Rob Brophy came through with his lovely part and Roy Griggs was lassoed, hog tied, and got his part here practically overnight!!  Good men!

Then the disaster time started.

First I get email from Russ.  "You know we have till the end of the month?  Meet is coming right up."  He casually says.

"Holy Mackerel" I'm thinking, freaked.  2 weeks? Lord, no time to round up more help I was planning on.  Once again, up against the impossible...

This time there can be no messing around, I go to work for real.  Got a couple days in, then...  My 84 year old mother decides it must be a good time for a crisis.

I'm on the phone every hour with one, then another of my 3 sisters and trying to get a flight I can afford (air travel is a subject for unremorseful bitching these days isn't it?  I hadn't been involved with it since the days it was clean, polite and casual.).

Worried out of my mind...

Russ, being the kindest of men, immediately says, "Hey, quit worrying about the project, if we can't do it, we can't and it's totally ok.  You go do what you need to do." 

Except I couldn't go to TX however much it was killing me not to.  It was thoroughly discussed between me n the girls, and decided if I could get there a week later it would be a better time to cover the bases while my sisters had standing commitments elsewhere they couldn't get out of, and besides it coincided with the available travel I couldn't afford, but at least priced closer to what I could afford then anything else I was finding.  The ticket was booked.

I was stressed galore.  Distraught in a word.  But I did need something I could put my hands on in the meantime.  I didn't know if any part of the project could be finished in time or not.  But sitting and worrying about mother when I couldn't do anything about it would have had me up the wall for keeps.

So work I did.  I plunged into it with a will.  Straight through.  I didn't think it was possible at all, and there could have certainly been more work done, but they did transform from hazy dream into reality.

The "new" attachment I did first so it got the lions share of the work.  The older patent piece was done in, an unbelievably short, down to the last scramble of time, so it had to be more of a prop piece.  Looks ok, but don't head into the burl wood.

But then, considering the Lee Valley production model, maybe not all that far from reality after all.   Heh, I'm needling you Robin!!  Everything else you do is so nice I don't get many chances. :-).

I boxed them up late afternoon on the day before I was leaving and got them into the PO in between final packing for the TX trip, about 2 minutes before they closed.  Right at the razor's edge.

Here's to you Paul Hamler.  Inspiration to us all!

Don't know why they look so huge in the pictures? They really aren't, you know ;-)