(Don’t) Do It Yourself

Elaine Viets

I love fiction. Especially Eric Stromer’s do-it-yourself TV show and videos on AOL.

I’m sure Eric is a capable handyperson who can fix a gurgling toilet, pour concrete and paint a room with one hand tied behind his back.

But something is missing on those shows.

It’s not Eric’s looks. He’s country-boy cute. The handymen I’ve encountered in Florida range from a sweet-natured gentleman who looks like a Hispanic Pillsbury Dough Boy, to a grumpy Russian who resembles a bear with a cigar.

It’s not Eric’s style. He explains each project in steps so simple even I can follow them.

I believe Eric, too. When he says, "It’s very simple to do" I want to break out my pathetic tool kit, which includes a set of freebie screwdrivers from Omaha Steaks, and remodel my condo. I’m finally starting to understand that "it’s very simple" is the DIY version of "I’ll respect you in the morning."

Here’s what bothers me: I’ve never seen Eric Stromer knock over a paint can, whack his thumb with a hammer, cut a tile pattern in the wrong shape, or make any other DIY mistake. Also, he never cusses.

My father was a DIY type. Not a very good one, but he did the household repairs with the help of a few six-packs – and I’m not talking about his abs. While Dad fixed things in the bathroom or the basement, I learned colorful words that were not taught in the Bluebird Reading Group at school.

Did Dad make DIY mistakes? You bet. But he risked life and property to fix the sink and paint the door. It was the manly thing to do.

My husband, Don, has too much sense to engage in home repair projects.

Not me. I grew up with three brothers, and I know I am just as good (or bad) as any man. Therefore, I try to fix things I should leave to the professionals.

Two weeks ago, we had new hurricane windows installed in our condo. The workers did a fine job, but they didn’t do the touch-up painting around the new windows. We could have hired someone, but I decided to paint it myself. Any idiot can wield a brush, right?

Yep, I was the DI – the Designated Idiot. The work had to be done quickly. A German newspaper reporter wanted to interview me. I had to get the touch-up work finished before she arrived. I raced through the house in a frenzy of cleaning and dusting. The dying plants in the ornamental pots were replaced with new victims. The bathrooms were scrubbed. Then I did the touch-up painting.

It was easy. The dark-brown paint went on thick and smooth as melted chocolate. I’d spread newspapers on the floor, to catch any drips. The painting was finished in about half an hour. Quick, easy, simple.

I knew better than to pour the excess paint down the kitchen sink. I did that last time. It ruined the garbage disposal. The plumbing repairs cost more than a professional painter.

Nope, I cleaned the brush in a glass jar, then threw out the jar. I put the lid back on the can and stuck it in the storage closet. Later, when I opened the door, the paint can dropped out and the lid fell off, spreading thick, brown paint on the tile floor.

"#$$%," I said, using a word I learned at Daddy’s knee.

It took two hours and every spare rag in the house to clean up the mess. Then I had to repaint the closet door, the floor and the baseboard trim, this time with white paint, which doesn’t make nearly as much of a mess.

While I scrubbed the mess, half drunk on paint fumes, I told myself, "You’re cute, Eric, but you’re dangerous."

Eric’s blog had a bitter sound now. The man actually said, "Doing it yourself is a courageous act that will always force you to come up against yourself and that is the beauty of it."

There was nothing beautiful about it, or my closet floor, Eric. Got any DIY tips for removing brown paint from my cuticles?

Comments

[William Simon]

My father was the original "Mister Fix-It". I was 9 years old before I learned people put cars in a garage; it was always Dad's Workshop. From a Skil-Saw (table version) to a Shop Smith to a set of jeweler's micro-screwdrivers. Woodworking tools, welding, car repair, name the tool and chances were extremely good he had it. Sears-Craftsman was to him what a bookstore is to me. Many weekends were spent learning how to lathe wood, wield a wrench, change a spark-plug.

Now that I'm an adult, I have a list of repair people I keep handy.

And people like Eric Stromer are full of shit..:)

[Lynn]

My daughter's ex-father-in-law is a diy-er. Even though he is disabled now and unable to do all those repairs he says he'll do, he refuses to get rid of any of his tools and keeps getting new ones. There is a path from the garage door to the laundry room door in the garage that you have to be less than 100 lbs. to use. If you want anything from the garage forget it. It was eaten by the tools.

