OldTools Archive

Recent Bios FAQ

43528 Kirt Winter <kirt@s...> 1998‑05‑20 Bio: Kirt Winter
Fellow Galoots,

As promised (or threatened ;-), here's my bio.  I also write the occasional
fictional novel for fun, so I hope you'll forgive my tendency to be
long-winded.

On the personal front, I'm in the middle of my 30s, have SWMBO and two GITs;
a four-year-old boy and a six-year-old girl who shows so much interest in
my wood butchering hobby that I cannot bring myself to call her a SWMBette.

I work at Hewlett-Packard, helping to design those paper-eating inkjet
printers as a software engineer, though at times I'm referred to (in a
derrogatory manner) as a "color scientist."

I have not found a single woodworking root in my past.  In junior high I
hated woodworking, because for the life of me I could not square a d*mn
board with a hand plane.  The aide in the class finally took pity on me and
gave me one to give to the teacher.  He salvaged a "C" for me, along with
the "drawing" section of the class.

Fast-forward about twelve years and I decided to build a deck on to our
house.  So, I acquired a B&D c*rc*l*r s*w and got it done, and had a
reasonably fun time doing it.  Decided to make a quick and dirty futon frame
too, and it lived up to its billing.  Shortly thereafter, we moved to San
Diego and bought a "fixer."  Got a Crapsman t*bl* s*w to help me with all
the fixing I had to do.

About the same time, I started watching Nahm on PBS.  I began to share his
fascination for all things electric.  During a visit to my in-laws house I
discovered that my father-in-law had a stash of Woodsmith magazines.  As we
were in the market for a new dining table, I began the campaign to convince
SWMBO that I could build it.  This, mind you, was a major undertaking and
I'm sure she had in mind that old futon frame that we unloaded in a garage
sale for $10.  So, for about three months I was the model husband and
eventually convinced her that I would build just the top of the table from
the plans in Woodsmith (it has a plyw**d top with edging, and leaves that
come out each side).  If, and only if she approved of the top would I
commence with the building of the rest of the table.  If she didn't like it,
she got to go to the store.  It was a big risk, but the model husband thing
was getting old.

Well, she liked it and thus began my current journey that has taken me from
being a happy software geek to a frustrated wood hacker.  I've completed a
reasonable number of projects.  The earliest of them, the table, a
bookshelf, a shaker library table, three toyboxes and a keepsake box were
all from Woodsmith plans.  My last two, however, are things I've designed
myself; a bed for each of my GITs.  My son's is of maple, with some red oak
and lacewood for accents.  It came out okay, but wasn't perfect.  My
daughter's, however, I'm really pretty proud of.  Save the use of the
t*bl*s*w (I at least had the sense to replace the Crapsman with a Delta), I
did most all of the work by hand.  The design is in cherry and is arts and
crafts inspired.  I'm delighted to say that after cutting the over 200
mortices on the bed with my Sorby morticing chisels, I'm not too bad at it.

I must credit fellow galoot Mike Harless with turning me on to this list and
inspiring me to begin using hand planes in earnest (he has graciously not
burst my bubble about my daughter's bed).  I've bought a few from Garrett
Spitzer and now have a "barely" ;-) usable set of about 15.  I learned about
"scary sharp" and have recently proven how sharp I can get a chisel, having
rammed one into my finger, sticking the blade into the bone.  Especially
considering I didn't have much velocity behind it and the fact that the cut
was so clean it took probably fifteen seconds before the blood began to
flow, I believe the method deserves the "scary" moniker.

On my "to-do" list is to get a website up with some of my creations (did I
mention that I was proud of my daughter's bed?).  And, now that I've managed
to get my bio done, maybe there's hope!

I've enjoyed this list immensely, though sometimes the gloats are pretty
hard to take, and look forward to contributing when I can.  Thanks to
everyone who does contribute, and a special thanks to our "moms."  Keep up
the good work.

Kirt
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Kirt Alan Winter                                             kirt@s...
Hewlett-Packard -- Home Imaging Division
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