50-80% of the shit you find at Home Depot for "homeowners" is halfassed bullshit. You can do it but it will suck. It might last long enough to suck for the next guy, but probably not. Physical patching, like drywall and stuff, will work if you do it badly it will just look ugly. Plumbing and electrical will either work 100% or fail eventually. It's worth treating that stuff as if you intend for it to succeed beyond your wildest imaginations. Nearly every task a home handyman wishes to accomplish can be accomplished by a high school dropout with half an hour of training. The exceptions are finish-related, such as tile, flooring, drywall and cabinetry. For finish-related tasks, most people can do a job that looks like it was done by a high school dropout with half an hour of training. In general, the difference between an onerous job and an easy job, between a tedious job and a joyful job, is task-specific tooling. If you are not doing this job regularly, and if you do not want to do this job regularly, it's probably in your interests to hire someone who does this job regularly. There is no aspect of plumbing or electrical that you can't handle yourself. The tools are cheap. However, if it looks like something you'll screw up, trust your gut. Any doofus can put in an outlet or a faucet but my father in law the doofus put in a dishwasher 18 years ago and it's eaten three dishwasher pumps in 15 months. I just spent $1100 un-doofusing it. Because I don't want to learn the intricacies of Johnson Ts, I don't like crawling under my house, and I don't work with 2" PVC pipe very often. A push mower and a power mower require about the same amount of effort to push. The push mower won't mow stubborn dandelions. But if you use a push mower every couple weeks you don't have to buy a power mower. There is no aspect of your plumbing that you can't make worse with Drano. If there's a girl in the house, the shower drain will clog. get used to cleaning it out. Don't expect thanks, just do it. The most likely thing to cost you a new kitchen floor (and probably subfloor) is your ice maker. PUDDLES ARE NEVER GOOD. The thing most likely to send you to the hospital is the ladder. Don't fuck around getting on or off the roof. The second thing most likely to send you to the hospital is your circular saw. The thing most likely to kill you is a combination of ladders and overhead power lines. Cordless power tools, on the other hand, will likely limit your injuries to urgent care and stitches. Keep your yard tidier than the least tidy yard in the neighborhood and don't be the last person to take down your Christmas decorations. Your neighbors are all judging someone and if it's not you, you might even get to know them. Get out a piece of paper. Draw a map on it with your house in the middle. As the opportunity comes up, get the names of everyone in the house next to you on either side, across the street, and if possible on the other side of the fence. You will meet them once or twice a year and if you can remember their names it will go so much more smoothly. Trees and bushes respond well to pruning in the fall or early winter. Cut at an angle so that water can't pool on the cut. Never buy Sherwin Williams paint. Never leave masking tape on for more than a day or two tops. Own many tape measures. Own many sharpies. Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle states that you can never find the sharpie if you're holding the tape measure and vice versa. The only antidote is multiple pairs so that you can overcome quantum entanglement. You don't need a pressure washer? But having a shitty electric pressure washer will allow you to clean things you didn't think were dirty. Having a powerful pressure washer will allow you to overspend on a tool you don't really need. Always take the advice of fellow homeowners with a grain of salt.Any advice or tips for new homeowners?
Congratulations on the new home! And yeah... buy a ladder. One of the "a-shaped" ones that extends, like the Little Giant. And buy a set of battery powered tools. I like Milwaukee. I've built entire buildings with this simple kit. And don't use ANY screw other than a star-drive. There's just no reason to use anything else as a fastener. This kit is a good starter, with a range of useful sizes. And get a home-owner's book. I have the Fix It Yourself Manual, which makes any kind of typical home repair pretty simple and straightforward. There's something about having a book open to the right page, when you are under the kitchen sink trying to figure out how to fix the garbage disposal, that beats a phone or tablet with a YouTube video every single time...
Couple of key things: 1. Camout. This is when the bit jumps out of the head of the screw, and scratches/damages the surface you are working on. It can also strip the screw head. It's almost impossible with star-head screws, but very common with cross-head (Phillips Head) and straight (flat head) screws. 2. Torque/Shear. A lot of people use drywall screws for everything. But it is easy to spin the head off the top of the screw (and leave the shaft in the wood) while mounting your cabinets on the wall. And those cabinets might fall down because drywall screws (and most phillips head screws) don't have much sheer strength, so the weight of the cabinet pressing down on the "neck" of the screw can shear the head off, and your cabinet falls off the wall with all your dishes in it. Star-head screws are (almost universally) made of tougher stuff with head and neck designs that are specifically made to stop shearing and carry those lateral loads better. 3. Standardization. No matter what you choose, standardize on it throughout your house. It is HUGELY annoying to have to use three different bits to remove a single light fixture. If you standardize and just keep one type of screw on hand, you will make and fix things with that one standard type of screw, and your life will get progressively easier over the duration of homeownership. (Related: I just spent an entire day going through my dad's workshop with him, and sorting a dozen different types of nails into a dozen different glass jars, and a dozen different screw types into a dozen other jars... and this man can't even turn a screwdriver anymore, due to age-issues with his wrist joints.) 4. Bits. Star-head screws always come with fresh bits in the box of screws. So you never need to buy another bit, and the ones you have are always fresh and new. It's a little thing, but... it's a big thing. Finally, check out Steve Ramsey on YouTube. He does basic woodworking tutorials, and is great. This is his one about screws that got me on board with this way of thinking:
Don't worry about it overmuch. If you need screws, it will be kinda hard to buy anything else. The philips-head screws are only cheaper in lb quantities while anything a normal homeowner might want is pretty much "proprietary star drive with proprietary drive head in marvelous snap package at price point that seems attractive". Bear in mind that if you're actually loosening and tightening things by hand, star drive are a pain in the ass because if you don't have the exact right driver you can't accomplish shit whereas if you've got a phillips then there's probably four screwdrivers in the drawer that will mostly work.Whats the benefit of star-drive screws?
