Today, our offices are closed to celebrate the 4th of July. We are very fortunate at Hammock to work with a client -- the National Society Daughters of the American Revolution -- (the DAR) who provides us with the opportunity to celebrate the founding of our America 365 days a year. Here's a five-minute video about Gen. John Knox and a special exhibit at DAR Headquarters. I put it together last week while in D.C., my "second" home.

Okay. I'm not actually "on assignment," however I'll be writing about my next few days for an article appearing in American Spirit next year. I'm doing wood therapy. As I'll be working with sharp objects, I'm going to avoid most distracting devices during my time out of the office. However, if you need to reach me, you can contact Natalie Willis (nwillis[AT] hammock.com).

I'm back in the office. Rested and relaxed from a week at the wonderful John Campbell Folk School in Brasstown, N.C. It may not sound "restful" to spend about ten hours a day for seven days making a loopback Windsor chair, but to me, it was enjoyable and, at times, inspiring. And, as usual when I have time to experience something completely new, I see the connections I never imagined before. While the trip was completely personal and off-duty (I even joked that my going offline was an experiment in being NeoAmish), Jamie Roberts assigned me a writing assignment related to it for an upcoming American Spirit. I also took plenty of photos and video. In fact, here is a set of photos on Flickr that follow the progress of the chair I made.

I hate to say it, but today is Patrick Ragsdale's last day as director of hackology at Hammock Inc. His actual title was something other than that, but I could never remember the official one. As Patrick touched about everything in the office that plugged in -- and knew how not to get shocked while doing so -- he'll be missed.

We've known for several weeks that he's leaving to take a job more focused on his lifelong love of tying string between Campbell soup cans -- or something like that. During the past few weeks, Patrick has helped us put together the support resources necessary to keep our technology up and running and we feel confident that when we arrive at work next Monday, everything will boot up properly. We'll be announcing other tech-related developments in the coming months, as well.

We wish Patrick all the best. We'll miss you. But we'll keep up with you on your blog.