wood > wine rack > wine > drinking > remembering

Got up early and went to Lowe's to work some more on the wine rack. I needed to get a more traditional wood saw, and I also picked up two cinderblocks to use as sawhorses and to stabilize the boards while I saw them. It poured more rain today as I worked in the garage. The design features a big X which I'd intended to make by intersecting two boards, but I needed to notch both the boards in the middle, which are 1-1/2" thick, to get them to fit into each other. I ended up using a flat-headed screwdriver as a chisel to get out the 1.5" wide piece of wood in the middle. Not pretty, but since the intersecting wood pieces notch together, you'll never see it anyway.

I put the big X, the two side pieces, and the bottom shelf in place, and looking at it, made the suggestion that given my less than precise fabrication technique, to simply forego the secondary cross pieces. Mom and Larry agreed. So tomorrow after I ship dad's clock stuff, I'll swing back to Lowe's and pick up the sandpaper and sealant I need.

Talked to Saori today via skype as she was working late at her office for a competition. We were talking about housing and the difficutly of finding it in Stuttgart. One of her coworkers has been looking for a place for four months. That's a long time. We're looking within a four metro station radius, or along the main stretch of Stuttgart, which is really not that big of a city. Saori wants something with character and a bit older, ideally located close to that four station line. I'm interested in location too, but more concerned with the rent than the character.

Meanwhile, my friend Dew got married in Japan! I realize that life doens't actually happen on the Facebook time scale, but he announced his engagement to Yoshimi-chan a week ago, and they were married a week later. I guess I'm too used to seeing my friends have very. long. engagements. and very. elaborate. weddings. It's a reminder that it doesn't necessarily have to be that way. I'm happy for the two of them.

I remember back in 2011, I sat by Dew in the Shanghai studio. Early in the semester, Dew was really unhappy. He had broken up with his long-distance girlfriend in Japan a month before. One of his very close friends has been propositioned for marriage, and he was coming to terms with his own feelings towards her. She decided to decline the proposition, broke up with her then-boyfriend, and decided to date Dew instead.

Dew had actually been to Japan fairly recently, having worked in Shanghai the summer before the semester started, but he elected to join studio trip to Shanghai in order to meet Yoshimi there. Actually, he pretty much bailed on every single activity we were supposed to be doing as a group over there. He booked a room in the incredibly swanky Peace Hotel on the bund, and our first night there, I was introduced to Yoshimi at the Peace Hotel bar. They were turning away tourists- the only way to get in was to be a guest at the hotel, and even then there was a wait. We squeezed into a small table and chatted over gin and tonics to the ancient jazz ensemble in the dimly lit lounge. Yoshimi-chan does Ikebana for a living- traditional Japanese flower arrangement.