Square Tables from Round for Dummies - The Freelance Files MMCCXII

round table with apron

Another day, another freelancer pretending to know how to build a table in order to collect ten bucks from the nice people at eHow.com. Will wonders never cease... Rhetorical question: of course they won't! So, once more into the breach: here's today's nominee, a sometime clown who goes by the handle of A.W. Ellison (also known as Bill Ellison), who once visited the dreck known as "How to Convert a Round Table to Square" on eHow. Today, it resides at HomeSteady.com.

Forced by eHow's masters (Demand Media) to write an introduction to his post, Ellison opined that, "A square table is made from a round table for a variety of reasons." We disagree, but, then, we don't have theater degrees. Be that as it may, we understand how a table is constructed; A.W. apparently didn't. We say that because Bill instructed his readers to construct a square on the tabletop, using the leg positions as a guide, and then

"Use the saw to cut along the four straight lines that form the square."

That'd be all well and good if Ellison,

1. Hadn't specified a "Circular electric saw" and "tape measurer" as tools
2. Hadn't suggested that, "If the legs are flush with the edge of the table, they can be removed and repositioned..."
3. Hadn't forgotten that a table has an apron... if he'd ever realized it.

The staff discussed his post and came up with the following notes:

1. Clearly, Ellison knew nothing about woodworking tools, so what was he doing writing instructions?
2. Gee: wouldn't that repositioning bit be part of the process? Sure it would!
3. A round apron would pretty much make it impossible to turn the table into a square; a square apron would certainly make the layout process easier.

No, about the only useful instruction our Dumbass of the Day passed along was how to construct a square from the position of the legs, and that wasn't in his "references" at all. In fact, the only thing in his sole citation was a PDF of a folding banquet table – and it was neither round nor square. Duh.

DDIY - FURNITURE