I overthink a lot of things. After more than 4 decades of tightening and loosening nuts and bolts, I can still confuse myself about which way to pull the handle of the ratchet when it’s facing away from me. The mnemonic “lefty-loosy, righty-tighty” works great when you are looking directly at the fastener you’re about …
My office door isn’t plumb. That bugs me. It isn’t far out. You can’t see it. Really, its only noticeable if there is weight on the coat hook on the back of the door. Because then it falls partially-closed. Not fully-closed mind you. Not even mostly closed. Just closed enough to look sloppy. If my …
Garage Monkeys. That is how Pirsig and Crawford describe them. Each writes about a different species: Pirsig about repair techs who lack arete and Crawford about the middle managers who stand between vehicle owners and vehicle repair techs. They are adjacent parts of the modern automotive service-shop organization and both offend something at my core. …
It’s one of my favorite parts of a repair job: a symbolic transition, instantiated in the physical act of switching the ratchet from “loosen” to “tighten.” In terms of the sense of satisfaction it brings, it is rivaled only by the moment a newly-repaired mechanism starts and operates properly again for the first time. For …