DIY Wonderland

On your classic 1-10 scale of DIY it is difficult to rate yourself. I know which end of the hammer to use, have not yet drilled through a pipe and own a tool box. Most of what I have attempted I have pulled off or filled in to look acceptable, I defy any man to be honest enough to give below 5 but neither am I a 10 so I am happy to settle on a solid 7.

We went to Homebase at the weekend I was like a kid in a sweet shop. There was an agenda but as soon as the automatic door slid open to reveal the magical DIY wonderland inside that went out of the window. There is a force like that of dark matter in the universe that is not full understood, that you cannot feel but are aware of it's presence, bought on perhaps by the smell of cut wood and solvents mixed with the testosterone from men around power tools. I can only imagine it's the same force that compels women when high street shopping as it has the same effect on me and I stood staring at the great wall of spanners. A 7 does not mean you like DIY and although I do not hate it I do not love it, what I do love is using the tools. Where else in our world of health and safety can you use 3 extension leads trailing over counter tops in order to drill in to a wall your 90% sure does not have anything else behind it with a pair of old sunglasses and some gardening gloves for protection. The risk is all part of the fun and I think without it it would be like a job and nothing would ever get done. It was with this in mind that I tried to imagine scenarios in order to justify buying a pack of 3 pliers, a set of spanners and some miniature screw drivers.

What we had actually gone for was an end cap to screw on to our recently removed radiators but by this time I was sucked in. In a clever trick of marketing DIY stores always put the best stuff (tools) right as you walk in, in fact it would not surprise me one bit if the cut wood and solvent smell mentioned earlier was not pumped through the ventilation, they then put the dull stuff (radiator caps) right at the back. It took us some time to get where we needed to be as the Big Cheese had to dismiss my attempts at justification as whimsical. With no new tools I had lost interest but with a job to do we looked at the plumbing section with no idea, measurements or bit to compare we did what pretty much everyone else does and guessed. On the way out we pick up some other stuff and took a route that conveniently took us past the tools section where the Big Cheese relented on the set of 3 pliers, £50 lighter we were leaving the shop.

There was no possible way to use my new pliers to fit the radiator caps, I tried, and the caps did not fit. It took another trip down the road to the best shop in south London (that is another post) to get the bit we actually needed, they fitted and we were full of triumph. It was not until we filled the water pressure back up that the water started leaking from another joint and despite the best efforts of me with my new pliers it was not going to stop. Well I can't very well do it I said I changed it the first time, so with a sigh the phone conversation went something like this.

Big Cheese
"Hi Connor, we know we asked you to come Friday but is there any chance you could come tomorrow"
Connor (plummer)
"Yes that should be fine"

Problem fixed.