Monday, October 22, 2007

DiY WTF

I'm not very handy. We have like 942 broken stuff scattered about house and property and the one in our family with any "skills" is too busy taking care of kiddos, etc, etc to pick up her fancy cordless, chuckless something or other. Actually she does pick it up once in a while... to admire it. Anyway, my point is that I am not handy. In addition, I am a wee bit lazy. One may think these fine traits added together form a deadly, less than desirable combination but no. There is a huge upside: cost savings. When you're too lazy to call for someone to repair things, or take things in to get repaired, or to - for example - finally get around to doing something about that missing 4th wall on "the shed" you tend to save a bit of money.

There may be a downside too.

On not-so-handyness from Scott Feschuk's blog (mailbag):
Scott: What is your greatest fear? – D.V., Edmonton
"My greatest fear is a scenario under which humanity is all but wiped out… and I have the misfortune to survive. What a nightmare: it would be so awkward – everyone sitting around divvying up jobs (“I’ll tend to our medical needs”… “I’ll draw up plans for permanent shelter”...) and I’m there with my limited skill set going, “If I really concentrate, I may be able to remember all the words to Sussudio.” That’s why I’m such a fervent advocate for not blowing up the Earth – my chronic fear that, in the dawn of humanity’s rebirth, the stray remnants of civilized society would judge me a burden and either feed me to their mutant bear-dogs or sacrifice me to whatever deity is in fashion at the time on account of my utter lack of useful skills and my ensuing inability to help build anything more complex than an enchilada. Seriously, I honestly have no idea what I could do to help my species get back on its feet. Attention roving packs of scavengers! Do any of your societies require someone to take a regular nap?"

On idleness from Scott Adams' Dilbert Blog...
"My front door makes a maddening squeaky-creaky noise when opened. I could solve that problem by putting a bit of WD-40 on the hinge. Every day, for three years, I have considered doing just that. But every day, for three years, something else seemed more important at that moment. My life is peppered with these little tasks that are just below the threshold of being worth doing. And that threshold is a moving target, depending on how busy I am. At one point in my life, I had a full-time job at the phone company, a full-time job doing Dilbert, and I was writing a book. I think I went four years without getting my car washed. Toward the end, it looked like a divot with an eating disorder. I sold it to a guy who only wanted it for the gravel."

VIDEO Lazy Line Painter Jane by Belle and Sebastian

2 comments:

Kevin said...

Do they sell duct tape in Canada? One can make a wall out of duct tape. And, there's nothing scarier than the sound of duct tape being unrolled.

mesmith said...

Oh yes, we have duct tape here. We probably invented the stuff. I've used a lot of it trying to patch up a slide but the rain tends to break the stuff apart. Maybe i'll try masking tape - no?