Stuff I learned from The Wood Whisperer

Worked my way to the first person I learned from: Marc Spagnuolo more commonly known as The Wood Whisperer from his podcast blog site.  (He's the goofy one in the picture... well, actually, that's not clear-cut either...)

If you've read my profile, I happened upon his site long ago while bored in a hotel room during a new-hire training trip.  I was doing some remodeling job and wanted new ideas.  That sparked an interest in learning more to, you know, make my own stuff, save some money :)  Actually – perhaps surprisingly – I knew making it yourself cost much more than store-bought stuff, but at least you could make your own goofy ideas come into fruition (or into the fire pit!)

I tore through the videos he had back then; they were very accessible and explained the parts glossed over in TV DIY shows.  Good stuff.

As for the title of this posting... the stuff I learned are the fundamentals, but that's what you need to build up to your own "thing".  I started on his site when it was pretty young; if you just start there now, you'll have, like, a bazillion videos to get through.  More popcorn.

Back in the day, he wasn't so busy so I made him busy with my email questions or chats when he was live streaming from the shop.  To give you an idea of how long ago that was, it was before someone stole his Makita SCMS.  Yeah, that long ago.

He later started WoodTalkOnline, a lively woodworking forum; I learned a lot posting answers to people's questions; even so far as to go to the shop to try out and verify what I thought would work would in fact work.  Tedious, but helps you learn quickly.  Just never become part of the "Internet echo" that repeats the same tired nuggets of advice that may or may not have ever been verified.

Thanks, Marc!