Woodworking In America (WIA) in Pasadena, California was a lot of fun. These were some of my favourite lines from the show.
I always seem to get asked the most difficult questions by the US Customs Agents in the airport. This time was different.
Customs agent: Where are you headed?
Me: Pasadena, California.
Customs agent: My brother has the same [luggage] as you. He loves that bag. But his got slashed and we all thought he was going to replace it with something he could find at the local store, but he went on Ebay to find the same bag… Enjoy your trip.
One of the events at WIA was the First Annual Feast of the Ribald Society of Old Moxonians.
Marco Cecala: Chris, did you go to the Old Moxonians dinner?
Me: No; I’m not old enough.
Some of the locals evidently have to make excuses to find time to get out of the house.
Paul-Marcel: Sorry for the late reply.
Roger Savatteri: Late? I’m at the studio, er… walking the dog.
Two other woodworkers were discussing religion. I interrupted.
Me: My religion is “tails first”. (I actually don’t have a strong preference when cutting dovetails by hand.)
One of the events at the Hand Tool Olympics was to rip a board as quickly (and accurately) as possible using a coarse-toothed rip saw.
Me: You’re louder than a table saw!
En route to dinner, we encountered bumper-to-bumper traffic.
John Economaki: This reminds me of home. Michael [Berg] works at this pace.
Still en route to dinner with the Bridge City Dream Team, I couldn’t resist making this joke.
Me: I was hoping we would be going for sushi so I could try to order a Jonokono maki.
Jim Ipekjian was searching through computer folders to find his Powerpoint presentation for his seminar.
Paul-Marcel: There’s a smart man who doesn’t use the Recent Documents feature when opening a document on a public projector.
Adam Cherubini had taught a class about moulding planes earlier at WIA and somebody mentioned that I had Time Warp Tool Works moulding planes in the Marketplace. He came over to look at them.
Adam Cherubini: That’s dead sexy (In a Mike Meyers voice).
A Nine Inch Nails song came on the radio.
Me: Technically, there’s actually no such thing as a nine-inch nail. I believe any nail over 6″ is a spike.
I may have gotten a little too “in the groove” in the Hand Tool Olympics booth while ripping a board.
@WIAConference: What is this we hear about @FlairWoodworks dancing on marketplace floor… nice! Camera guys heading your way!
In a quiet moment, I found myself at the Festool booth looking at their new TI-15 Impact Drill.
Me: I was hoping your impact driver would have a quieter hydraulic hammer mechanism.
Festool Rep: Liquids and power tools don’t mix.
Paul-Marcel: That’s why they discontinued the stein.
Festool Rep: No – That was probably because of your crappy review!
The Dovetail Competition at the Hand Tool Olympics drew a large crowd. It was an exciting event and a lot of fun participating and spectating. I had just witnessed Chuck Bender cut a dovetail and heckled him in good fun. Then it was my turn. As typical, I tried something unconventional.
Chuck Bender: I can’t heckle him, because I can’t figure out what he’s doing!
Sculptural Woodwork by Chris Wong 
Please tell me you are working on the Jonokono maki roll.
Jonathan,
I need to acquire more precision tooling before I begin that project.
Chris
Thank you! That’s the best coverage of WIA I’ve seen yet!
Total fun
Whole event was a lot of fun, but you captured an awful lot of it with those quotes.
While not a WIA quote, let’s not forget “wow, how big is that? and how much did it cost? does it come in a smaller size?”