**Official SINGLES THREAD 9-11 MAY** On Singles and DIY

9th May 2008 | Snugs

[snugs]

Does your home reflect your single status including your attitudes towards it or are they formed from childhood and how your parents home was like.

Is your home functional, decorative, needs attention and somewhat tired or well maintained and modern? If you had a partner do you think it would be different?

Daveloneranger gave a few single spins on the topic.

Would a guy who can “DIY” be somehow more attractive to a lady?

If he was not a pratical person either around the house or with cars/bikes or other machines would that make him somehow less attractive, appealing or at least “marketable”?

On the otherhand does women doing DIY stuff etc more or less appealing to men?

What got me to think about this subject was that we had an insurance claim due to a roof leak part of the claim covered redecoration to the bathroom and painting/wall papering one of the bedrooms and papering landing, drop and hallway. This led me to start the painting and thinking about flooring upstairs and in the hallway that needed to be done. This kicked started me whereas before I was quite content to live in the tired look of the home.

This had happened after mum became too old to do the DIY dad as long as things function is not too worried about it looking modern and prestine and as for matching well he would never notice. I am very similar in some ways and go for function above matching and look but this insurance claim gave me the opportunity to actually have a few areas of the house that do match and are more modern.

I would surmise for me I am quite happy to live in tired but functional house but if kicked started can enjoy and want something better and probably if I had a partner who was into the DIY etc would be more into it.

[snugs]

Clutter has a home feeling about it IMHO most people would be horrified in the mess that I can cope with until it all gets too much and a get a black sack and throw half of it away.

[knarf]

Only half ... /8^).

I've noticed that I live in a path around the house ...

door to sink to coffee to computer to TV to computer to coffee to bathroom to computer to coffee to computer to bed.

Everything on the peripheral is "storage".

When "storage" reaches eye level ... I make a pot of coffee (a familiar 'path') ... and pitch at least half out .. (what in thee hell did I save a friggin' newspaper for ?? )

My next adventure will be hiring a roll-off and put it right outside the front door.

[snugs]

You would like my friend Phil then. When he was married with 2 young children he completely built his fitted kitchen at his home in Sheffield.

He bought the materials and made the doors in those days you could not buy doors except as part of a fitted kitchen how things have changed.

It was also before the days of small lights under units in the kitchen and he went all over the neighbourhood finding small fluorescent tubes and built the casings for them from scratch.

In his present home he has built a raised flower bed in the front garden, rewired the house, put in a new kitchen though this time he bought the units and just installed them.

He also reinstated the open fire in the lounge which even involved putting a chimney pot back on the roof.

Last weekend he put a new fence up in between giving me a hand with my projects.

He put my sink unit in about 8 years ago after my mum struggling for a couple of years with a sink unit only propped up on a couple of pieces of wood after we had a flood in the kitchen which eventually rotted the old sink unit. Because our sink is imperial (inches) and modern units are now metric he had to cut and carve and adapt the unit.

We had recently had new furniture at work and he had bought some of the old plan tables out of the engineering department which were white old fashion melamine and he made one of those into work top in the kitchen which again had rotted during the flood.

Here is the sink unit he adapted and fitted and work tops he made are to the left and right.

Here he is building the front wall/raised flower bed at his house.

The finished wall

He also put in a the cooker for me that I bought on Ebay

Here is the fireplace and open fire that he reinstated he made the mantlepiece from scratch as well from MDF and then painted it.

[snugs]

Priorities are imported yes I need to crack on and do more around the house but also after working full time and caring for dad often I just need to chill out and go on the computer or watch a film on TV which is now a pleasure having recently bought a second hand more modern TV from a colleague at work.

That was a good deal mine was a bit temperamental and was only a normal mono TV no fancy sound or change of screen ratio. The newer one has surround sound and various change of screen ratio etc. And yes I did set it up myself.

[snugs]

Its good to have you please drop in from time to time.

[snugs]

My friend Phil loves the DIY but also the outdoor things as well such a bike riding and visiting historical places so hence he has a lot of unfinished projects.

[snugs]

I know the feeling, when I cleared my old bedroom it too over 20 large black sacks (bin bags whatever you call them in the States).

There is still at least another 10 to go plus dumping the old dressing table, cheap chipboard/plywood unit from the late 60s which served me well from childhood but has to go now. I am also dumping the single bed and turning this box room into an upstairs sitting/TV room where I can invite friends.

[Ladysmith]

Is that so? Good for you! Enjoy the heck out of it!

Oh, Lord, the rat is out there barking again. ugh... Guess it’s time to fire up the lawnmower!

[knarf]

Marry me ... we fit ....

/8^)

[snugs]

LOL we would get the property condemend after a week :O)

[Ladysmith]

Here are my priorities: Work (so I can pay the bills), play in the sun as much as possible, THEN house and projects... LOL!

[knarf]

/8^)

[A knight without armor]

Wow. You bought that on Ebay!

[My hearts in London - Everett]

WOW! That is fantastic work! I wonder if he has a counterpart over here in the states somewhere. lol One of the things that I really admire about my father is his work ethic. If he’s working on something - carpentry, tiling, masonry, etc. and there’s a flaw in his work (even if it’s not something you or I would notice) he will redo that part of the work at his own expense because he takes such pride in doing quality work. I got my perfectionist streak from him!

[Nowhere Man]

I'm not much of a carpenter, in fact I can't hit a nail too well, but I'm useful in other DIY stuff like fixing radios and tackling an occasional TV. I've also done minor auto repairs. The reason why I wasn't around much last week is last Friday (May 2nd) was my last day on my job so I'm job hunting again. In fact, my Ford Explorer needs front rotors and rear drums along with brake shoes for both brake systems, an exhaust system and some work on the right, rear rocker panel (under the right, rear door) for it to pass inspection. Although it failed and I shouldn't be driving it but I have no choice. Still when my buddy and I get the parts, we will work on it together. I admit I could use a vacation, but it is a helluva way to get one.

At least I can get caught up on some things I need to do for the house like my neglected hedges, clean the basement, and watch to see of the Pittsburgh Penguins get to the Stanley Cup so I plan to just take it easy for a few weeks and take it from there. Anyhoo, the Wings Over Pittsburgh Airshow is this weekend, expect some pictures from me.

The Canadian Snowbirds are on the top bill this year but I've been buzzed by everything from a World War II C-54 that was in the Berlin Airlift, to F-16's, to F-18's, to F-22's. Heck, we can stage our own dogfights. B-) I know the UK has their "Red Arrows," I wish they would come here and perform. BTW, a C-130 flew over my house, I thought he was going to take off my roof. B-)

[ottbmare]

In general I find that men who learn that I have my own extensive collection of power tools so I can do my own home improvements are horrified. Yes, this is true of Republican men too.

I love power tools. They give me the ability to do things I wouldn’t otherwise have the strength to do.

[Tolerance Sucks Rocks]

Too bad you don’t have your state flag up in your profile. I could see whether you lived near me. :-)

Believe me, I’d be much better off if I had even 1/10 of your apparent DIY knowledge (as guesstimated from your love of power tools).

[Tolerance Sucks Rocks]

Geez, your government sounds like a lot of fun. What do they think? “Well, today, instead of getting rid of radical muslims in our midst, we’ll just micromanage homeowners and force them to use professionals who donated big-time to our parliamentary campaigns!”

[snugs]