carpentry, day 1

today began the third week of the six week course. carpentry, finally! we were all pretty excited. many of the women are listing carpentry as their area of interest.

two experienced, retired union carpenters are our teachers. interesting, good people. they talked to us about what to expect on the job, benefits, retirement, career advice, work advice. we took a quiz on safety, and then headed downstairs to the workshop.

our job was to carry heavy, bulky objects up the stairs, out of the building, part way down the block, and then back inside and down the stairs again. we did this first with a 61.7 pound bucket of compound, and then with other, lighter objects such as ladders, tool boxes, a tripod, and a wretchedly heavy old pipe. two trips with each.

it's training, and after lunch we did three trips up and down three flights of stairs to top it off. then some work with fractions and measurement, and an intro to different measuring devices.

while waiting for a quiz to be graded, i sketched the work bench that we will be building. i'll put it here when i get my camera back from a friend. sketching in 3d is a challenge for me, but i love the geometry of it.

i'm anxious to start. by the end of the six weeks, i am told that we will build a room, complete with studs and dry wall and maybe a ceiling.

---

in other news, i just sold my air conditioner. it feels good to be rid of a bulky, electricity gobbling appliance that makes a lot of noise. more space in my closet. and i slept fine under the fan during that last big heat wave. plus, less is more. i'm hoping to need less and thus work less in the future.

my knees are worrying me a bit. stairs to the train and the subway, stairs to my apartment, back down to the basement three times for laundry, on top of all the stair work we did today. hopefully a good sleep will help with the strain i'm feeling. also the coming holiday.