80. Fixing

Third night in a row that I’ve spent most of my night under the sink. Drilling something in upside down is difficult.

It’s kind of been nice having a different have schedule. Yesterday, I got home at about 5 p.m., went out for a drink with a friend, did some grocery shopping at Trader Joe’s (!), and then went to Home Depot. I proceeded to tinker with my sink and dishwasher for the next hour before I realized I had to make another trip to Home Depot. (It’s just down the street from me, and, yes, I’ll probably have to make another trip their tonight.)

I didn’t even eat dinner till about 9:30 p.m. last night. I was too focused on trying to get the dishwasher all right. I have slightly-below-average handyman skills, but I’m getting through it. I think it’s more that I don’t have all of the tools and I need to go buy them. Whereas at my park job in Maryland, I could find a lot of stuff, or go get it at the hardware store fairly easily.

I really haven’t had much to do at home since moving back home. My nights mainly involved working out, eating dinner, writing, and watching Netflix. I’m beginning to think that isn’t quite the way everyone’s schedule is.

I’m not a good tinkerer. I’m usually afraid that I’ll break something or I won’t be able to put it back together. I haven’t destroyed anything under my sink just yet, I hope it will stay that way.

It’s probably good that these changes and adjustments in life are coming while I’m still a bachelor with a lot of time on his hands. I would be even more stressed out if I had kids or other schedules to contend with while trying to fix up a place and make it ready.

Also, most of my purchases in the last few months have been basically non-essential: books, snacks, drinks, entertainment. But I bought a drill yesterday! That’s one of those things you think you’ll just borrow from friends, but it feels kind of awesome when you do have one. (Hopefully I’ll get to use it often.) (Sidenote, line of of the night from the guy in the power tools aisle: “I wouldn’t sell you a Black & Decker if you were a 12-year-old girl.”)

Also, more of my work conversations are about house stuff. Whoa boy. It’s getting really exciting here.

It’s fun to learn new things, to tinker, and to figure out stuff that you didn’t know before. I think home ownership will be a good challenge for me. As a low-maintenance guy who doesn’t need much to be happy, I think this will be a good challenge to see if I can keep at least those essential functions of life moving. Things don’t just happen automatically. The lights are kept on because someone is working somewhere and you’re paying your bills.

And the dishwasher will be working again because I’m going to fix the damn thing.