[Hannah]

I just love to be a DIY-er! Last summer i painted the whole set for our theater play.and although i was completely bathed in paint and even though i don't have a single artistic bone in my body it was absolutely fun!
our director on the other hand wasn't too happy with the idea that on the day of our opening night i was climbing on roof tops...and i guess you can understand that since i was playing one of the main characters...

[Nancy Martin]

At the age of five, I was playing in the basement with my Betty Crocker kitchen set when my father--working on some project in his woodshop in the next room---suddenly banged on something and took the Lord's name in vain. You know that cliche "my blood ran cold?" Well, that's exactly how I felt---frozen inside. I was afraid to move for five minutes in case he guessed I was there and had heard him. Even at five, I had a guilt complex!

Great blog, Elaine! Sorry about the paint spill.

[Harley]

Elaine, did the Bad Brown Paint Incident occur before or after the German newspaper reporter?

This is such a nightmare. I'm a DIY, but ONLY if it involves paint. No tools, other than a hammer to hang the occasional picture. I went way out on a limb last month and bought spackling compoud to fix the nail holes acquired from changing my mind about where the pictures should go, and also because I do a whole other picture rotation during Christmas, to complement the decorations. I have a lot of holes in the wall and I was beginning to worry they were a metaphor for what was going on in my brain. So I spackled them and painted them.

But I don't do screwdrivers or pliers or any of that nonsense.

[Josh]

Don't your pictures fall off the wall when you have earthquakes? I picture California as being one big tschoke-free zone, since everything would fall and break.

But, of course, I never sweat the small stuff.

[Elaine Viets]

You bought spacklng compound, Harley? You are way more advanced than I am. For the first 10 years of our marriage, we lived in rented apartments, with white walls. Toothpaste filled in those holes nicely and lasted until we got the deposit check cashed.

[Sheila Connolly]

I can't remember my father fixing anything, but then, we rented a lot. My husband, on the other hand, thinks he can fix anything (he's right about 75% of the time, but the other 25%... Plus he's cheap and doesn't want to ask someone else to do something).

Painting tip I have discovered only recently: wear latex gloves when you paint. Your hands may get sweaty, but your cuticles will be clean.

[michele]

Fun topic, Elaine!

My husband is the best kind of DIY'er -- he fixes the things he can fix and recognizes the things he can't. If he can't fix something, he hires someone who can. He can fix a lot, though. He once repaired the power steering on our car in 10 below weather with no gloves on!

[Elaine Viets]

Your husband is the kind of man who can save marriages, Michele. Smart enough to fix things, and even smarter to know his limitations.

[Maryann Mercer]

Chuck is kind of a perverse DIY-er. He says he'll do it and then doesn't. But, he keeps repeating the "don't worry I'll get to it" mantra until I want to spackle him! That said, he did put in the kitchen cabinets all by himself with minimal damage to himself and none to the oak. We still however have the kickplates sitting in the basement because he hasn't laid the tile. Me? I can tap a hammer and paint a wall, but I'd rather not. I am a klutz.

[Pam aka SisterZip]

Maryann, Dear Hubby is like your Chuck. He is an industrial maintenance mechanic by trade and can do anything. It is just getting him to do it is the problem. We have a 15 year old "new" furnace sitting in our basement. We got a great deal on it but he has never put it in. Never been used....

[Pam aka SisterZip]

Oh, and the outside of my house...3 different colors and they don't all go together.

[Joyce Tremel]

My husband is a do-it-yourselfer-extraordinaire. In 27 years of marriage, I only remember him calling a repairman once. Fortunately, he knows what he's doing. Although in his day job he's an accountant, he builds gorgeous oak furniture in his spare time. Yes, our garage is a woodshop.

[Kerry, The Martial Tart]

My Dad was an awesome DIY-er; it probably had a lot to do with why his original profession was engineering. Unfortunately, he and my Mom had very parochial ideas about gender-appropriate training for kids, so instead of learning all about power tools and construction and plumbing, I learned how to clean. It wasn't until I was in college and working as a theatre techie that I finally got to play with big saws, drills, etc., and realized that, had I had those earlier opportunities, I coulda been a real DIY contender.

As it is, the lack of a garage, lack of time, and a husband blessed with the philosophy that "If something's worth doing, it's worth paying someone to do it right" have turned me into a small-job-only gal (the last thing I managed was reversing the door on my new dryer -- and it even worked!). I don't even paint any more if I can get away without it. I do, however, admire enormously those who can do things like remodel their own kitchens!

