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First Delivery:  It was a long, hard road, but we managed to mostly finish Kevin's cabinet and get it delivered in time for Christmas.  There's still work to be done, for sure, but the goal of letting his kids pound on it first thing Christmas morning was met.  Here's some of what we did to accomplish that goal.

Kevin's Note:  Some of the pictures taken at John's place look like crap.  I wanted to blame the fluorescent lighting or some strange spiritual anomaly, but it turns out that I just had my camera set wrong.  Yeah, I'm an idiot.

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Arthur's control panel was complete on the outside... ...but the inside, while really cool looking, still had no wiring. So Arthur begins that process... ...and eventually gave himself a nasty blood blister.  Injury number two, I think.
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When last we left Kevin's control panel, it looked like this, minus the black t-molding on the front. John begins to punch holes in the beautiful thing. This is some ultra-compulsively clean drilling right here, my friends. Buttons without joysticks would suck...
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...so we cut a place for them. Then drilled holes for them to "mount," as they say in the business. Ah.  Two joysticks. This is about 1/3 of Kevin's control panel, still without any wiring.
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Meanwhile, back at the shop, there's work left to be done. We're not sure what it is, though. Oh yeah, this is one thing.  Kevin is measuring for his front door. Kevin is still measuring.
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Ah, now he gets to cut his door.  He's never used a "roto-zip" saw like this. But it turns out that he didn't do half bad. We loaded up Kevin and Arthur's shells. Kevin's is en route to John's house, then Arthur's to his house.
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They have to do a lot of work to Kevin's before it can be taken and "hidden" at Kevin's house for Christmas. The monitor installation was...interesting.  It's an 80-lb. 27" beast, and we had to custom weld some brackets for it (top and bottom.) But there it is.  Mounted. And here's the control panel mounted with the bezel to the side and the front door open.
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We made some final software adjustments before delivery. ...and on Christmas morning, 2003, Kevin's kids got to play. Here, they're warming up on some Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.  4-player action is forthcoming! This is what it was all about for Kevin.
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All four kids can play, if they want.  Here they're actually playing a regular PC game, "Operation Krabby Patty" from the Spongebob collection, using the trackball. Brittney is tired of the incessant photography. Kevin tied up the kids so he could practice his hot Street Fighter EX 2 finger action. He thinks that his body language may actually improve "mad skillz".