In message 01BBFE4D.9BB88A40@w...you write:
>I'm a 33 year old father of three (6 week old girl, 3 year old boy, 6 year 
>old girl).  I spend most of my waking hours under the employment of 
>Tektronix.  I grew up in south western VA, but relocated to OR three years 
>ago after receiving my Masters of Computer Science from the University of 
>VA.

Welcome aboard - I'm just finishing off my Ph.D. in C.S. - I've found
these the most productive woodworking years yet...

>After finishing my bench I hope to sell my benchtop table saw and buy a bow 
>saw with the proceeds.  I'm sure I'll have some questions for the group as 
>the bench proceeds.

Ooh....Save your money.  Build the bow saw.  Dirt simple, and blades are
easy to find - a good sharpenning and blade shop will sell them to you
for about 10 cents an inch.  I posted something a few days ago on how to
put a saw together which I can drop you again if you like - it takes
about an hour (including the minuscure amount of metal work, which only
requires a hacksaw and a drill) and the result is very satisfying.  Same
thing goes for marking gauges and panel gauges - really quick and
immediately useful.

And besides, someday someone will show up at your shop with a church
full of pews to give you, and you'll regret not having a tablesaw or
bandsaw to rip the damned moldings off the top of this great lumber.
(True story, except that I had to pick up the pews myself - white oak,
about 800 usable BF, it was a small church.  Been using a lot of oak
lately...)

As for planing elbow, can't say I've ever had that, although I've
buggered my wrists morticing with an under-weighted mallet (mind you
that really agravating a previously existing condition of key-board
wrists).

	Paul

 Internet: lalonde@c...
 Web: http://www.cs.ubc.ca/spider/lalonde/homepage.html

"On ne voit bien qu'avec le coeur, l'essentiel est invisible aux yeux"
                                - Antoine de St.-Exupery