Home improvement 101

I had to take my car to the garage recently. While a mechanic worked on it, I waited in the waiting room and worked on my laptop. Every few minutes or so, I would tune into a home improvement show that played in the background on a nearby television. I think the garage planned it that way. As I watched, I came away with several conclusions:

—The show made me feel out of my element. When the mechanic told me I needed expensive new tires and a Flux Capacitor, straight out of the movie Back to the Future, I took him at his word. The mechanic got a good laugh from the joke, but I got the last laugh. I told him that since “Where we’re going, we don’t need roads” that must mean that he was wrong and I didn’t need new tires. Oh what a shocker, he didn’t seem to like my response.

—How come every home improvement show has one guy with a New England or New York accent. Is that supposed to make me feel better about the improvement? Can’t the rest of us folks scattered across the U.S. make our own improvements? Remember Bob Vila from This Old House, the guru of home improvement experts. Or even make-believe Tim “The Toolman” Taylor from the sit-com Home Improvement. I don’t remember either of them having an accent?

—The hosts never got dirty. They looked like hipster dudes straight from a Carhartt or Dickies storeroom. Meanwhile, I walk into my garage. I work on the simplest DIY project and end up head-to-toe in dust and dirt.

—In one episode they mixed cement, sand, crushed and graded stone, and water. They made it look like the most complex thing known to mankind. I half expected a scientist with pocket protector and nerdy glasses to come on screen and explain the scientific and engineering principles behind cement. “Yes, Bob, the molecules from the cement bond together over time with the aggregates from the stone to form an impenetrable force.”

—What’s the most manly thing, I’ve done today? I got up and out of bed and made my own coffee. What’s the most manly thing the home improvement guys did? Hmm, pretty much everything.

Oh brother, I’m out of my league. No more DIY projects for me. Anyone have a good, cheap contractor to call?