I hate DIY

[73GTVJim]

It can't just be me.

I never have the right tools.

The cable is always just too short.

The cut tile is never quite spot on.

I've done it the wrong way around....again.

That crucial little screw just pinged off somewhere.

The holes just don't quite line up.

The tool slips and scratches something it shouldn't.

It's taken me seven hours to fail to complete a job I could assemble on a desk in 5 minutes if the wires all reached.

I'm sick of it.

[GhostyDog]

I take it this is something to with Bertie?

I have good days and bad days.

The bog roll holder in my bathroom continues to taunt me after 5 years. It's held by two screws but they are far too close together so you can use a decent fixing on a hollow wall. I located one of the batons and attempted to screw it into that but I missed so it's hanging off again.

[Happy Man]

What have you broken now

[GhostyDog]

Originally Posted by keithyboy

I have good days and bad days.

The bog roll holder in my bathroom continues to taunt me after 5 years. It's held by two screws but they are far too close together so you can use a decent fixing on a hollow wall. I located one of the batons and attempted to screw it into that but I missed so it's hanging off again.

I've got a few like that, had a over the tv cabinet sat n the floor in my upstairs sitting room for 2 years, it needs buttons fixing to the wall and my plasma needs taking ff its stand and fixing to the wall on a articulated bracket.

It's one of those jobs that may never get done because everything works, I'm not big on finishing DIY

Its the that will do mentality

[73GTVJim]

Originally Posted by GhostyDog

I take it this is something to with Bertie?

Originally Posted by Happy Man

What have you broken now

Neither. I can't afford to "get an (un)professional man in" so I perhaps foolishly decided to strip out and refit the bathroom before Christmas.

I've taken off all the old tiles, did get in a plasterer to redo the walls but I'm trying to do the rest mainly with the help of my best mate's power tools when needed. The bath is in and two walls are tiled down to the batten level....and I'm quite pleased with them given my total lack of experience.

Today I bought a new light fitting and I'm extremely frustrated. It isn't hard to fit....if only everything would bloody reach! I've already damaged the newly plastered ceiling trying to pull a bit more wire through. They're still too short to reach the smart new fixed connector block on the new fitting and when I did get them in, the blasted orientation of the base -as rawlplugged and screwed into said new ceiling- means they won't twist enough to line up the hole in the bulbs bit of the fitting and the base.

Originally Posted by GhostyDog

I'm not big on finishing DIY

Its the that will do mentality

I fear I'm in that camp. And I know all my errors and beat myself up for the smallest fault when I just know I'd accept it as one of those things if I was paying some pro joker a grand or more to do it.

So I get the worst of all worlds when I DIY.

[GhostyDog]

Originally Posted by 73GTVJim

Neither. I can't afford to "get an (un)professional man in" so I perhaps foolishly decided to strip out and refit the bathroom before Christmas.

I've taken off all the old tiles, did get in a plasterer to redo the walls but I'm trying to do the rest mainly with the help of my best mate's power tools when needed. The bath is in and two walls are tiled down to the batten level....and I'm quite pleased with them given my total lack of experience.

Today I bought a new light fitting and I'm extremely frustrated. It isn't hard to fit....if only everything would bloody reach! I've already damaged the newly plastered ceiling trying to pull a bit more wire through. They're still too short to reach the smart new fixed connector block on the new fitting and when I did get them in, the blasted orientation of the base -as rawlplugged and screwed into said new ceiling- means they won't twist enough to line up the hole in the bulbs bit of the fitting and the base.





I fear I'm in that camp. And I know all my errors and beat myself up for the smallest fault when I just know I'd accept it as one of those things if I was paying some pro joker a grand or more to do it.

So I get the worst of all worlds when I DIY.

I replied o this 3 times and ech time safari crashed

[steveisfrowning]

There is a thread for this already you know......

[73GTVJim]

Originally Posted by steveisfrowning

There is a thread for this already you know......

I know SIF but that effin' light fitting deserves its own rant for typifying everything that I hate about DIY and how inadequate it makes me feel just about every time I try to do something.

[steveisfrowning]

allowed

[Gibbo]

Originally Posted by keithyboy

I have good days and bad days.

The bog roll holder in my bathroom continues to taunt me after 5 years. It's held by two screws but they are far too close together so you can use a decent fixing on a hollow wall. I located one of the batons and attempted to screw it into that but I missed so it's hanging off again.

Why not make a back plate that is larger than your fitting,
screw that to the wall and then mount your bog roll holder
onto it?

[steveisfrowning]

Originally Posted by Gibbo

Why not make a back plate that is larger than your fitting,
screw that to the wall and then mount your bog roll holder
onto it?

