This past weekend started just the same as many others.  Everyone at the office was talking about their plans for the two days off. My wife called and asked if I could stop on the way home to pick up a few items at the grocery store. I finished a little paperwork and headed out to the car to make my way home.

But, that’s where the similarities ended.  I was actually on my way home to cook dinner for the arrival of a special guest. The Woodworking Show was in town, and Wood magazine’s Jim Heavey had accepted my invitation to come to my house for dinner.

I had made the offer to Jim last year.  “The next time you get to Tampa with the show, you have an open invitation to come over for dinner.”  Just a few words to him last year, but now he was actually coming over.

Unlike other visitors, I knew that the shop was going to be one area that was going to get a visit.  I had spent the past few nights straightening up the shop. Tools that were lingering around from previous projects went away. Wood I was milling was stacked into piles on the bench. The broom and vacuum made an appearance and took care of all of those plane shavings and the sawdust from a busy last weekend of planing and jointing.

That night, after Jim had called to say that he was on the way, I was cooking dinner and starting to fret.  After all, Jim is a very talented woodworker.  He has contributed articles on how to organize shops – what if he looked at my shop and shook his head in disgust? What if he looked at the stack of lumber I was working on and said something bad about the way the work was coming out?  Was I going to get a lecture about my insufficient dust collection setup? I mean, this guy makes DVDs about how to woodwork and set up your shop!

“You are nervous,” my wife observed. Yes, I had become nervous, thinking Jim was going to be critical.

But, I then took a deep breath and thought about Jim’s demeanor.  He’s a really down-to-earth kind of guy who teaches woodworkers to stop talking about every single goof up on a finished project. The nerves faded away just before he had arrived, and when Jim pulled up in his rental car and came in.

It was a great visit.  I resisted the urge to walk Jim out to the shop immediately and get it ‘over with’ Instead, I got Jim a beer and introduced him to the family.  We talked about his flight, the shows, Jim’s service as a firefighter and as a school board president, his grown kids and his grandkids. Both of my sons wanted to tell him jokes.  We laughed politely as the silly grade school humor poured out.

After the dinner plates were put away and while the cherry pie was baking in the oven, the moment of truth came.  I gave Jim a tour of the projects in the house.  The front and back entertainment centers.  The unfinished desk and storage unit in my son’s room.  The Contemplation bench I had built a few years ago. “I remember reading about that on your blog.”

The trip to the shop was just as pleasant.  He told me about how he had set up his shop and mentioned that he liked the way I had mine set. He liked the workbench and was impressed with the two vises I had in the shop.  He was impressed that I had the blade guard and splitter setup on the saw. “This place is definitely you, Tom.  You must have a lot of fun out here.”

Later than night as we ate dessert, we shifted gears to the great basketball games in the NCAA Men’s tournament. Everyone was cheering as the action was taking place, and I was duly impressed by Jim’s knowledge of the game.

At last, the evening had to come to an end.  After all, Jim had to teach the next day.  As Rhonda and I waved goodbye while Jim backed out of the driveway, I had a sudden realization.

Woodworkers are just regular guys and gals.  Each of us has our skills and gaps that need to be filled.  Each of us  has our strengths and weaknesses.  And, we all face our common challenges.

This past weekend, I passed a very notable milestone in my career as a woodworking blogger.

My anti-spam filter caught the 10,000th spam directed at my site!

No, I don’t normally like to write about things not directly – or at least not circuitously – related to woodworking, but this, my friends, is a monumental occasion.

Every day since Tom’s Workbench first opened for business, I have signed in to see a tangle of spam comments caught in the filter like the clotted mats of my wife’s hair I occasionally have to snake out of the bathroom drains.

Increase the size of my you-know-what!  Buy cheap Ambien online! The government is coming to get me!

I can hardly contain my excitement….

Some of the spammers are clever, heaping praise on my writing, hoping I will just blindly approve them with their links.  Here are their comments with the ‘names’ as given to me (BTW – of COURSE I removed all of the links… I care too much about your computers to blindly link you somewhere!):

I had fun reading this post. I want to see more on this subject.. Gives Thanks for writing this nice article.. Anyway, I’m going to subscribe to your rss and I wish you write great articles again soon.

* Cast Aluminum Bistro Set

Dear Cast, thanks for the compliments.  Now, where’s my espresso, barista?

Good day. Initial I need to say that I actually like your webpage, just observed it last week but I’ve been following it since then.

I seem to be to agree with most of your thinkings and beliefs and this post is no exception. I fully

Thank you for the wonderful website and I hope you keep up the good function. If you do I will keep on to browse it.

Possess a wonderful day.

* Americanfridge.net

Fridge… you got my personal motto in there. Carpe Diem – Have in your possession the day.

Other spammers come fishing, looking for me to click on a website in order to weigh in on a topic or a product. Of course, if I click on the link, there’s a good chance my laptop will pick up more viruses than you would get gumming the toys at the end of a day in a daycare:

Hey all,

I’m currently doing research about the general opinion of the iPad. What do you think about it?

It seems like not everyone is thrilled about the iPad. They say the iPad has been hyped too much by Apple and it’s not nearly as revolutionary as they make us believe it to be. On the other hand there people can’t wait to get their hands on it.

What do you think about the iPad and it’s features? I will collect some of the input and write a nice article about it!

* James Denardo

Jimbo – Can’t give you my impressions about the iPad, because I don’t work for Apple and I – like everyone else on the planet outside of Steve Jobs – haven’t actually held one in my hands. However, when Apple does come out with the iRouter, iSaw or iChisel, I’m all over it.

Hey I just wanted to let you know,

* pnömatik

Pno… thanks for the heads-up… I really appreciate it.

Other spammers seem to be speaking in tongues, firing off salvo after salvo of gibberish in an attempt to get as many links to products and services out in one post as possible.  Fer instance…

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* Dekelupgovoy

Dek – Huh? Did you blow up a dictionary or something? Yes, there are plenty of words in the English language.. but you don’t have to use them all at once…

There have suddenly been a run on jokes tagged to the end of spam posts as of late.  While still annoying, at least they offer some comic relief.  For instance:

I have a fresh joke for you, Reporter: Who would I blame if California fell into the Pacific Ocean? Geologist: It would be San Andreas fault.

I have a nice joke. How many letters are in the alphabet? Nineteen. Because ET went home on a UFO and the FBI went after him.

Here’s a good one for today. What do you call a line of rabbits hopping backward in unison? A receding hare line.

Groaners, for sure.  But, at least they are trying…

Fortunately, in this world of full of divisiveness and adversarial relations, it’s good to see people sometimes are in agreement:

All times that I arrive hire, feel me very good. Your site is excelent.

* Leslie Carline

All times that I arrive hire, feel me very good. Your site is excelent.

*  Reyes Dalcour

Leslie, meet Reyes.  Reyes, Leslie. First of all, let me set the record straight… I don’t touch any readers who come to my site.  Never. So, I’m not sure about the allegation of inappropriate touching. Also, not only are they in lock step agreement about the quality of my site, they also misspell the same words!

I’ll keep on putting out that high-quality content, and you guys keep those cards and letters coming…