Bringing Home The Gold!

Well, this may poove to be a very boring blog for you all, but its not my fault that you read it. This is about my trip to the Provincial Skills Competition in Winnipeg, here I took part in the Cabinetry competition, where only the gold medal winner gets to move on to the next competition, Nationals.

Was I expecting to win, maybe. I was expecting to place in the top three, I know myself and my abilities as a crafts-men in the field of carpentry, I knew I'd do well. Of course, I didn’t know how well my fellow competitors knew they’re trade. I assumed they would all be as varied as my class mates here in Thompson, turns out I was correct. Yeah for TraV. Any who.

The competition. I show up at Red River College, I was directed to the south Gym for registration and opening ceremonies, I got lots of really cool free stuff which I’ll mention later. I was only in the Gym for five minutes, when someone calls my name..."Travis Hobbs!!" Im like, "ahh...hello?" He told me that my competition had started and that I was late and making them wait, I quickly told him that I was directed here by someone else in charge. He was like, oh well then, lets go. So I gathered together my hundred pounds of tools and gear and followed the man on a very long journey through the school. We came to the shop where the officials were already explaining the competition and my fellow competitors were all set up to start. I was not. I quickly made my way to the back and listened to the end of her speech. It began. I had no trouble getting under way and in the first ten minutes I was already in the lead as far as things accomplished. This lead only lasted an hour as we made our way into the joints part of the project. We were expected to make a drawer. This drawer had many expectations, four of were different joints. One was to be a hand cut Dove Tail joint. This was hard and it hurt Trav, tendinitis of the shoulder was hurting Trav. The others were simple, haha, not so but not so hard. There was a Dowel Joint, Lock Joint, and a Rabbit and Dado Joint. This is what took time and skill. Here I seen the other guys messing up, breaking joints, badgering they’re wood and making things that don’t qualify as a joint that I know of. So, this encouraged me. The competition dragged on, three hours, fatigue and frustration started to set in on some, but not on many. I was beginning to believe that I would finish in the allotted time. At three hours and forty five minutes or so, the first guy had finished, I was shocked and figured like everyone else that he would win. Of course, this could not be confirmed since we were not aloud to talk. I finished my box with satisfaction fifteen minutes later and began to twiddle and pick at it till it was perfect as I could have it be with what I had at hand. I did not think it a gold winning project, but I did think it worthy of second or maybe third. I finished and waited for the medals ceremony to begin in a couple hours.

I watched other competition's and cradled my shoulder, changed my shirt and put away my tools. All was going well. I went to the ceremony and met up with the other competitors who were in other skill testing competitions from Thompson. We waited through the awards ceremony as they made they're way through all the competitions. Bailey, a girl from power mech was called up for a silver medal. We were all proud of her, she was in a work health and safety competition. Not to difficult, but requires lots of study. She did well. As they made there way on to the final awards I heard them announce Cabinetry and I perked up. They announced bronze, then silver and neither were me, thus I was disappointed and thought, great... I didn’t even place! They announced the Gold Medal Winner...."Ch-rae-vise Ho-besy?, no wait that’s Travis Hobbs from R. D. Parker Collegiate (how could you pronounce my name wrong??), I made my way up on stage and stood at the top of the podium. The guy who finished first never even placed. There, I was thanked in front of the six hundred people in the crowd for coming all the way from Thompson to compete. The president of the college made his way over and I bowed to receive my medal and shake his hand, he told me to bring home the Gold! I told him he could bet on it. We got our pictures and made our way over to the professional photographers to get our photo’s done. I was then instructed to go back to the shop because there was more?? So I did, and I was given a check for two hundred and fifty dollars. I was thinking that was pretty sweet. Turns out I was the only one from Thompson to win gold in they’re competition. That was a downer, but everyone kept asking me if I liked fish, I was going to Halifax! Next month that is, being May. I will be gone for six days, expected to spend two full days working on a tool box of some kind, the plans have not been released yet, and even those are subject to change, to throw us off. Im looking forward to that, Im famous!! Well, maybe soon.

I got a $92 set of coveralls...fancy fancy, bracelet, water bottle, T-shirt, check, and a bunch of stuff, like $400 dollars or more by the time it was all done, and the school gave me $72 dollars for meals, that was well used.

So, I brought home the gold for Manitoba, time will tell if I can beat all the other gold medalists of Canada, if I can do what must be done to be the best, and be known nationally as the Best Highschool Cabinet Maker in Canada! Well, we'll see what happens.

Later all,
TraV