That's mental. Given the sort of technical proficiency demonstrated in these quarters it could be a series of back plates that would, effectively, bisect the smallest room.

[Gibbo]

Sorry

I keep forgetting to be incompetant when on here

[steveisfrowning]

It hurts when I hear people suggesting matter-of-fact, competent solutions to simple problems.

[jonalfaspider]

i had a simular day, i gave in to the mrs and started tiling the bathroom floor, by 12 all was good removed toilet basin, old floor, bath panel, blar blar blar. had lunch went back upstair, dry layed tiles, looking good only about ten to cut, get my tile cutter out try cutting a tile and the blade is knackard (lent in the the mrs dad!) not a problem i will just nip and and get another, go to b&q dont have correct size, so go wickes, again wrong size, i ask a guy working their he show me the universal one and assures me it will fit, so i buy it and of course when i get home it doesnt fit! take it back for a refund and head to the next diy store! after messing about trying to get a blade i get home four just after four, fit the new blade (£14 for a little metal wheel) offer up my first tile bang goes the bloody blade! so i decide i will lay the tile that dont need cutting and my luck is changing....so i think! i lay all the tiles apart from the edges by eight, as i asmire my hand work a heard a hissing sound and water start to come out of the pipes that the sink would be connected to, the water goes all over the tiles and the groat WTF .............the mrs put the water back on coss she wanted a tea!!!

[steveisfrowning]

he mentioned bathroom

and tiling


<massive facepalm>

[Keithy]

1) Sorry Jim, but even if he is letting you off I won't - you know the thread to use.

2) Take comfort from the bloke who HAS paid someone to do the bathroom and has a leak that has 'Cattle Trucked' his downstairs ceiling.

[steveisfrowning]

I'm getting called 'he' now

it makes me feel special, almost like a god














and also makes me feel that the money spent on the op was actually fully vindicated

[73GTVJim]

Originally Posted by steveisfrowning

It hurts when I hear people suggesting matter-of-fact, competent solutions to simple problems.

It's always so bloomin' easy for some! My mate is like that....or he gives that impression and does big projects at his house seemingly without issue......it just reinforces my sense of useless inadequacy.

[steveisfrowning]

Originally Posted by 73GTVJim

It's always so bloomin' easy for some! My mate is like that....or he gives that impression and does big projects at his house seemingly without issue......it just reinforces my sense of useless inadequacy.

I see my neighbour - professional chippie - cutting up stuff neatly with circular saws on benches and stuff

and I'm in the garage carving at a plank with a spoon, feeling bitter and resentful

[73GTVJim]

Originally Posted by steveisfrowning

and I'm in the garage carving at a plank with a spoon, feeling bitter and resentful

That kind of sums up my tool kit. I bought the light and realised I had to go borrow Tony's drill because I no longer have one - having loaned my cheap, crappy B&D thing to someone a decade ago and being too soft to ask for it back and then they moved away. I don't do enough DIY to justify spending a packet on a decent drill so it just adds to my negative feelings having to impose on my mate, who happens to have several (really) drills in imposing looking big ABS cases and just about every power tool known to man in his shed.

I have a Bosch angle grinder I bought on impulse once because it was on offer at about £20 and took off Bertie's rusty exhaust with...one and only use. That's it. The rest of the time I;m using rusty tools and kitchen implements and wondering why I can't do the job right!

[steveisfrowning]

plus I'm lazy so there's the times when I have a perfectly good screwdriver in the garage, and it'd do the job in 30 seconds flat......but somehow 15 minutes with the tip of a steak knife often seems to win out

[73GTVJim]

Originally Posted by steveisfrowning

plus I'm lazy so there's the times when I have a perfectly good screwdriver in the garage, and it'd do the job in 30 seconds flat......but somehow 15 minutes with the tip of a steak knife often seems to win out

Been there.

[Gibbo]

I'm sure there's something you're good at

[zulu ferret]

Keep this post going as long as you can lads so that I can get the missus to read it and then, Maybe, just maybe she will realise what a jewel she has had in me for 38 years? Perhaps in appreciation I'll get a reward from her with luck? Fat chance, she'll only miss me when I'm gone after all my practivist efforts have been fully deployed on the house and she being a 'Merry Widow' will move the toy boy in?

Little do they know I have Booby Trapped many of the fixes and fittings, so that should they ever get tampered with by my replacement they will 'self disintegrate' now that is a form of Smart DIY don't you agree? Took ages to map out and install my designed 'Break when touched' one off models of DIY construction/type.