Every time I get involved in something like that, I think of the Malcolm in the Middle episode where Hal starts to fix a light bulb and by the time he’s done he has the car apart because everything breaks along the way. Lois walks in and he comes unglued when she asks about the light bulb.

I have to fix the tools I use to fix the tools that fix the thing.

Yup.

This Old House makes everything look easy.

Every five minute job is just a broken bolt away from being a ruined week.

Does anyone else get paralyzed on fixing small things because they’re terrified of it becoming a larger thing?

This never occurred to me… I just thought I need to fix this. Shit. Debuff unlocked.

I guess “hire someone” is always an option, but it’s a difficult task sometimes, especially finding someone reliable.

Actually, this is way more annoying to me. I’ve been ripped off/scammed too many times. I hate blindly trusting other people to not screw me over. Just this week my AC mysteriously broke after a recent-ish visit from some HVAC “professional”. I had to call another company cuz this is way more complicated than I can handle (for now…). After talking with the 2nd guy, it seems like the 1st guy didn’t do the maintenance work properly… I tried researching and going with a reputable company, but damn it still feels like a shot in the dark. Completely random chance they may completely break my shit.

Also, for some work, I’ve noticed I do it either at the same standard or better than some of these “professionals”. So. Meh.

Yes, it may take me several weeks to do it, but at least I know I tried to do it right, instead of rushing off to the next job.

Just assume there are no small projects, and changing a light bulb will take 5 trips to the hardware store, lol.

But mostly I just blunder in with blind optimism and then remember this fact

I get this. Recently we had a wet spot on our ceiling. It was about 1/2" diameter spot. Needed time to get it fixed. I planned for about 3 hours, cut into the spot, find where the wetness came from, fix wetness issue, fix hole, texture and paint. 2 weeks is what it took.

When I opened the hole, rat dropping fell and the wetness was from the rats pulling insulation off my from condenser line which was sweating. Root cause of the issue is find where the rats are getting in, seal that, catch the rats that remain, then fix all the stuff id originally set out to do.

My wife complained the whole time I only needed to fix the drywall everything else was just to delay