The Norman Transcript

Opinion

Discussion

November 7, 2012

Pity the husband without fix-it skills

By Keith Kappes The Norman Transcript

NORMAN — Why does a new, young wife assume that her husband has all of the manual skills of her daddy?

And why are new husbands so anxious to avoid disappointing their brides that they willingly go into harm’s way?

My first foray into the world of the handyman started innocently enough. My sweetie asked me to hang some framed photos.

Her father was a great carpenter who built their family home. Mine was a good carpenter.

Our apartment lease said we had to fill any holes in the walls, so she reminded me to be careful when I located the “stud” for the nail.

I didn’t know they were 16 inches apart, so I took the only nail I could find and began to search.

Blam!

Unsure of the thickness of the wallboard, I hit the nail a bit harder than planned and missed the stud but left a hole with my nail she said was more like a railroad spike.

Not to be outdone, I tried again.

Blam! Blam! Blam!

By now, the wall looked like it had been attacked with a machine gun. She finished hanging the pictures.

It was different when we replaced our family room paneling a few years later in our second home.

The new plywood paneling fit nicely where the old paneling was removed ... until we came to the wall plugs and light switches.

I couldn’t find a measuring tape, but I knew I could hold the paneling upright in front of the wall and make the holes with a jigsaw, by sight.

No one told me the paneling would wobble or that I should measure twice and cut once.

The holes I made looked more like broken windows. A kindly neighbor finished that job.

A couple of years later, she asked if I knew how to use spray foam. She was bug proofing our home. I lied and said I did.

I really didn’t know anything about foam but I had seen a TV commercial, so I bought two cans.

She wanted me to fill a hole where an old water pipe had gone through the basement wall. I confidently pointed the can and sprayed ... and sprayed ... and sprayed. Finally, I ran out of foam.

I was feeling pretty good about my do-it-yourself skills until one of my kids came rushing in to say he had found something scary.

Hanging there on the outside wall was a large, pulsating yellow blob, getting bigger by the second.

And I also forgot to wear those plastic gloves.

Ouch!

Keith Kappes is a columnist for the Morehead (Ky.) News. Contact him at kkappes@cnhi.com.

For local news and more, subscribe to The Norman Transcript Smart Edition, or our print edition.

Text Only | Photo Reprints
Opinion
  • Diana Frost letter correction

    Letter correction: A letter to the editor from Diana Frost, originally published in March 2012, was inadvertently published again in Sunday’s paper. The Transcript apologizes for the error....

    May 23, 2013

  • Teachers should be proud

    Editor, The Transcript: He walked by the camera in his red OU T-shirt, splattered with dirt, hair disheveled, and cuts on his face. He told the reporter about helping rescue people from the rubble of the tornado. He spoke of his experience ...

    May 23, 2013

  • Misinformation clouds global warming

    Next spring I will again have to update my lecture on global warming. Atmospheric carbon dioxide is now rising above the 400 ppm level for the first time in perhaps 5 million years — a scenario humans have never experienced. In my Geology ...

    May 23, 2013

  • The Oklahoma standard

    The sight of hundreds of young student volunteers walking across Moore’s Fourth Street interstate overpass had to be uplifting to the city’s tornado victims. They carried rakes, brooms and trash bags. A few had children’s red wagons. There ...

    May 23, 2013

  • Roman Catholic Church too busy to respond with hate

    Editor, The Transcript: Diana Frost’s letter of May 19 concerning the Roman Catholic Church was so unreasonable that it almost defies response. Still, one of her many accusations must be addressed....

    May 22, 2013

  • There’s no answer for ‘Why?’

    Just hours before, there was breakfast and laughter. Pictures were on the walls and memories were in every room. But in seconds, those joys of life were reduced to a concrete slab by a rage of nature that man will never fully understand....

    May 22, 2013

  • Moore’s amazing resilience

    Our hearts, already heavy from Sunday’s deadly tornado in far eastern Cleveland County, sunk even further Monday afternoon as we watched the tornado rip through Moore. The monster storm that hit Monday followed nearly the same path as the ...

    May 22, 2013

  • Crazy Kim and the Tippy Twos

    Kim Jong Un certainly seems crazy. But sound mind isn’t a requirement for predictable action. Tyrants often mask steady goals with wild behavior. One need only think of world pests like Fidel Castro and Saddam Hussein to realize entire ...

    May 21, 2013

  • Relying on private prisons

    Oklahoma began contracting to place inmates in private prisons during Gov. Frank Keating’s administration in 1995. Today, more than 5,000, or 23 percent, of our inmates are in the custody of three private prisons....

    May 21, 2013

  • Thanks for warnings

    We can’t say there wasn’t enough warning this time around....

    May 21, 2013