Update

Quick update on a few projects:

The Soapbox car has a pulse. 

The Plastiplums are not yielding very exciting results...yet.

Peeper chairs are done.  Kiddie Conference Table on deck.

$44.00 for a pair of Chuck T's, I think Not!

I don't know if you know this but Converse was bought by Nike a couple three years ago.  So my beloved Chuckie T's are now allowed on campus!  (ref: Nike campus in Beaverton, shoe regulation)  

I feel like I have been burning through my Chucks faster than usual.  At first I attributed it to the load I carry on my shoulders.  That would make sense.  I don't swing my arms anymore when I walk and my feet slap when they hit the ground.  Even in grass.  But I can't imagine that accounting for more than a small percentage of the overall deterioration of the sole.  

My point is that I am not going to sit in Nike's backyard and pay $44 and change for kicks that last a month and a half.  Not unless they hire me.

I am going to see how long I can keep this pair going.  I have a little more work to do but here is the breakdown of what has happened over the past few days.  I wore them around today, mowed the lawn, rode up Mt Tabor, they feel good.  Actually they feel friggin' awesome.

I put music to the slideshow and it is by Action Daddy. 

Put It On Casters! Passive Aggressive Furniture Fabrication

Of course architects can design furniture... they design whole friggin' buildings for crying out loud.   But seriously, I love architects.  I pick them out on the street.  As a matter of fact, last year at the ButtJoint I was working with the big door open and this dude walked by.  I asked him if he was an architect and low and behold!  I think it freaked him out.  He probably thought I had met him somewhere but I could actually just tell.  I can pick out bass players too.  

Anyway, I was having a conversation with a couple of architects I know the other day and one says, "I know, take a log and put it on casters!" He snapped his fingers and turned around triumphantly as if all problems were solved and it was that easy.

I was instantly reminded of this log with a few different chair back styles poking out of it at the Hudson Hotel in NYC. 

"That sounds like an architect thing to do." I said.

My friend, an architect, designed the bench at the Hudson.  I never loved it.  I thought it wreaked of what it was: An undeveloped, smartypants whim.  It is like a joke from the movie "Airplane".  With the budget he had... he should have put wheels on it, at least.  I mean, why stop there?  let's put some USB ports in it.  Ohhh, if I ran the Zoo!

Of course, it isn't just architects who do such things.  To my horror and surprise I found this image from something that came out of the Droog studio in Holland.  Same wacky idea but this time they made the chair backs out of metal (maybe gilded).  Holy Irony!  I am guessing an architect who works at Droog did it.  Prove me wrong and I will send you a free t shirt.

So I decided to call my architect friend's bluff and put some casters on a log.  Bring on the awards!  Notify MOMA! Get ID Magazine on the phone! I have to say that it makes moving the log around a whole lot easier and Passive Aggressive Furniture Making is a relatively healthy way to deal with my design demons.   Working it out...

Soapbox Derby Update

If you close your eyes, you can feel the rumble. No, Dave Lombardo didn't move into your basement.  It's not the world coming to an end! 

It is the sound of Twin Barrels Burning.  

The race is 5 weeks away and The Solution is crystalizing.

I am calling it The Solution because it is not a car, it is an answer.  

Beautiful Glossy Plastiplums: As Green't As It Gets.

Like eating all of the food on my plate, I always feel like I should use all of the two part epoxy I mix for a project.  Today, in a panic, I plasticoated a few plums, on a tree, in a client's back yard.  

My Personal Epoxy System (PES) requires me to mix a portion dictated by the epoxy pump designers, so usually I have a little extra.  Worst case scenario is that I get a jolly, cracking out the paintbrush epoxicle from the yogurt container I used to mix the polymeric elixir.  Wet epoxy is as nasty as it is cool, so I a strive to waste not a single, engineered drop.

I coated a few plums and I am very excited to see what will happen. It may have been the most important thing I did all day.  I am flooded with epoxy integrated plant ideas.  No, good ones... really good ones.  Maybe I will cast some clear cubes around some saplings and grow a fauxrest. How green't is that? Send me some epoxy and I'll freakin' do it.