A couple of INSANE plumber's tricks

1. Bread? Why would a plumber need bread? Oh - he can put it down a couple lengths of pipe which need to be sweated together, to absorb moisture. Then when a blow-torch is applied at the point to be fused, the heat turns the bread to toast. When the water is turned on, WHOOMP, there goes the the toast. Or WHOOT, there goes the toast, if that's how you roll.

2. Peppermint oil? Why th'? So, you have a leak somewhere in a pipe in the wall or floorboards or ceiling. Somewhere. So, run your pressure check, but put a drop of peppermint oil in the business end where pressure doodad is hooked up. Oil will blow through the pipes and you will smell it at the point where the leak is. As I said, INSANE.

Plate joiner

As I amass tools slowly, I want to specifically concentrate on the ones that have very limited uses...any schmoe can buy a hammer, for god's sake.

I lost my mind when Kyle turned me on to (and, in turn, let me turn on) the plate joiner (or biscuit joiner) when we were assembling his kitchen counter last week (has it really been seven days since I last held this wonder, straight down from the firmament?). It cuts semi-circular divots in the side of your board, which you can then fill with wood glue and what is called a biscuit [hello, Marge]. The other board you are joining board one to has another divot exactly opposite, and the whole thing comes together like the tongue-and-groove option with the chartreuse "ties" on an old Hot Wheels track set. The biscuits, further, expand when in contact with the glue and you come back in a bit and whammo!, the whole thing is now ONE BOARD.

The best thing is: this tool has NO OTHER USES.

It is the best!

My birthday is May 19, btw.

A trip to Ace Hardware

Having finally started to grow up as I near the knoll of death, I have a new fondness for hardware stores. Was at our fave local Ace on Saturday, "buyin'"some nails. Here are some exciting things I saw:

Pig and hog rings! These go through pig/hog noses, so you can grab the pig by the ring, I guess?

The real question is: who needs these within city limits? Although, D_____ being D_____, there's probably some heavy "pig ring" scene out there among the kinkier singles. Maybe?

This also put me in mind of wondering who makes these...like, there's still some mild-ass dude who gets up in Indiana in the morning to go work at his machine turning out hog rings. His brother goes to work at some place where they make some proprietary mom-and-pop horseradish, probably.

Oh, man, how badly do I want one of these things, to mount on in the inside of the shed, next to the hygrometer and a moldering page from an Old Farmer's Almanac? It's a doohickey/template to check or test what size/type of screw you have. Imagine chatting companionably with a neighbor who says "Yeah, then I gotta go in the morning and check on some screw threading patterns..." and I can say "No, no, come on back here - I have just the thing..." then, later in high summer, same neighbor's methed-out 23-year old stepson breaks in to the shed and steals it because, in the moonlight, he thinks it looks like "real gold." Bliss!

You understand, right, that this Ramset (tm) Hammershot (tm) uses gunpowder cartridges to blast nails into cement/concrete, yes? Now read that again and imagine the childlike glee that crossed my old, dusty and wizened fizzog as my mother-in-law told me she had one IN THE BASEMENT. It is basically mine, in other words.

Then feel inordinate pity for the Bride and her mother and sisters that I am what passes for Man of the Family!

USA! USA!

Hey! I bought what must be the very last item to be produced in the United States!

It's this carpenter's square!:

Very excited to have my own.

Bring something over and I will cut it up!