Christmas is just racing towards us.  We are hosting the family this year and it is time to get prepared.

Pat and I went out and bought a fresh cut Douglas Fir tree from a farm north of us.  Damn those plastic expensive fake trees cannot hold a candle to this one I am sure.  We are holding off mounting and decorating the tree until many of the kids show up on Dec 22.  We have been attending parties and sing a longs at several of our friend’s homes over the last two weeks where their homes are fully decorated and you can just see Patty twitching to get at it.

Part of the Christmas time with the kids and grand kids will be an escape room from my workshop.  So yesterday I reached a point on the model I am building (a 1798 British Frigate similar to The Diana that Kelly and Dave now own) where I could this is a good point to take a break.  Set it to one side and prepare.

A big part of this is to absolutely clean the workshop from sawdust and whatever.  After all the Escape Teams will be wandering around the basement looking for clues.

But I hit a delay.  Recently Pat and I (on Black Friday) purchased a new 55″ super dupper extra high quality TV to replace the tiny 46″ UHD we currently have in the great room.  Problem is the old TV and the swiveling  bracket we paid so much for 9 years ago is too heavy for Pat and I to manage so we are planning to have the younger guys do this for us when they show up.  We are going to move the 46″ into the den to replace this archaic 34″ that we have there.

Another Problem.  We do not want to use the heavy wall mounted bracket that we paid so much for years ago and just want the TV to sit on its stand.  Now here is the rub.  I apparently threw out the mounting base for the 46″ years ago as it was taking space up in the basement.

So I went on-line to see if I could purchase a base.  Yes you can but $184 US plus $60 shipping.  My clean up was delayed as I had to build a base and mount from stuff in my workshop.  I hope it works.