I’m not much of a hands-on person when it comes to home repair, so it’s not often that I get to flex the muscles toned from years of desk jobs and computer labs and put a few hours’ work in construction.
My self-improvement project this weekend was to put up a shelf, hereby known as “Operation Find Some Goddamned Room For Those Playstation Games.” Please note the standard engineer’s response to by not fixing the situation (cleaning the house) but instead making it slightly worse while still solving the problem (putting up a shelf to hold even more stuff). OpFSGRFTPG started off with a bang by kicking the rest of my family out of the house so I could get to work. Don’t worry, they went to go see Serenity; I’m not heartless. I took this opportunity to watch the Family Guy movie while I worked.
The unit was put together without a hitch, although I’m sure the neighbors minded the 30 nails I had to hammer in. The real problem began with the mounting. I had to find room along my walls to actually put this thing. Eventually I conceded that the best place would be to put it above my TV, though it intersects with the path of the door if it opened too far. I’ve reduced the severity of this possibility by hanging a protective series of hawaiian shirts and bathrobes from hooks on the back of the door to act as a protective bumper should the door be carelessly thrown aside. Six holes (for two bolts, mind you), one expanding bolt screwed through a wall, and some muffled cursing later, I now have a wooden-encased glass-doored shelving unit from our Swedish friends at Ikea proudly perched in my room.
I’m sure the settlers of the West felt the same way aftering craft their homes from raw timber and hewing a house from the chaos of nature. It’s Miller time. Well, Mountain Dew time.