It has been ages since I last posted. I wont get in to the reasons for it right now. Lately I have been working on a project for next years Halloween fun.

A few years ago I built a “Lightning Box” based upon a color organ circuit, and a halogen flood light. The unit works, but is a bit clunky, and relies upon an external CD player boom box unit I bought at the Dollar store for $5. The whole contraption definitely could use some re-working.

The current plan is to make the unit fully self contained (with the exception of the speakers) and solid state. The C player will be replaced with a audio player circuit I located that is based upon the ATTINY85 processor. I also plan to remove the amplifier board from a set of old computer speakers, combine that board with the audio player, and then feed the amplified audio into the color organ as well as the speakers. This entire collection of hardware should be able to be housed in a standard Carlon 4×4x4 PVC watertight junction box. More on that later…

I have attached a picture of the working prototype Audio board.

Gordon and I found ourselves at the Kendall Pub tonight. Our friend Steve was scheduled to play, but unbeknownst to us they also scheduled a bagpipe & drum group as well. Poor Steve. The bag pipers were great, We even managed to impress the hell out of them by complimenting them on their rendition of “leaving of Liverpool”. The look on their faces was priceless.

Well, so far the fight count stands at one.

Every so often since Halloween Palley has asked me to get physical pictures made from Halloween.   I kept telling her I would, and decided that I woudl put them in an album and give them to her as a Christmas Gift.  (I thought about doing some sort of scrap book thing, but I know nothing about scrap booking)  So I went ahead and selected all of what I thought were the best pictures from the night and made prints.   I then hunted through half a dozen stores to find what I thgouth was a nice albulm to put them in.   It was nothign fancy, but it was soemthign she had been asking me for.

When she opened it the response was,  “Ohhh! oh good now I can finally get copies made.”   “Uh, if you want extras, let me just re-print them, making copies from the prints is not going to be as good as the original files.” “Why do you need extra copies?”  “Well I told you I want to send them to Micheal.” “No you didn’t.”  “Of course I did, thats the whole reason I wanted them was because he wanted to see them.” “Ok, whatever… I’m pretty sure you never mentioned that though”  “Of course I did, you just have to many things goign on and never remember these things.”  “Whatever” “Oh good grief, don’t start!”

So, turns out she didn’t want the pictures for anything other than to give to Micheal.  Should have known…

As promised, here is the post about the party. Before I get into details, I would again like to thank capnjake for picking me up, and returning me safely to the hotel.
We arrived shortly after nine to a party that was in full swing. The party officially stated at eight, and neither of us wanted to be among the first there. As we were getting organized and ready to head in we were met by our host, the one and only Bilgemunky. We then headed in and met with the guests inside the door. A few seemed familiar, and it turned out they were. Most were people I’ve met through the Port Washington Pirate Festival. capnjake and I then proceeded to fill our mugs. He had brought along ingredients for a special concoction that was extremely tasty. While our beverages were being concocted, I felt a gun shoved into the small of my back. I didn’t give it a second thought, or even a reaction at all frankly… (Yeah, I’m not normal) The owner said, in a very familiar voice, “See, the man has a gun to his back and doesn’t even flinch…” I responded with, “Why would I, when I knows I got nothin’ ta worry bout from the man whats holdin’ it.”

Bartholomew Grogswiller and John T. Hawser

I then turned to greet my good friend Ian, and his wife Chris. The four of us made full introductions once again, to make sure everyone was acquainted. At this point we were hit up for pictures, a strangely frequent occurrence when Ian and I are together. Ian, Chris and I wandered the party together most of the night. We talked of a great many things, past, present, and even planned a few events to come.
Later in the night Bilgemunky carved the roasted pig, and many pirates set out to balance out the libations with a little meat.

