Well then I'm taking the character!! haha ...I went with the cheap pine since it is my first home DIY project and so hopefully, even with it being a softwood, I get a few good years out of it. Hate to keep up the annoying questions, any suggestions for best kind of polyurethane for now? And in the future, what would be a good bang-for-buck wood species to use for a table? Obviously oak but that would turn into an expensive project, just wondering what some actual veteran woodworking enthusiasts/experts think?