Seasonal invasion
It’s that time of the year again when the seasons change. Before, though, they never changed in my shop.
It’s that time of the year again when the seasons change. Before, though, they never changed in my shop.
Well, that’s not entirely true as my basement shop gets a bit chillier in the winter. But the seasonal change I’m talking about is one that happens in every square inch of our house but my shop: the dreaded invasion of seasonal decorations.
My wife goes nuts for seasonal decorating. We have an entire storage room with nothing in it but decorations that she swaps out every four months and every conceivable holiday. My shop has always been off limits to this incessant madness, however. Until now.
This is what I found at my miter saw station this morning. I should have expected it – I knew that she’d bought new seasonal rugs for upstairs, so the old ones had to appear somewhere. It would also explain why she was acting guilty last night.
While I’ve always eschewed such decorating in my shop (if the decoration isn’t woodworking or sci-fi related you generally won’t find it in my workspace), I had to admit that the splash of color looked kind of nice. And after using the saw for a couple quick cutoffs earlier today, I also had to admit that the little rug felt good between my feet and the concrete.
Plus, it could have been worse. Instead of a pumpkin rug, she could have decorated my shop with pumpkin spice potpourri baskets.
A.J. Hamler is the former editor of Woodshop News and Woodcraft Magazine. He's currently a freelance woodworking writer/editor, which is another way of stating self-employed. When he's not writing or in the shop, he enjoys science fiction, gourmet cooking and Civil War reenacting, but not at the same time.