Bilgemunky and the Pig

After eating, many of us moved out into the back yard to continue our discussions and after a while, it was time for the group photos. I didn’t had my camera up to the collection so I don’t have a copy, but I suspect there will be some passed around at some point.
As the party thinned out a little, with a little prodding from yours truly, capnjake started a shanty sing in the back yard. (He brought songbooks, so it wasn’t like he wasn’t planning it all along ) He started off the night with “Rolling Down the River“, funny thing about that is that song had been stuck in my head since Thursday afternoon, so I actually had a pretty good idea of the chorus and all. He continued with a few other songs, with the other party goers joining in when they could. Ian and Chris were standing next to me and also joined in. After the 4th or fifth song I looked to and said, “What’s next?” He looked back and said, “you could do Ambletown”. “Now?” “Yeah” “Ok…” and with that I launched into Ambletown. I finished to applause, which still dumbfounds me every time I think about it… From there I let the pro handle a few more, then I ended up doing “Long time ago”. Not that this will come as any surprise to any of you that know me, but standing there, singing along, and even leading on a couple songs was the highlight of my night. I really just have a lot of fun with it, and even if I’m not all that great it doesn’t matter as long as it was fun. I think we finished up the singing with Drunken Sailor, which by this point in the night most guests left were. After that we milled about again talking and carrying on until about 2 am, when there was only a few of us left and we decided to call it a night. After thanking our gracious hosts, capnjake and I got back into his car, and he dropped me back off at the hotel.
All in all a fantastic night, and I look forward to next years party

Halloween? What? John, it’s June… Yes, yes it is. I have had an idea for a prop I want to build since the after Halloween sales netted me some faux planters. The idea is to have a skull burst from under the “dirt” of the planter. To do this with enough speed to startle anyone will require theist of pneumatics. Tonight I sat down with my Dremel in hand and built the inner workings. I’m proud to say that as of 10:15 pm I have a basic working prop.
the solonoid I’m using is a low amp model capable of being directly driven from a micro controller. This means I should be able to add in lighting, sound and perhaps even fog all controlled by whatever trigger I wwant.
Muahahahahaha
I’ll post pictures soon.

Happy Birthday the_shantyman, many happy returns.

On this night of nights may all who have felt sorrow and loss find peace and solace.

MUAHAHAHA!!! I opened my mail today and what to my wondering eyes did appear, but a… nope not a miniature sleigh nor eight tiny reindeer… but 2 photos from the Port Washington Holiday parade!

I have scanned them using the low quality scanner I have and posted them. When I get a chance I will be using a better one to get better scans, and will replace these.

The caroling party was a lot of fun. The few pictures I took are up. We sang a lot of songs and I think everyone had a good time. As always there was lots of food, we don’t have a party without gluttony

The caroling also left room for some hijynks including some snowball fights, and a bit of wrestling in the snow by the ladies of Bounding Main.

Today is the day of the Port Washington Christmas Parade. The parade starts at 3:00, and I’ll be leaving to head up there about 9:30. I’m going to be in the parade for the Pirate Festival, then hang out a bit afterwards to hand out flyers, pose or pictures, etc. Not sure what will be on the agenda for the way home, but if anyone on the 94/294 corridor wants to get together, give me a call on the cell, It will be me and the girlfriend.

I stumbled across this song by John McCutcheon today, the version I heard is sung by Robbie O’Connell. Wow, what a tear jerker. I can see a number of you doing this one, in non-faire settings…

Christmas in the Trenches
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Today at the Carolina Renissance Festival, I was given a new name. I am now known throughout the Carolina fair, and probably half a dozen other faires as “Shanty Claus”. This name was given to me by “The Pirates Royale”.
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Ok, so I’m leaving for NC in the morning for the Carolina Renaissance Faire. This weekend’s theme is A Pirate Christmas, puttin’ the tide back in Yuletide…

I find it really funny and in keeping with that humor, my brain came up with the following rewording of a Christmas classic. It’s scary to me that it actually fits the tune…

“Up in the riggin reindeer pause
Out jumps good ol’ cap’n claus
Down from the crows nest with lots of toys
All for our piratey christmas joys

yoho ho ho who wouldn’t go
yoho ho ho who wouldn’t go
up in the riggin click click click
down from the crows nest with cap’n nick

First comes a barrel for first mate Bill
Oh, dear Captain, don’t you spill
Give him some rum thats good and fine
We’re all tired of hearin’ him wine

yoho ho ho who wouldn’t go
yoho ho ho who wouldn’t go
up in the riggin click click click
down from the crows nest with cap’n nick
”