I run Black & Decker Matrix. They are mediocre versions of every single tool, but they also cost like $40. I have no reasonable need for a zip saw, but I have reasonable need for a $40 zip saw. I use a router about every other year, but every other year I have a $40 router. And the stuff is so cheap and packaged so weirdly that I have like three drill motors, three drills, an impact driver and five batteries. Including some that are supposed to work my weed whacker but will keep a jigsaw going forever. I actually use the dumb thing to compress the air in my casting chamber. Ostensibly that's so I can fill my wife's tires when she has a slow leak but you put a Schrader valve on stuff and suddenly it's useful.
Interesting device and solution! I like it. I just happened to get a great deal on the basic Miwaukee drill/driver set with two batteries and a charger. After that, getting any other tool that fit the same batteries just made sense... and the tools have held up really well over years of moderate use. (I tend to go building-crazy for a couple of months, and then build nothing for several months.)
Yeah you buy into a battery system more than anything else. I find that most power tools suffer from "dive knife syndrome" - the only thing you need it for is to tap the pommel on your tank to get the attention of other divers and mmmmmmmmmaybe use it to pry something up or cut something you're tangled in. Ideally it's got a blunt tip and is bright yellow or orange so that when you drop it you can find it. Yet most dive knives, because they're bought by weekend warriors who think they're Navy SEALs, look like this: The average consumer drill looks and acts like something you would use to single-handedly assemble a motorcycle crate with, when really, 90% of its functionality is swag hooks for your wife's fuchsia baskets.
And also whether you should use it. In the United States it's extremely common to have a shutoff valve for the house, and another shutoff valve for the water company. The water company's valve has been used every single time someone moves out of the house, and is maintained by the water company. The house valve was turned on once when the house was new, and then turned off thirty years later, at which point it promptly broke and was replaced, and it's ready to do it again.
If you are going to do anything to your yard, don't do it piecemeal. Don't tear out those bushes and in a few months cut down a tree. Tear it all out, leave yourself with as much of a blank slate as you can. If you don't love something in your yard get rid of it and get rid of everything at one time.
I'm really happy with how bushy my habanero plant is. It's much happier in the bigger pot. I killed one not repotting it soon enough. A third was recently repotted, and I'm hopeful it will look stronger. One last one needs to get a new pot soon. The outdoor ones are going to need to come in this week as we have some overnight lows in the 30s coming. I have some seeds from a super hot pepper, and I'm going to try to get them going over the winter once I free up some smaller pot space. I'm no gardener, but this one pepper plant is going on two years old, and it's from a seed from a grocery store pepper. I'm pleased with myself.
House Totally lost interest in working on the house this weekend. Managed to do some painting on Saturday, but had no energy on Sunday. So, I let the wife talk me into going to the nursery on Sunday to look at plants. I thought it was just window shopping, but we ended up getting some shrubs and planting them and moving a bunch of other plants. So exhausted from digging on Monday, I convinced the wife to go kayaking after work during a lull in the rain. And finally, yesterday I got to rest and relax. Family Our middle child came for a quick visit on Monday evening. It was good to see the three of them. Looks like they won't be shipping out until late October now. So we might be taking our grandson for this weekend! Everyone else is status quo. Not a bad thing. Me Planning to go brewery hopping in a couple of weeks with some friends. We're going to camp out for the weekend and spend two days hitting as many Rhode Island breweries as we can. I could really use the brake and am looking forward to it. Had a conversation with my wife over the weekend where I complained about home office and my thoughts on improving it. She told me to do it, that regardless of when I go back to the "real" office, the improvements won't go to waste. So now I am shopping for a new ultra-wide monitor to replace my two crappy monitors, a new webcam and microphone, new chair, redesigning the desk, etc. Guess this will be my birthday and Christmas presents this year. I really should be putting the money towards the house, but I'm greedy. Life keeps moving, I keep chasing it. It's all good.
I actively avoided the debate last night, but unfortunately I've been reading about it this morning. It is not making my morning better. Poking around the news websites it looks like even the right wingers are having a hard time spinning this in Trump's direction.
