From 
Pretty In Pink?
by Robert A. Jones
September 2006
To spruce up the house and give it some curb appeal, we decided to add red shutters around the windows. Painting shutters with a brush can be slow, so we decided to rent a paint sprayer and paint them assembly-line style in the garage. We laid down dropcloths, opened the doors and windows for ventilation and sprayed on primer and two coats of paint. After finishing up for the day, I closed the overhead garage door and saw that our nice white door was now a uniform pink! The overspray from the sprayer had risen and settled on top of the door while it was open for ventilation. The next day was taken by still another painting project - the garage door!
Between Hornets And A Hard Place
by Albert F. Reed
September 2006
Hornets had built a good-size nest in our porch light, so I rounded up a can of insecticide and a large cloth and waited until dark, when the pests would be in their hive.
That night I quickly wrapped the cloth around the light fixture to keep all the angry, buzzing hornets inside. But when I tried to grab the can of spray at my feet, I realized I couldn't reach down that far without letting go of the cloth-the only thing between me and an irate colony of stingers. Was I stuck!
Fortunately, it was summer and the windows were open. After I gave a few desperate yells, my wife came and rescued me from my potentially painful pickle.
Dumb Waiter
by Joe Jessman
July 2003
My wife and I decided to paint the wood stairway in our colonial home. The risers we’d paint the trim color and the treads an oil-based gloss black. As the weekend approached, the timing seemed to work out perfectly. Our 5-year-old son was away and we’d be able to focus on the project and avoid getting footprints in the paint. Our plan: My wife would stay upstairs that night while I painted the stair treads (top to bottom) and then I would simply sleep downstairs while the paint dried. But when I woke up the next morning, the stair treads were still tacky! No way would we be able to walk on them that day either. Throughout the day, I could be seen taking breakfast, lunch and finally dinner to my wife by way of an extension ladder set up outside to a second-story window. Late that evening the treads finally dried and we were all reunited.
Indoor Bobsledding
by Tom Richmond
June 2006
I purchased a Jacuzzi tub to replace the old cast iron tub in our upstairs bath. We got the300-lb. tub out of the bathroom and then decided to gently lower it down our wood staircase to get it outside. We wrapped a blanket around the legs at the upper end of the tub so my wife could guide that end with a firm hold on the blanket. I was to be at the lower end of the tub. Well, all was going fine until one of the stair nosings broke, causing the tub to jerk and get away from us. It started careening down the stairs, and to avoid being bowled over, I hopped into the tub and rode it all the way down. It broke all the nosings before smashing into the wall at the bottom of the stairs. Luckily my wife and I both made it through without a scratch, but unfortunately our remodeling project grew by leaps and bounds. When I told my father the story, he said we should have left the tub in place, broken it up with a sledgehammer and then carried down the pieces.
Snake on the Loose
by Fred Gammel
November 2004
One Sunday morning, I woke to a clogged sewer drain. Frustrated, I went to my local rental shop and picked up a 150-ft. power plumber’s snake to clean the line once and for all. I inserted the snake into the cleanout, and everything seemed to be fine until I got to the end of the snake and still didn’t seem to have reached the clog. I went outside and discovered that the snake had traveled out the roof vent and down the side of the house and had become tangled in my neighbor’s perfectly pruned rose-bushes. I carefully removed the snake, pulled it back through and tried again— this time successfully.
Clueless Cordless Owner
by Greg Ruvolo
November 2004
Not long ago, I installed a new medicine cabinet in our bathroom. I removed the old recessed cabinet, leaving a large hole between the studs. The new medicine cabinet was a flush-mount style and a bit smaller than the old one, so I cut a piece of drywall to cover the old hole. Just then, my cell phone rang. I told the caller I’d talk after I was done. I set the phone down and remeasured the opening and cut the drywall and screwed it into place, then taped and mudded the seams. As soon as I finished, my cell phone rang again. I looked everywhere but the phone was nowhere in sight. I placed my ear close to the newly patched wall and I could hear it plainly inside the wall! I was careful to look inside before I installed the second drywall patch.