I know… scary… very scary… Thank god, thats all for now… I fear I may wake up with the rest of it though…

[Edit: 7:30 a.m.] It seems verse 3 was actually pretty close to being written for a pirate anyway so a couple of changes and poof…

Next comes the sea chest of gunner Will
Oh, just see what a glorious fill
Here is a pistol and a boarding axe
Also a cannon and a whip that cracks

yoho ho ho who wouldn’t go
yoho ho ho who wouldn’t go
up in the riggin click click click
down from the crows nest with cap’n nick

Ok gang, you asked for it. Here are the photos I managed to snap, not great but they will have to do. The 1st page or two are of pre-halloween prep. Jump in to page 2 for the stuff taken on Halloween itself.
Some of my personal favorites as the following shots:
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It’s the big night.
A huge thank you to Stacia, Christopher, and Zack all their help. We had good weather, good weather is usually both a blessing ad a curse. When there is good weather, more people tend to travel other places it seems. When we have bad weather, or a threat of bad weather, we get a larger turn out. It’s weird.
The new talking skull, and monster in a bush were hits. The giant skeleton puppet is always a huge success, and had many return visitors. I had to pose for tons of pictures and had conversation with a number of kids. I still cant get over all the kids that stare up to theskulls head, and hold up their candy buckets to show the skeleton their haul.

Humanoid Trick or Treaters: 348
Canine Trick or Treaters: 5

Yes we do give out dog treats to the dogs that come too. We even had one show up that remembered it from last year, last year he was very skittish about approaching the house, this year he happily took the treat and guarded it. The owner laughed heartily, and said “Oh he remembers you from last year when he got a treat so we had to come back”

I also got growled at by a wiener dog named Odie who was protecting his family from the big giant skeleton. After a minor correction he was content to let me continue talking to them.

Tomorrow: Pack things back up and put them away for another year.

So, while trying to recover today I was bored… So I managed to finish the look of the skull. Hot glue, moss, and a little stain and wow!

Oh and since last I posted, I painted the pedestal using Juli’s techniques.

Thanks very much to . I now have four fully stoned tombstones. Opinions?
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Today I was able to make a lot of progress on the new props for Halloween. I managed to carve 2 more tombstones, and make some serious progress on the Talking Skull. The tombstones, except for one more, are all carved and their fronts are painted. I have attached the wood I will use to mount the stakes using Liquid Nails adhesive. Tomorrow night I hope to paint the back sides of all of the tombstones, then later in the week lifeonwry is going to help me make them look like stone.
The talking skull prop made a quantum leap today, thanks to a shopping trip last night with my lady. I have been struggling with what I was going to mount the skull on. Last night while at Target, we found a Halloween urn. I saw it, and knew I had to have it, it was perfect. Once I had it I knew I needed a platform to go in it to attach the skull. I made a trip to the hardware store, and forced my brain to reject things for what they were designed for and to look at them as “legos” so to speak. I knew I needed something able to support the weight of the skull, and yet be made of a material I could work with. I decided PVC would be the best bet, and wandered the plumbing isle. I found a flush mount toilet flange, and knew I had exactly what i needed. I stopped in the paint area picked up some mis-tint paint in the approximate shades of grey I needed. When I got home, I checked the flange in the urn and it was an exact fit. I drilled a hole in the center, mounted the skull and knew I had what i needed. I then disassembled it and gave the flange a good coating of black paint.
Later I drilled a couple holes through the urn into the flange to allow for 2 screws to hold it securely in place, and then attached some LEDs for up lighting. It’s really coming along.

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Ahoy ye scurvy lot! The bell’s been struck, and `tis now International Talk Like A Pirate Day! Anyone with plans best be sharing em, or I’ll keel-haul ya!

Ok, perhaps a bit morbid of a title.. but oh well, I’m feeling kinda morbid.
I give you Dentist Brown.

Stranger tread
This ground with gravity.
Dentist Brown
Is filling his last cavity.