Sheds, Beds, and Spreads
- Michael Jay Tucker's explosive-cargo
- 6 minutes ago
- 4 min read
Okay, last time, I had us deciding (in 2019) that we were going to get us a Casita...a little house....to put in our backyard. That was because while we love our home in Georgetown, it is just a bit too small. Which sounds really greedy given that there are people out there who’d die for the kind of housing we take for granted, but, the truth’s the truth.
We had decided on a Casita because we thought it would be kind of cool to have a cute little outbuilding in our backyard (and we’ve got a BIG backyard, even if the house is a bit on the wee side). It would increase (we thought) the re-sale value of the property, and it reminded us of our favorite AirBnB, the one in Albuquerque I’ve talked about before.
So, with stars in our eyes and a dream in our hearts, we set out to Get...Our...Casita!
The first thing I thought of was I Could Do It Myself! I could, I said, go to Home Depot or Lowes and buy one of those prefab sheds that they sell. I could have it delivered here in Kit-Form. And then I’d put in the flooring. And then put in the insulation. And install this. And install that. And...buy a bunch more tools. And watch hours and hours of instructional videos on Youtube. And make a complete mess of it. And then afterwards spend a bunch of money having the disaster I put up torn back down again by professionals. And then maybe paying a bunch of fines for doing it all without having the right permits. And we simply won’t go into what would have happened if I tried to do my own wiring and electrical. There are some things that are just too horrible to consider.
Yeah...here’s the grim reality. I am to DIY what anthrax is to cattle ranching. I am to home improvement what the Hindenburg was to the FAA. I am to renovation what the Titanic was to the luxury liner industry.
That may sound a bit much, but it’s true enough. I’m just not good at all that stuff. My Dad was great at it. There wasn’t anything he couldn’t fix given time and a pair of pliers. My son, David, seems to have the same skills.
About the photos: First, the Casita at the AirB&B we frequent in Albuquerque, New Mexico. This was the inspiration for own project. Second, Martha at the the High Noon, one of our fav restaurants in New Mexico. This is from our 2023 trip. And, finally, an image of what my usual DIY home repairs efforts look like when completed. (This is, of course, AI. But it is pretty close.)
Me? Oh...God...No. Somehow the home repair skills went right over my head. They didn’t even slow down long enough to part my thinning dirty-blonde hair in passage. If I touch something, rest assured, it breaks. It’s history. It’s gone. It’s on its way to the landfill if not a toxic waste repository.
To give you an idea, about a week ago, we were putting up our Christmas tree. One of the decorations -- a little tin Santa riding a reindeer -- had been crushed in storage and needed to be widened at one point. So I got my screw driver to pry it open just a teeny, tiny, itty bitty, bit more...
...and the screw driver slipped and went straight into my thumb. As in...ouch. And Phooey. And darn. Or words to that effect.
And thus I became possibly the only man in history to do himself serious injury with a tin statue of Kris Kringle ridin’ Rudolph...who didn’t have a red nose at first, but very definitely did after I’d bled all over him.
So, on sober reflection, Martha and I agreed that maybe...maybe...just perhaps...it might be a good idea for me to abandon the whole DIY angle and, instead, do the sensible thing and hire a contractor.(*)
Great. We even got help from our son, who is an architect, and he provided us with a long list of things to do and say while we dealt with contractors. (This proved to be invaluable, btw. Thanks, Dave!)
So we started phoning around, posting to places like NextDoor, and asking neighbors for recommendations for contractors. Which was when we made another interesting discovery.
To wit: when you are living in one of the fastest growing communities in the country, everyone is hiring contractors to build stuff. As in ...EVERYONE...and their dogs.
Ergo, contractors with free time are few and far between.
Except...except...
For the contractors no one *dares* to hire.
Something which, very shortly, we’ll learn the hard way.
More to come.
Footnote:
*Martha later told me that when she heard I was thinking of trying to DIY the Casita myself she got out her Rosary, something she hasn’t done since she was eight. Can’t say I blame her, really.
Ah well.
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