Wednesday, June 17, 2009

And a Canoe Hoist to Boot


Finally! It is done. 7 trips to Home Depot and 2 weeks of parking outside are over!

If you don't count the time spent kissing, it only took a couple of hours of actual work time. But it was sprinkled over such a long time period that every day the task seemed to loom larger and larger. Before the end, it wasn't a simple canoe hoist, it was an incredibly challenging rocket we were trying to complete before North Korea tested another nuke and wiped us out of existence.

Here were out issues:

1) We got 2 too few pulleys (it took 5 total.)
2) We were short one carabiner.
3) How were we going to attach the canoe? We needed more eyelet screws for the boards.
4) The rope wouldn't stay in knots so we needed rope cleats.
5) We screwed the board 1 foot too close to the light bulb, so the canoe completely blocked the light. Then the screws stripped so we had to pry them out.
6) We needed one more rope cleat because we forgot about the first knot on the ceiling.
7) The ropes around the canoe were too long, and the canoe hung so low that we couldn't get our cars underneath it.
8) The rivets on the canoe keel don't come out if the drill is on 'reverse' but the drill bit will break if enough force is applied. No amount of colorful language will alter this basic fact of life.

Sheesh...we're exhausted! It is pretty standard for us to take a simple project and twist it and turn it until it is a complicated mess. It's basically my calling in life. I can do it in practically any situation, with little to no effort. In fact, I emulate the motto, "There is No Job too Simple for Our Staff to Complicate!"

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