Getting Close / Stupid Hurts

There's a glimmer of light at the end of the proverbial tunnel. And routers are nothing but raucous, 30,000 rpm implements of death and destruction.

I spent a good part of yesterday laying out and drilling holes to for the draw-bore pins in the 12 mortise-and-tenon joints and routing the tracks for the wagon vise and a sliding jack located on the front of the bench. Things were going swimmingly until my lack of an attention span bit me.

I had layed out a 5/8" wide by 1" deep by 42" long track on the underside of the benchtop and just finished setting up my plunge router (which I hate using due to noise, mess and just being a general hazard to anyone within a 15 foot radius) to make the cut. I went through the mental checklist I run through when using these cursed machines...
-bit/chuck tightened correctly?
-cord out of the way?
-guides set up correctly?
-unobstructed path?
-saftey glasses/ hearing protection? / respirator? (yeah, I wear a respirator when I make a significant amount of sawdust as I'd like to continue woodworking down the road)
-router positioned correctly?
-good grip on machine?

Looks good, lets do this. Turn it on... Click - Whhhiiinnnneee - CHUNK - JUMP - "%&?! %##&*! !@)#!"

Next I went through the mental checklist I go through when I do something incredibly stupid:
-concious?
-tool turned off?
-feeling in extremities?
-bloody spray/gushers?
-digit count?
-what hurts?
-what did I just muck up?

Nothing huts. All digits accounted for. No new red stains on the workpiece or myself.

Thankfully, I was able to get through the "did something stupid" checklist with the only consequence being a chunk cut out of the front face of the bench top. When adjusting the depth of cut prior to switching on the tool I must have gotten a little bit of grit or dust in the plunge mechanism and the router didn't fully retract prior to me beginning the cut. When readying things for the operation I had placed the machine down onto the workpiece, resting on the soon-to-be spinning bit instead of the bottom of the router base. When it was switched on, the bit spooled up, dug into the surface of the bench, and skitted the machine across a path of destruction before I had realized what was happening and able to turn the thing off. Good thing I had a good grip on the tool prior to switching it on.

I've only had to go though this checklist a couple times and hopefully don't need to in the future. I was pretty steamed at just putting a giant idiot mark on the front of the bench as I'll be looking at it for the next couple decades, but perhaps it will serve to be a constant reminder to slow down and focus on what's in front of me. Ugh.

After I had cooled down and thanked my stars that the chunk was taken out of the benchtop and not my person I assembled the base as a trail fit. Looks pretty good!

I spent an hour last night cutting oak pins to assemble the base and hope to have the bench fully assembled, minus the vises, by the end of the weekend!

Apparently, a review solely of woodworking activities is insufficient in a blog post. The fam is doing fine. One of Nisha's work colleagues loaned us a walker type thing while squirt transitions from quadraped to biped. She's really starting to get the hang of things... this stuff happens so fast!

We're looking forward to seeing everyone over the holidays!