I'm not sure how I failed to find this during my great miter saw hunt a few weeks ago, but back in 2002, someone named Tom Judkins penned an awesome post to rec.woodworking that goes into how to decide on a particular type of miter saw. His level of detail is terrific, and he includes a lot of tips on how to check whether a saw will cut true, kick your work off of the table, and help prevent injuries. It's worth a bookmark in any woodworker's browser.

The U.S. government might be engaged in a heated debate over the definition of torture, but here in Casa Queso, it's pretty clear that the term includes such things as having to take a weekend trip to Chicago the day after this box arrived as my anniversary present from Shannon:

Seriously, I cannot wait to get that bad boy set up!

After planning enough projects I want to do around the house, and watching enough DIY television, I now realize that it's insane for me not to own an miter saw. Thinking about specs, it seems like a no-brainer that I should get a compound miter saw (in other words, the motor and blade shouldn't just create angled cuts, but should also create bevels by rotating around the front/back axis). But given my two big constraints -- cost and space (we have a tiny basement we use for all our storage) -- I'm not so sure that moving up to a sliding compound miter saw for the extra $400+ that it'd add to the price is all that necessary. I'd love to hear other people's opinions, on whether my assumptions make sense, on brands that would be good for a non-pro weekend warrior like myself, and on anything else that seems appropriate!

Wow, it's been a little while since I did any home improvement -- Shannon and I have been out of town for two straight weekends, and we have long-anticipated visitors this weekend, so our plates have been a little full! But that also means that I've got a bunch of projects on-deck, including something a little ambitious for me: building a new wraparound desk into our wee little study. I've been playing around with designs in Illustrator for the past few days, and I figure I'll have my materials list ready in a few more and then get down to brass tacks (or wood ledger boards!).

In the mean time, I feel like Kevin Kelly has been rocking it with simplicity over at Cool Tools, with the speed square on Wednesday and the magnetic drive guide on Monday. (My confession: after his post on Monday, I bought that magnetic drive guide, had it shipped via Amazon Prime, and have used it a half-dozen times already. I honestly have no idea how I've lived without it for this past ten to twenty years of using a power drill.)

Kevin Kelly's Cool Tools site has another awesome equipment tip today that I feel the need to pass on: DemoBags. Made of tightly-woven plastic fiber, the bags are supposed to hold anything you throw at 'em, and withstand the abuse that's typical of demolition and renovation waste disposal -- which makes them perfect for the 400 to 500 pounds of broken-up concrete that I need to clear out from beneath our backyard deck. I ordered a batch of them from Absolute Home, and I'll let y'all know how they work out!

Kevin Kelly's Cool Tools highlights a tool, a non-contact voltage sensor, that I've found to be invaluable each time I try to figure out the maze of wiring that's tacked up to our basement joists. The one that the site features is the Fluke VoltAlert; when I was stocking up on new-homeowner tools, I went with the GB GVD-504A Circuit Alert, at less than half the price (and eligible for Amazon Prime or super-saver shipping). If you find yourself needing to work with electricity, it's a no-brainer that you need one of these in your toolbox.

When we went down to DC last weekend to get all the painting done, we figured that we'd need a ladder or two for various parts of the work, and Shannon's father was kind enough to put this onto his list of things to drive down. One of the ones he brought was a four-section articulating ladder (I'm pretty sure it was this ClimbTek 12-footer), a kind of ladder I'd seen all over the place but never used. I gotta tell you, I liked it a lot -- pretty light, extremely versatile, and just perfect for the kinds of tasks that end up needing to be done around a small house. I made a mental note of it, but at just over $200, it found its way onto my "when I really need it" (rather than the "as soon as we move in") list.

With this in mind, imagine how happy it made me to see Kevin Kelly's Cool Tools mention a good, sturdy, less-expensive alternative to the ClimbTek today, the Gorilla Ladders 13-foot Multi Position Aluminum Ladder. People seem to talk well about them (they compare more to the $375 Little Giant ladders than they do to the ClimbTeks), and the $99 price is a near-perfect reason to think about moving the ladder onto the "as soon as we move in" list. If I get one, I'll let you know what comes of it!

(And as a postscript, ever notice that "ladder" is one of those words that, the more you say or type it, the more ridiculous it becomes? "Ladder! Ladder. Ladder?")

While we're talking about painting, it seems like the right time to mention the taping-off lessons we've learned over the past few years. Every indoor painting job begins with taping off the room -- masking the ceiling, floor, and trim -- and I'm pretty convinced that putting a little more time and energy into doing the job right means that you actually save time painting and cleaning up afterwards. That being said, it can get a bit tiresome and annoying, so anything that makes the taping-off process easier is welcome in my book.

Shannon and I painted every room in our place in Brookline three years ago, and came to love Scotch Ready Mask painting tape. It's actually an impermeable paper tape that has adhesive on only part of its width, meaning that only one edge sticks to the wall (rather than the entire tape). All I can say is that it worked well -- it created nice edges, and it was trivially easy to get off the wall when we were done. Needless to say, when we started planning our trip down to DC to paint the new house, I grabbed a bunch of rolls and put them into the supply crate.

Imagine my confusion, then, when the tape gave me problem after problem as soon as I started using it in DC! I began taping off our guest bedroom, and within minutes of its application, all the Ready Mask tape came peeling down from the walls. I'm not sure if it was the humidity (DC certainly was more humid last weekend than Brookline was three years ago during our month or two of painting) or if the walls were a bit dusty, but in any event, within an hour we had made a trip to our local Capitol Hill hardware store and come back with good ol' Scotch Blue painter's tape. And while it went on without a hitch, we found that it took the occasional bit of ceiling paint with it when we took the blue tape down -- not ideal, but certainly better than a tape that didn't stick in the first place.

The one bit of painting that we have left (other than touching up the ceiling edges!) is the seven new wood windows that are being put in next week, and I'm not sure which painter's tape I'll use for those. I assume that the Ready Mask tape will stick to the glass better than it did to the walls, but window painting is tedious enough without having to deal with masking problems, so I have a feeling that the blue tape will get the call again... we'll see.