08/02/2007

A home-improvement project can become a way of life

By Tom Carr
Record-Eagle staff writer
tcarr@
record-eagle.com

Read Tom's past columns here

My wife and I were making some home improvements, so we hopped in the car and went to one of the mega-hardware-and-home-improvement emporia in the area, with a short list of things we needed to buy.

No problem. Let's go look at the pedestal sinks and faucets. While we're there we can look at blinds for a bedroom.

That shouldn't take long.

The one thing I don't count on is that these stores have way too many things to remind her of other projects to do.

"Oh, look, there's an ironing board,” she says. "That reminds me, we need to paint the utility room.”

What's more, we then had to go to the other huge stores of that genre to compare all of the prices.

I'm grateful that she saved us about $50 doing that.

But that was after we sped back to the first store and zipped past the woman who thought she was locking up for the night.

Now, I know home projects may sometimes lead to other things that need to be done.

Say you're fixing a leaking drain pipe in the sink. As you take things apart, you may find a warped board on the bottom of the cabinet that needs to be replaced, or other pipes and parts that are necessary in order to make the original repair.

There are bound to be about six trips to the hardware store for unforeseen problems.

That's similar to when we go shopping for a light fixture for a bathroom, there's a good chance we'll end up putting down new tile in the dining room if I let her look down that aisle.

Yet she's the one who tells me I need to be more focused when I linger at the seductive, stainless steel, mammoth grills. As I start to lift the gleaming top of one of them, she pulls me away as if she's saving me from an oncoming truck.

She's the same way when we go shopping elsewhere. She doesn't let me go off on a tangent to look at guitars, CDs, cheeseburgers or the other things I love.

Don't get me wrong.

I do enjoy making the house look nicer. When she picks out the stuff to make that happen, I'll gladly put it in.

I just don't have it in my DNA to feel like I'm a kid in a toy store when I'm in one of those places. I just want to get in and get out.

And there actually are a lot of things we agree on when it comes to home improvements.

Like we both know we have to do something about the living room wall.

The only thing is I would like to cover it with a flat-screen TV. She wants to hang pictures of the kids there.

Hey, we already know what they look like.

Contact Record-Eagle staff writer Tom Carr at tcarr@record-eagle.com.