at any given moment...

At any given moment, something in our homes, or garages or work shops is either broken or about to break. You may remember last week that I had fixed our power washer. It required a part that cost less than 10 bucks including postage. Now that I presumed it to be working again I thought I'd use it to wash the car, the tractor, the garage door and the truck. It made it through washing the car before it quit. This time, it wasn't a problem with a leak as before. Now the motor wouldn't turn on, which meant, either there would be a problem with the power supply or with the switch inside, or worse. I checked that the circuit had power and then felt the cord to see if it had hot spots which would indicate a possible short circuit. Sure enough, the cord was hot in one spot. Was it a problem with the wire inside, or had it been simply sitting in the sun? I decided to give it a further test. I coiled the cord up, and plugged it into an extension cord. It worked. Perhaps the change in position of the cord held the wiring inside to reconnect. Just repositioning the cord is not a long term fix. I will need to replace the power cord. On the other hand, it worked long enough without problems to wash the tractor, the truck and garage door. And I saved the blamed thing again from an untimely trip to the landfill.

At any given moment, something in your home or garage or work shop is either broken or about to break. And the question becomes, would you rather be master of what you possess, able to diagnose and fix problems yourself or a slave to all machines?

Today I've also been making interior dividers for 7 small jewelry boxes. My objective is to get at least two of them completed to deliver to Crystal Bridges Museum Gift Store on Wednesday. With the dividers completed, all I have left is application of Danish oil and final assembly including Brusso brass hinges.

Make, fix and create...