SomaCow

I love women, don’t get me wrong.

But they…it’s just…they can’t…they always have to…

WHY CAN’T THEY MAKE UP THEIR FREAKIN’ MINDS?!

So, you buy a house. By which I mean you visit every one of the 1,800 model homes in your area, pretending to be interested when the woman says “I love the vaulted dormer soffits” or “this would make a perfect breakfast nook!”. Look, I’m a man, I have no idea what a “breakfast nook” is. It sounds like a kind of English Muffin.

Then, you move all your furniture and crap in, which is a seven-week process, during which you nearly lose a finger in the footrest of the recliner and, even if you never set foot in the attic, you somehow always wind up with fiberglass insulation in your hair. The point is that you haul your years of accumulated “treasures” into your brand new house. Then, exhausted and most likely bleeding, you collapse onto the chaise lounge (for which the cushions have not yet arrived) and you think to yourself “Finally this is over!”.

Ha! You are a foolish little man.

Why? Because, what is the very next thing the woman in your life wants to do?

“Christen” the house by having sex in each and every room, including the closets, pantry, attic, garage and various crawlspaces in the ceiling?

No.

She wants to redecorate and remodel!

You can plan on spending every Sunday for the rest of your life moving furniture in a circular pattern around each room, until it finally winds up back where it was to begin with. The tons of furniture that you moved in by hand will, of course, immediately need to be replaced with more expensive furniture because your college beanbag chair “looks ratty next to the elegant armoire”. Hey! When we loaded up the trucks, there WAS no armoire. Suddenly, one has appeared, complete with knick-knacks (which she will now complain about having to dust). Men don’t have knick-knacks! We have old copies of Playboy! I have never dusted mine once and they are just fine!

Now that you’re $24,000 in debt with “The Home Furnishing Decor Salon Parlor and Bistro”, you can finally relax and enjoy your new home, right?

Seriously? You’re going to fall for that again?

No, now you have to open an account at “The House-Fixing Depot” because the “perfect love nest” that SHE chose has inexplicably become a “fixer-upper”. Dammit, woman! The house is only eleven hours old!

I just don’t know how to cope with the standard female trait of never, ever being satisfied with anything they have.

You want to know what I would do? You want to see my idea of “redecorating”? Do ya?!

This is a diagram outlining the most convoluted redecorating plan I could POSSIBLY ever concoct, even after twelve beers (click the pic for full-sized image):

I’m not exactly Mr. HomeImprovementPants. I’m more like Mr.
Pay Some Ethnic Laborers To Do The Job While I Suspiciously Watch Their Every Move Pants. I once built a spice rack for my Mom, but it broke. She put a spice into it.

So you may be quite surprised that I’m going to teach you how to take on such a massive project. But I am confident when I say that I am quite surprised, too. The information below was gathered by watching some of my in-laws build a “deck”. Note that “deck” is in “quotation marks”.

What you will need:

40 1×6 boards, 15 feet long
10 2×8 boards, 15 feet long
1 hammer
1 chalk line
Some screwdrivers
All the screws in the world
1 pair of long-handled grill tongs
1 case of your favorite brand of beer
3 friends who don’t like your favorite brand of beer

First, decide where to build your deck. The driveway, the attic and the liquor store are all really bad choices, take my word for it. When you have selected an area, check carefully to see whether it is outdoors. If not, choose another area.

Remove any debris from the area. Remove any trash. Remove any life forms. Remove your shirt, because you foolishly started this project on a sweltering July day. Drink one of the beers now. You’ve earned it.

Hammer the 2×8 boards into the ground, from west to east. Be sure to place one of the 2-inch sides down (very important, take my word for it). Stand at one end of the boards and kick over the ones that are not lined up with the others, because they will not provide adequate support. Drink two beers and proceed to the next step.

Place the 1×6 boards across this foundation, from north to south. Carefully screw the top boards to the bottom boards. After two or three boards, look thoughtfully at your work, then fake a groin pull. Hand the tools over to your three friends and ask them to continue. Drink several more beers.

When the work is about halfway completed, stand on the boards, testing their support. Stoop over and examine the amount of space between each board. At this point, your cigarettes will fall out of your shirt pocket and down between the boards. Retrieve them with the long-handled grill tongs.

More beers, please.

When the final board is attached, stomp on the deck and proclaim that your friends are the finest craftsmen since <insert name of any craftsman you might think of here>. Finish the last of the beers.

You may very well be wondering why you needed the chalk line.

I don’t know why you needed the chalk line.

Take my word for it.