I could only work half the day today as I have a major case of jet lag… To give you an idea how tired I am, I came home too tired to sleep and almost watched C-Span. Still can’t believe there is a C-Span II.

The attendance in Atlanta was spotty, I am not sure about the value of big trade shows anymore…my local connection of friends suggested it was a poor show for sales.

I left Atlanta encouraged regarding the JMP. There was very strong interest from power challenged countries and we are going to ship units to India, Bahrain, Guatemala and one other country I can’t remember at the moment. These are all for programs to put people to work in the tourist industries so I am excited to see where this leads. Also sending a couple of units to Britain. So in many ways the word is getting out. Everybody liked the internet videos that Michael produced in our office and we plan to do another one this week.

I did get a chance to talk at length with yet another internet woodworking expert who has changed his views regarding the JMP after seeing it work. Amazing what first hand knowledge will do for opinions.

Japan was simply exhausting. I couldn’t sleep, the toilets scared me (and I played ice hockey for 20 years…I would rather get hit in the face with a puck (again) than sit around and find out what those toilets do.)  The language barrier was no big deal, cutting wood is easily understood, and many of the visitors spoke English. The JMP is an ideal tool for shoji screen work and I want to make a video demonstrating this capability. The people were very warm, excited and enthusiastic and just like in the States, nobody could believe the quality of the cuts. We have several customers in Tokyo and couple of them stopped by to say hello which was great.

As expected, the food was fantastic.

Tomorrow I will let the cat out of the bag and introduce Commemorative Tool 15–stay tuned.

–John