DIY RIP

I saw some news reports today that DIY skills will be extinct by 2048 and I have to say I'm not surprised. Now I know they won't actually be extinct by then and the logic behind this study seems extremely flawed, but I have no problem believing they are in severe decline. I've noticed staggering DIY incompetence amongst my peers, from being unable to change a light bulb to the blank looks I get when I ask if they have a Philips-head screwdriver.

What sort of wizardry could master this screw?

I admit that I probably have a bit more knowledge in this department than most given that my father was a builder for the twenty years before I was born, and to this day is still pursuing minor construction and DIY projects in his spare time. Throughout my childhood, and my brother's the same, we assisted him in whatever project he was undertaking, this usually meant holding a light, passing tools and turning things off and on to test progress. Observation and osmosis, as well as a few 'no the pliers, c'mon you know this' comments, have left me with a reasonable knowledge of all things DIY.

There's only one problem with all of this, though I learned a lot of terms and the process through which projects should be undertaken, I was seldom allowed put these into practice. My father is a bit of a perfectionist when it comes to these things, his favourite saying being 'If somethings worth doing it's worth doing right', and so most of the time I could watch but not touch! So when there's a DIY job to be done, I'm relatively confident of how it should be done, but the results aren't always exemplary. Examples of my handiwork are dotted around the country, be it a poorly hung cabinet door, wires showing on a plug or paint spots on the floor.

Phillip soon regretted taking his father's advice of using his head when it came to DIY too literally.

Yet, though my work is often unpolished in it's finish, I do usually get the job done and it's tremendously satisfying. I really do think this decline is a sad state of affairs, I shudder at the thought of someone calling an electrician to change a light bulb! There really should be a compulsary course in schools at least for one year that teaches the basics of DIY. Transition year is an ideal opportunity for such a course, at the end of which every student should at the very least be able to change a fuse/wire a plug, change a light bulb and tell the difference between flat head and Phillips-head screws. Parents too have a responsiblity in all of this, get out there with your children and do something practical, build a tree house with them for instance.

There are of course people laughing all the way to the bank with this, the plumber getting the cost of a call out to change a washer on a tap or the electrician making a mint changing fuses on plugs. So I urge everyone to at least give it a go, especially with the internet, there's so many step-by-step instructions and video demonstrations (something I'll be discussing in another post) that there really is no excuses.

So go on, stop the decline and Do It Yourself!