Merry Christmas from my Lair to Yours

 

Merry Christmas to you and your families from St Michaels, Maryland.  I know 2020 has been a difficult year for all of us and we're learning to celebrate the holidays in different and "more distant" manner.  Still we can test new ways to celebrate and it's better to have a positive outlook than not.

At my house, this will be the first Christmas we will not have our son in the house with us Christmas morning - an inevitable outcome but one that will take some getting used to.  On the positive side we will get him and his girlfriend for a socially distant Christmas dinner and is suspect Mary Beth will be pulling out all the stops to impress his young lady.  Impress or Intimidate - I never under this  higher level female communication stuff.  It's probably best if I don't trouble my pointy little head about such matters.

We'll be trying to create some new traditions this year and will likely be having a large Christmas dinner with the extended family over Zoom.  It will be a shambles but a shambles that I will really enjoy.

Speaking of new traditions, I finally broke down and built a Eastern Shore of Maryland holiday mainstay - a Christmas tree made out of crab traps.  Yes these little beauties adorn houses, docks and boats during the holiday season and the scream out class and sophistication.  I bet you can hear from wherever your reading this blog right now if you listen carefully...

Anyway, I kind of like the tree and it's nice to see peeking through the trees as one trundles up the drive way.

Be safe and be positive this Holiday season - we will get through this period of trial to better days in 2021.

Lamps Done

 The switches for my son's steam punk lamp Christmas present are all done.  More impressively, I didn't give myself a shock (it's happened before)

There's an on/off switch on the base and the water valve acts as a dimmer (that was a bit of pain to figure out how to do!).  Technically since the bulb can be controlled via a phone app (and it's a blue tooth speaker), it really doesn't need a dimmer.  I just thought it would be cool and a great excuse to pick up a few rotary switches.  Amazon can be a very "bad" thing.

 A better shot of the lamp.  The white power cord is temporary - it's what I had in the shop.  I've got a old cloth covered one on order from Amazon (it's a fake antique) but it will not arrive by Christmas.

If you try this project please read up on switches and good safety steps in building something that mixed electricity with iron pipes.

I doubt I'll wrap this present but I'll think he'll like it.

Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays form the Uber Geek's Lair

 Wishing you and your families a joyous holiday season and the best hopes for a happy and healthy new year.

Holiday preparations are winding down here in St Michaels, MD which is good given the big day is 72 hours from now.  With my son home from college and my wife healthy and happy there really isn't anything more I need.

One tradition here on the Eastern Shore is for one of my neighbors to put on a rather extensive yard display and this year's a good one, especially if you like trains.