I have been working wood my whole life but am brand new to woodturning. I had a shop set up in Wisconsin for quite a few years that I heated with wood, which provided me with a good use for my scrap. A few years ago my wife and I moved south, and now the scrap has a tendency to pile up. My day job is building wood car bodies, and occasionally some wood boat work, and I always start with a load of rough sawn lumber of at least 8/4 and sometimes heavier. The odd size and shape pieces I use leave me with a lot of cutoffs that it seemed a shame to burn. I tried giving them away but nobody seemed interested. Well, I thought, if nobody else wants to make anything out of my waste, maybe I can. So, I bought a small benchtop lathe and am in the process of collecting a useful set of tooling. The nature of my scrap seems to lend its self more to bowl turning than anything else. so thats the direction I have been going. After grinding a stick or two into dust just to try to get a feel for the tools I managed to turn out a few small bowls. I would show them to you but my wife gave them away.... either because someone else wanted them, or because she didn't, I'm not sure which. In my younger days I would have taken the hard headed brute force approach and figured it out by doing it, but I'm going to try something new and see if I can't benefit from the experience of others. I tend to read more than write, but I imagine you will see my name pop up occasionally.