[Joyce Tremel]

Also my mother wasn't bad at do-it-yourself, either. She knocked down a few walls in her day. One morning when we got up, we found she'd painted the dining room red overnight.

[Laura (in PA)]

My Dad was incredibly handy, could do anything, and painted and wallpapered for a living. My husband... isn't. I learned a lot from Dad and do all the painting and wallpapering, along with small repairs in our house. I panic if my husband mentions trying to fix anything.

I have a brother who is also quite handy, and a brother-in-law who builds amazing inlaid wood furniture, but they live 200 miles away. I would give anything for the name of a really good handyman in my area, as most things I can't fix remain unfixed.

Wow, Elaine. Chocolate paint spill - that sucks.

[Harley]

I don't personally know any DIY-ers other than you, Elaine. Oh, and one sister-in-law, who lives far away. My family is a collection of highly educated, interesting people who are helpless in the face of leaky faucet or squeaky door.

We all paint, however. I consider that more therapeutic than practical.

[Elaine Viets]

I like painting, Harley. But I'm bad at it. I decided to paint a rusty patio table -- outside on the patio. It was fine, except the cat walked through the paint, and I had to go through the house, clipping little black paw prints out of the beige carpet with nail scissors. There's a DIY hint you don't often see.

[Kathy Reschini Sweeney]

When I was young and foolish, and in lu-uv, I helped re-hab an old house. Never again.

Stripping the woodwork was the absolute worst - the fumes, the mess, the chemicals.

My husband, thank heaven, still loves the DIY projects. Last fall, he re-did the dining room. Everything but the wallpaper. It looks fantastic. The summer before, he built a cedar shed in the back from a kit - way cool - came in pieces.

Me? My idea of DIY is to do my own nails.

[Tom]

Back to the paint-in-the-cuticles question, Elaine . . . when you're gonna get the digits cruddy, you've gotta ask yourself, "WWMD?" -- which is short for "What Would Madge Do?"

Secretly, Madge wouldn't use the green stuff. No. As all bicycle mechanics will tell you, "Only One Goo Is True, And It Is Blue." Dawn is what the professionals use to get the petrojunk out from under and around fingertips.

My experience is that kids (of either gender) need some education in coping with entropy in the world, some screwdriver and wrench time. Hammers and saws can come later. WWMPD (What Would Mrs. Peel Do?)?

And for hanging pictures - Oooks are the best damn things in the world!

[Tom]

And you're not a bad painter, Elaine - you just had a careless apprentice.

[Rita Scott]

I come from a family in construction so picked up alot of DIY sense. My late husband had absolutely NONE. (I told him one night not to use the kitchen sink because I had put enzyme cleaner down the drain. He starts rinsing a dish & when I asked what he was doing, he said he wasn't using THAT side of the sink. I opened the cabinet to show him that the pipes come together underneath. DUH!)
Bob has finished his basement, built decks, remodeled kitchens, pretty much knows how to do it all or can figure it out.
See why he's so attractive to me? LOL

[Mary Storyteller]

Ah, the scent of sawdust still makes me think of my father, building stuff in the basement (no garage). He was truly handy; he and his brothers built the house I grew up in, not perfect, but serviceable. My friends in Tennessee built their house also, and claimed that there wasn't a true 90 degree angle anywhere in their charming home. The floor was made of oak from a tree that died.
I only can fix very small things because my father also thought only his sons should use the power tools, but I do have my little Help-Her toolset for little jobs.
There does seem to be some required vocabulary for manual work. When I was five, I overheard my father and uncle use a word I must have liked. Mom found me rhythmically hitting a stick on a step and chanting, "bastard." She told me not to use that word again and then had a talk with the men about appropriate language use. She had a similar talk with Dad when I sampled his beer at the neighbor's (watching the old black & white TV required a darkened room, so he didn't see). My mom was definitely holding back my "wild side."
About those latex gloves -- (BTW, I've also read that soap under the nails helps cleanup, just scratch across a bar of soap). There are gloves that breathe better than the latex gloves, but still keep the hands clean (not surgically clean, but clean). Light, strong, machine washable. I can't find all the info right now, but this is from the shipping e-mail Business:KRD International
Contact E-Mail:dermasoft@austin.rr.com They aren't cheap, but they claim to be strong and last a long time, and they are comfortable. (I follow up on any alternatives to latex -- darned inconvenient allergy, but sometimes there is a nugget of golden info).

[Pam aka SisterZip]

Oh, and the outside of my house...3 different colors and they don't all go together.