Stovetop Lollipop
by Ray Kimberely
October 2004
Our family has always enjoyed camping and cooking over an open fire, so I decided to install a freestanding wood stove in the house to capture the feel of an open fire. Well, I installed the stove, started a fire, and checked the air intake and exhaust. Everything worked just fine. As I was driving the last screw into place, my wife called me in for dinner. I set the cordless drill down and went into the kitchen to eat. While eating, I smelled something burning in the other room and went to investigate. There it was! I’d set my cordless drill down on top of the wood stove, and it looked like a lollipop with the screwdriver bit attached to a melted mass of plastic and gears.
Beep Me!
by Janet L. Davis
October 2004
I’m a single female first-time homeowner and pretty good repair person. One day I got home and heard an intermittent beeping sound every few minutes. Knowing that smoke alarms do this when the battery is low, I replaced the battery. Minutes later, I heard another beep, so I replaced the battery in the other alarm. Then I heard a beep again! Figuring the batteries were no good, I replaced both of them again. Much to my chagrin, I still heard the beep. There couldn’t be that many “bad” batteries! Finally, it dawned on me—the incessant beeping was coming from the digital pager in my briefcase!
Bungee Shrub
by Thomas Carroll
September 2004
The shrubs along the front of our house were getting over-grown and needed a good pruning. After a couple of hours of aggressive shearing, the shrubs looked worse than ever, so I decided to pull them out and get new ones. After digging around the trunks to free the roots, I tied a heavy rope to the base of one of the shrubs and fastened the other end of the rope to the back of my 4x4 pickup. I slowly drove the pickup forward to tighten the rope and then accelerated quickly, hoping to jerk the bush free of the soil. Well, it worked. What I didn’t expect was the rubber-band effect of the nylon rope. It catapulted the bush right through the back window of my truck. Sitting in the cab with glass strewn all over the interior, I regretfully remembered that my dad always used a heavy chain for this task!
Honey, someone’s at the furnace!
by Bob Schwindt
September 2004
We needed a new doorbell, so my handy brother-in-law helped us install one. A few days later, very early in the morning, the doorbell rang. We got up to check the door and nobody was there. About a half hour later, the doorbell rang and again nobody was there. Convinced it was a practical joke, we camped out by the door. It rang again, and this time we could see there was definitely nobody there. We knew that a doorbell uses low voltage supplied by a transformer. We traced the wires and noticed that my brother-in-law had wired the doorbell into an existing transformer that was also hooked to the furnace thermostat. As a result, whenever the furnace turned on, the doorbell rang. We purchased a dedicated transformer for the new doorbell and are now sleeping in on weekends.
Well, after reading about sealing the cell phone inside the wall, this reminds me of the story that my brother loves to tell. This one tops the cell phone. He was helping a friend finish a basement and after coming back from lunch, they could hear the distinct muffled sounds of the family cat meowing from inside the wall. Only took two holes in the newly hung drywall to find one slightly dusty cat, who finished her nap upstairs.
Curious that most of these goofs, especially the really dumb ones, are from men.
Why didn't the wife climb down the ladder to get to the first floor?
I am a professional Handyman. I had a lady call me to ask me to install a new ceiling fan where the old one was. I said "No problem." When I got up on the ladder I noticed that there was caulk around the bell ( The thing that touches the ceiling.). When I started to cut the caulk loose the fan fell on me. I have yet to figure out how the first installer got the fan to stay put until the silicone caulking dried hard enough to hold it in place.
You think a pink garage door is bad? When I was a kid, my parents got the bright idea to paint the old grey stucko on their house. My brother and I ended up growing up in a house with a baby blue top(the stucko doesn't go to the top) and a BRIGHT pink bottom. All the neighbors used it for reference for directions to their houses.
i know how that feels. it's happened to me and my dad a couple of times.
Perhaps a pink door isn't the worst thing in the world! It's certainly an easy way to identify your house when giving directions to people who have never visited you before!