Humorous Look at Tools and Their Usage by Peter Egan

[Moses Ludel]

We each have an appreciation for tools, and here's a humorous note on what tools can do.  At the "swapmeetdave.com" site, Dave shares a humorous tool list by Peter Egan from his Road & Track column.  You will appreciate Peter's insightful wit, humor and obvious awareness tools:  http://www.swapmeetdave.com/Humor/Workshop/Definitions.htm.  Enjoy!

 

Thanks to Swap Meet Dave and Peter Egan...

 

Moses

[biggman100]

Moses, i have read, from time to time, some of Peter Egan's columns, and they always serve to at least give a good laugh, even when not sharing any useful information. When it comes to magazines, and even outdated, and what my wife calls now useless, repair manuals, such as the Haynes manual for 1979 to 1988 Yugo GV manual, (yes, i actually owned 2 of those cars years ago, feel free to laugh), i am what my wife calls a pack rat, due to having crates of old magazines in my shed. After all, what else is a shed good for?  They range from Car and Driver, to 4 Wheel and Off Road to Lowrider, to Import Performance, and even some real odd ball rarely knowns, that are all vehicle or snowmobile related, and i will even sometimes go back and read through them for missed or relevant tips and ideas.

[Moses Ludel]

Biggman100...Don't get my wife started on my "keeping stuff" and storage sheds.  Wife Donna and your wife should not compare notes!  Donna subscribes to the theory that if you haven't used something in the last six month, you don't need it.  Tools and equipment?  Can that apply here?

 

We consciously chose to 'downsize' in 2009, selling our 3 acres with home and "dream shop" at Yerington.  The move to Fernley involved compressing a 2400 square foot automotive shop-studio (plus 600 square feet of "bonus storage" above the office) into a suburban home with a 3-car garage.  I strategically restructured the former shop as a 480 square foot shop studio.  (Tall, custom built 100 mph wind proof carports provide sanctuary for the magazine's vehicles.)   This move provided an opportunity to draw the line on what to keep, and my metaphor became the loaded question, "What would our kids do with this stuff?"  At the time, 33 years of marriage and children had included shuffling my "pack rat" overage through numerous moves, from Nevada to Oregon, Oregon to California, California back to Oregon and, finally, back to Nevada in 1994.

 

The inventory?  Visualize the usual accumulation plus scores of heavy boxes packed with magazines, essentially my published work, dating from the early '80s to 2008.  Add to that the "important scraps of paper" and memorabilia related to who knows what...

 

I parked the car hauling trailer within the shop and parallel to the office, installed the 4-foot plywood sideboards on the trailer, went upstairs to the "bonus room" mezzanine storage area, sorted stuff sensibly, and tossed every bit of "What would the kids and grandkids do with this?" overage over the railing and into the car hauler.  Two trips to the transfer station, with the tandem axles and tires crushed each time, benefited from the generous use of the station's backhoe to drag the weighty mass of paper and "stuff" out of the trailer.  Finally, things were in perspective.   

 

The accumulated home exercise equipment, yes, the kind that eventually serves as clothes racks, went to the Boys & Girls Club.  In the end, we kept the house square footage and downsized the shop, added a 10' x 20' shed now bearing items "to go through soon", and have made the 480 square feet of shop-studio work.  I am very comfortable with this arrangement, as it is a shop backdrop much like others—those with a home garage, a small commercial shop or a pole barn...I intend to do an HD video soon on which tools and equipment are vital for a highly productive, fully functional yet compact automotive and fabricating shop—without wasting space on overage and pack ratting...Just as soon as I get the current project out of my 480 square foot, downsized shop!

 

Moses