This is what happens when you debate with fascists, unfortunately, and is a perfect example of why the people who say that these politics can be beaten by being debated out in the open are wrong. Fascists agree to rules then don't follow them. They speak over you. They do not attempt to "win", they attempt to please their base and make a lot of noise. They prevent you from getting your message out. on all counts, Trump succeeded in those goals. Biden gained nothing from this debate. Indeed, he may have even lost voters to the "not voting" option. Trump lost very little, and those he did lose are likely not going to vote for his opponent, they're just not going to vote at all.
I'm a little more with you on this. For over four years Trump's only MO has been to dominate attention and drown out. Every media outlet from right to left has been his tool. He did it in the debates with Hillary, and he did it again last night. I remember how post-debate people "scored" in Hillary's favor like she won, but she didn't. He was bigger, louder, lied constantly, and was the only thing anybody was thinking about afterwards. Trump is a known quantity and I also suspect he lost very little. Biden on the other hand, is at his best when he can speak his vision directly to the people. Trump shut that down hard last night. Oh it was messy and chaotic? Who cares? How is that bad for Trump? Oh he refused to condemn at hate group? Exactly like he refused on camera to denounce the former Grand Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan during last election? Biden was getting beat up for most of that debate, in ways no different than we've seen before. He was much better in the second half when he had a few moments of direct contact with the camera, but IMO those were few and far between as he failed to deal with Trump's standard playbook. At least he was strongest towards the end. He needed to lose that ragdoll energy. Few silver linings though: 1) Trump is a known quantity operating at the peak of the only gear he has. He can't actually get better or improve his debate performance. 2) Biden absolutely can, especially if it's more effectively moderated. 3) Biden is in the lead and Trump actually needed to win people over not stall Biden. Would have been great for Trump if he was the one in the lead going in, but he wasn't, and that hoses him. Anyway, I fully expect Biden to be much better in the next debate no matter what Trump brings, and expect Trump to more or less remain in stasis. And even if it's a repeat, still good for Biden overall. For kicks, go back and read the summary of a Clinton Trump debate from 2016. Sounds familiar. I actually though HRC did much better against Trump than Joe last night.He called Mrs Clinton a liar and a "nasty woman".
He said the women accusing him of sexual harassment bordering on assault were either attention-seekers or Clinton campaign stooges.
He said the media were "poisoning the minds" of the public. And, most notably, he refused to say whether he would accept the results of the election if he loses.
My wife and I tried to watch it, but it was too painful. We hung in there for about 30 minutes before my anxiety and blood pressure skyrocketed. Listening to them interrupt each other and the name calling, it was just beyond the pale. I suspect Biden's plan was to push back on Trump's bluster, but it just came across as childish. When Biden said the debate wasn't "Presidential", I kind of wrote the whole thing off. He was right, it wasn't. I was hoping he would be the adult on stage, but the comment really kind of hit the nail on the head. He tried to "out-Trump" Trump. Biden did reign himself in after a little while, but the damage was done in my opinion. And the fact that the moderator had absolutely no control of the performance was ridiculous. I really hope they install a mute button on the candidates and use it when it is not their turn to speak going forward. And I hope that Biden brings some decorum for the next debate. He isn't going to win over any Trump supporters no matter what he does, but he could scare off independents that he needs.
I think Biden pulled it together a bit more in the second half. He spoke directly to the camera a few times that were pretty effective. I agree that he should have resisted the urge to engage even more, but Wallace was totally ineffective as a moderator and Trump was taking full advantage. It's crazy that he didn't mute the mic of the person that didn't have the floor. Sad that it's necessary, but it is necessary.
Probably was against the debate rules that both sides agreed to. There was an editorial in the Times today that called on Biden to boycott the next two debates. I strongly disagree. That plays right into Trump's strategy, insofar as it can be said that he has one. I think that Joe might actually be the person for the moment. A person who can laugh when Trump is trying to anger you has the correct response. Sadly, he probably could have been in 2016 had Beau not suffered that GBM.It's crazy that he didn't mute the mic of the person that didn't have the floor.
This was effective af, and apparently people haven't come around to realizing it yet.A person who can laugh when Trump is trying to anger you
I don’t think that will be the effect. Apparently Biden hauled in a record amount of donations during and after the debate. It appears that most were sickened by what they saw, and I don’t see much evidence that Biden has been faulted for it. Most blame seems to fall on Trump and Wallace. I also expect Trump’s embrace of white supremacy to dispel some ennui.
Is it too tinfoil hat to suspect Republican relaxation on COVID as we get closer to election is a voter suppression tactic? Thinking a big spike will scare Dems into voting by mail (and possibly not be counted), while the Republican’s contingency will say the virus is fake anyways/show up disproportionately (more than the norm) in force to vote in person. Also, Pubski seems too quiet on Wednesdays. Last week the comment count stayed at 4 for a while despite the top commenter (when hovered over the post) was someone I didn’t follow, nor contribute to the comment count until the 12 hours were up. Wigging me out, homes.