive environment.

During the filing period in June, at least two candidates filed to run for all three positions up for election this year, and in one race, three candidates filed. So, at the time, Central Kitsap had what appeared to be a very competitive set of school board elections lined up.

Then one candidate had to drop out of a race when her family got the opportunity after a long wait to move to base housing. That took her out of the area to be represented by that position on the board, and left board incumbent Bruce Richards without opposition for the Nov. 3 election.

Now, in one of the strangest election developments I’ve ever seen (and I’ve covered elections as a reporter or editor for more than 30 years), another candidate for CK School Board has come out publicly to recommend that voters cast their ballots for his opponent.

I met Robert MacDermid many years ago when our kids were both in CK schools. I liked him a lot, thought he did a lot for the schools, and I was happy to cast my ballot for him when I received it in the mail last week. Now, he’s done one of the classiest things I’ve ever seen a candidate do. After meeting his opponent, Mark Gaines, listening to him present his candidacy, and realizing that they agree on just about everything and that his opponent has more recent involvement in the schools, MacDermid came out and endorsed Gaines this week.

Sort of eliminates another possible contest. But in this case, it appears that both candidates were offering the public pretty similar commitments. And, either way, the winner will be new to the board and able to look at district policies and directions with a fresh eye.

Maybe here in Central Kitsap we’re more fortunate than I could have hoped.

— Jeff

after the June

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Darla, 45, died Sunday of cancer.

Many Central Kitsap leaders who have worked more closely with Darla have more to say than I could.

I just remember a very busy woman who was very happy to hear that I was blogging about CK and was also very happy to share that news with the Silverdale Chamber of Commerce’s e-mail list. And I remember that she willingly took time out of her day to sit down with me a few months ago to talk about the library and things KRL should be considering about its future in its strategic plan.

Darla was a considerate, caring person who will be missed.

— Jeff

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So it’s always exciting when my ballot arrives and I can fill it out (though the excitement is sometimes muted a little in primary elections when there’s only one race with a choice). The November ballot came in the mail today, and I just filled it out and put it in the envelope so I could mail it in tomorrow.

We in Silverdale get to vote on the two state initiatives, on three school board races (one of which offers one candidate unopposed), on an unopposed fire district election, an unopposed port district election, and on a contested Silverdale water district race.

The only one I hadn’t really heard about before was the water district race, so I checked out the voters pamphlet, then went to the Kitsap Sun’s online election guide and made my choice. I tend to want to reward candidates who have taken the time to fill out the questionnaires sent out by the paper.

Voter participation is one sign of a healthy community. If you vote, you’re also more likely to pay attention to what goes on around here, to have opinions and share them with others, and to get involved in making the community better. When academics study how healthy a community is, voter turnout is one of the first statistics they look at.

I’m not suggesting that you vote just so Silverdale looks good the next time someone does a study. I’m encouraging you to fill out your ballot because I believe when we fail to vote we lose our voice in how the community should be run. So get those lavender envelopes in the mail to the auditor’s office, and I’ll stop moralizing.

— Jeff

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A ray of sunlight illuminates a fern near Lower Hawk's Pond.

My wife and I had planned to take a hike with friends today, to enjoy the beautiful weather for a mid-October in the Northwest. Originally, we were heading for Mount Walker in the Olympic National Forest south of Quilcene. Rather than test her legs on a trail that forest firefighters train on, Joyce asked if perhaps there was something a little less uphill that might serve the purpose.

So we ended up at Buck Lake in North Kitsap, just on the edge of Hansville. While we’ve been to Point No Point several times, I’ve never visited the Kitsap County Park at Buck Lake before. And we’ve never had the chance to explore the trail system that the Hansville Greenway community volunteers have been working on for several years. I’m glad we did.

We started at the parking lot of the park, and walked down to the lake to take a look. It was deserted when we arrived … not a soul in sight. Aside from the call of a flicker, and seeing a few robins, there weren’t many animals in sight either.

After getting our bearings and finding the trailhead for the greenway, we headed south along the shore of Buck Lake, then through a meadow, and then through some woods past Upper Hawks Pond and then finally toward Lower Hawk’s Pond, where we saw two mature bald eagles on a tree overlooking the wetland. (It was hard to call it a pond today; the dry weather has just about drained the area.)

Along the way, I came upon this scene, where a ray of sunlight illuminated a fern on the forest floor.

The volunteers and the Hansville community should be congratulated for creating a very special place. Yes, some of the woods we walked through had been logged and were regrown. But still, it seems much more natural than most of the areas served by the Clear Creek Trail in Central Kitsap. It’s unfortunate there weren’t enough natural areas left in Central Kitsap when the Clear Creek Trail volunteers began their efforts.

— Jeff

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