I’m not sure why we call them rabbit trails, but we do. It might have to do with the way rabbit trails seem to go all over and go on and on so that finding your way back is a monumental task. Or perhaps it has to do with falling down the rabbit hole in Alice and Wonderland. Everything is different and you have no idea where you are and how do you get back. In either case, that’s where I was this weekend for sure. It started simply and innocently with a need for a pencil holder. And it just grew from there.
I have a 3D printer that I bought several years ago. I had quite high expectations of using it then and only ever printed out one or two of the demo prints that came with it. It has mostly gathered dust and taken up space until this year. As you might recall a couple of months ago I finally figured out how to set up and use a 3D print file that was not a demo file, and print something useful. I haven’t really used it since. But it was a start. Now I have a project, and it all started from a conversation about me printing a pencil holder.
I have a set of pens that came in a great holder that spins and has them all set out so you can easily see which one is which. It’s great. It takes up too much space. I wanted something different to put them in. The last time I made a pencil holder I used Lego Bricks. I don’t have that many anymore and certainly not the sizes that would make building another pencil holder possible. But I have a 3D printer. No I didn’t print Lego Bricks. Though…Sorry, a thought ran off with me. Back to the pencil holder. I went online to Thingiverse and found a couple of options for a pencil holder that I liked and could print. I downloaded the files, did some scaling, did the slicing, and holy cow it’s going to take over 13 hours to print. Good thing it’s Friday.
This was all I really planned to do at that point. Print my pencil holder. And then a conversation with my manager for my day job. We were discussing the Aerogarden and I brought up how the spikes that you use to grow things in often have to be cut and disposed of when you decide to pot the plants that have gotten too big because the root systems are quite robust and I don’t want to damage the roots if I can avoid it. My manager, after hearing about my printing and this problem suggested that maybe someone had made a replacement for the spike that wasn’t like that. And off I went.
Yes, it turns out someone has designed a root-saver replacement and put the files on Thingiverse. Which meant that I had a new project after my pencil holder finished printing. I’ve printed out a test of the spike and it looks like it’s going to work like a charm. I’ve found a couple of other helpful bits like a plug that covers the empty holes when they are not being used. I showed one of the plugs to my Mom and she said it looked like a character from the movie “Batteries Not Included”. Then she wanted to know if I could paint eyes on them, the plugs. And off I went again.
So a couple of bits of particulars for those who are curious. I bought my printer through Monoprice several years ago. They still sell either it or a similar model. My print area is 200mm x 200mm x 180mm and the printer only has one print head. I am printing with PLA filament, it’s a plant based plastic that is non-toxic and has little if no fumes when printing. The converting, or slicing software I’m using is Cura. I had to custom setup my print settings in it probably because the version of the software I have is considerably newer than my printer. My printer is the equivalent of a RepRap if you know what that is or was.
The printing really did consume my weekend, which is probably good because the rest of my week wasn’t that interesting for writing about. I’m still studying. I’ve made some progress. The approach of rewriting the notes I took seems to be helping. It may have been a punishment in school to have to write lines over and over again, but in this case it is really helpful and I feel like I’m finally grasping some things. So I’ll be continuing to try variations of re-writing my notes to help with the studying. It may not be the most efficient way to most people but it is the repetition that I find works best. And that makes sense. It’s like playing scales over and over and over, or doing kicks over and over, or forms in Taekwondo. I have done those things so many times that it often takes little thought for me to go through any of those if asked.
I had planned to get to the more creative and fun things this weekend and didn’t. Best of intentions and all of that. I’ve still got plans to work them in this week. I’m thinking maybe a guitar lesson or two for my lunch hour and donut work one evening after Taekwondo class. That should work. And maybe some work on a digital art piece I’ve started in Procreate on the iPad. It was inspired by my nephew.
That’s the exciting stuff for this week. As you can see, there’s no telling what I’ll be getting up to from week to week. Join me again next week to find out what adventure I fall into this week.
