Meet Rob Johnstone

Rob. How long do you think we've known each other? I told you, I was gonna start with the question. Gotta be at least 20 years. Yeah, I, I was trying to spitball in 2025. So I am very happy that Rob Johnstone is here, Rob and I have clearly known each other for a really long time. Um And one of the things we were both in the magazine industry when we met and I remember we were at some event and kind of chatting it up like this and somebody said, like the, the vendor, the manufacturer said, I'm surprised you guys are so friendly and not like more competitive. But um it's just kind of been that way all along helping each other out. It's uh it's not exactly a dog eat dog kind of business. So, and I'm very glad about that. So, um, Rob is an excellent woodworker. He's actually formally trained as a luthier, which is not a religion yet. Um And before I go to a story on your bio, why don't you just tell the folks at home who you are and what you do and as kind as it relates to this stuff. Yeah, I, like I said, Rob Johnstone, I had a, my dad had a family uh woodworking business. I grew up there. I was the cheapest piece of labor that he had. I was a standing boy for many years lifting a porter cable rou uh belt route, belt belt, sander, belt sander. That probably was the freight trade one, the freight trade one that probably weighed about 25% of my body weight. From there. I went on to uh become a hospital corpsman. And then from there, I went back to work for my dad. And then I decided to go into business for myself. And at some point I saw a advertisement for a custom woodworking uh magazine and I thought I can do that. And so uh I got into the publishing business first with how to books, then with uh woodworking magazines. I was at Woodworker Journal for 26 years and now I'm working with George again. George worked for me. Now I'm working for him. One of the things I'm so happy to have Rob in here for is that I um this is I tell this joke all the time, but it's only halfway a joke. My hand tools live behind a plate of glass that says in case of emergency break glass, Rob is a much better versed hand tool person than I. So he's gonna do a bunch of hand tool stuff you can watch for and then also too on the finishing side, we wwgo a get so many questions about finishing and I always kind of remove myself from it because I'm like, my approach to finishing is an HB LP gun and a jar of Lacquer and I'm very good at that. Um, but you're gonna bring some new stuff to us on finishing as well. Yeah, I'm gonna try to show you how to get really good professional results without using a sprayer and without being a professional and without being a professional. Yeah, because let's face it, neither of us are. And, um, the other thing is wipe on finish is something that's very easy to do in the confines of a home shop. So you have a lot of cool stuff to look for coming from Rob, a whole video series that we're about to shoot. Um, so Rob, I, I am thrilled. We finally got you here and, um, we're gonna look forward to some fun stuff. I'm excited too. Let's see what we can do. Cool.