Router Table

Finally I figured it out. I wanted to make some unusual baseboard trim--something with tiny curves and angles--out of knotty pine, but this is tricky because the knots are hard and brittle. My high-speed router can make the cuts, but it is just not possible to do it by hand.

So I broke down and bought a router table, one of those things that I've always sorta wanted but was able to resist thanks to my genetic frugality and years of practiced cheapness and skinflintery.

A router table holds the router upside down, with the pointy part sticking up through a hole in the table, allowing you to cut the angles and curves with some precision (rather than holding the router itself by hand and moving it over the wood). Yeah, I know, for centuries craftsmen made trim like this without power tools--another reminder that I am a simpering maggot, a sickly sucker fish in comparison to those guys.

I was so pleased with the results that I've been reminding Cheryl, again and again lately, what a special and talented person I am, using my store-bought power and precision to create something cool. Such is the nature of woodworking, of life, today.

The trim does add a nice touch. But I'm not done. Next I need to finish off the arched doorway so that the paneling blends into the curved wall. The project goes on and on.

Bingo, our CIA-engineered puppy-bot, was on hand to inspect my work and to practice his secret uplink protocol. Apparently he can automatically record a video and upload it to the agency servers just by staring. The days of me walking around in my underwear are over. Who knows what is out there by now...