Bright Ideas.

Right, pay attention please, this is important.  You have to use the correct wall plug for the hole you’ve drilled, see all the different sizes, they’re colour coded – in this case we’re using a brown one – that shouldn’t be too technical for you, now should it?  Anyway I can’t go into the details at the moment I need to get this finished before Cameron gets back.   

What?  We’re men for God’s sake, you don’t think we’ll fight over who gets to use the drill, do you?  I just thought I’d get this picture hung before he gets back. I don’t see why I should have to wait for ‘Mr Fix It’ to get home before indulging in a bit of power play, all’s fair in love and war.  He went out, which means it’s mine, all mine. 

  

Come on, what man doesn’t get a buzz from holding a 240 volt hammer drill, with variable speed, adjustable torque settings, reverse action & motor brake for precise screw driving.  Yeah, I know, cool doesn’t even begin to describe it. 

It’s a piece of piss actually.  You mark on the wall where you want the picture to go and, using a tape measure, then measure from the top of the picture to the d-ring on the back – 3.5 inches in this case.  So, from the pencil mark on the wall you go down 3.5 inches and mark where to drill.  Hope you’re learning something here – never mind Handy Andy, just ask for Jewson Josh. Aaah, Jewson’s.  A man could spend hours in there.  You should see their range of power tools.

What?  Oh, OK.  Some people, no patience.

So let’s get onto the next step, pay attention at the back, if you don’t listen to what I’m telling you, you’ll never learn anything.  Yes, that’s better. OK, next, locate the correct drill bit.  A masonry one in this case as it’s going into brick, 6mm should do nicely.  Ah…. there it is.  I do wish Cameron would put things back in the right place instead of just shoving them anywhere.  He really should know better.  Still watching?  All that’s left to do is tighten the drill bit with the chuck key and drill the hole.   Bob’s your uncle, Fanny’s your aunt, and job’s a good ‘un. 

  

This bit’s important, otherwise you’ll shoot off across the wall, makes a right mess. Just put a bit of pressure behind the drill and squeeze the trigger.  You can…

*BANG*

Fucking Hell.  That shouldn’t have happened.  Christ, I must have drilled through the cable in the wall. What a pillock!   

Shite… this is not good, not good at all.  Not good for the drill, not good for the wall and most definitely not good for me. Cam will have kittens when he finds out.   

Oh, that’s just great, there’s no power going to the sockets now. I did go through a cable. BOLLOCKS.  I would just like to point out at this late stage, that I may have forgotten an important step when teaching you the art of drilling a hole.  Just in case you have been listening to anything I said, which I very much doubt. And you can stop bloody laughing, it’s not that funny. It’s not you that is going to have to face up to the fact that you’ve got to tell your dearly beloved you’ve just tried to give yourself a cheap perm. 

Cam warned me last time about it, too. What was it he said?  'For crying out loud, you idiot, are you trying to kill yourself?  Use the bloody tester before you drill.  You can’t rush these things, Josh, you’ve no idea what’s behind that plaster.’   

Yes, I think that was roughly what he said, and he went on to tell me what he’d do if I ever did it again.  No, I’m not telling you that bit – sod off, you nosy buggers. 

OK, don’t panic Josh, you can get round this, you’re a genius remember?  I won’t be a minute.  I’ll just pop downstairs and flick the trip switch back on.  

++++ 

Isn’t that just bloody typical – I wasn’t hanging the picture anywhere near that electrical socket.  Some idiot of a builder must have laid the cable diagonal across the wall instead of from top to bottom.  Talking of bottoms, this doesn’t look good for mine.  Cam’s going to know I haven’t used the fecking tester.  There has got to be a way around this. 

Now, granted, the obvious thing to do in this situation is to just tell Cam when he comes home.  Admit I’ve made a mistake, rushed the job I suppose, and take the consequences for my actions.  Yes, you’re right, that’s what most people would do – but I’m not like most people, now am I?  Most people don’t have a bloody paddle in their bedside drawer, either.  I don’t like that paddle – he wields it like he’s beating the dust out of a carpet.  It bloody hurts and it carries on hurting for ages afterwards.  Don’t you dare call me a wimp! 

How the hell am I going to cover this one up? All the sockets in the bedroom are on that circuit. He’s going to notice as soon as the bedside lamp doesn’t work. 

Think, Josh, think – there has just got to be a way out of this……Oh, my God, I am a genius.   It’s obvious – I’ll just hang the picture up, that’ll cover the hole and make everything look all right.  I’ll then drill a hole through the skirting board from the spare room into our bedroom and run an extension cable through it.  It’ll come out behind our bed and Cam will be none the wiser.  The bedside lamp will work and so will the telly.   

Bloody hell, I’m good.  You can learn so much from me, you know.  It’ll give me the chance to sort it out another day.  Give me a bit of time to think up a better excuse too – I’m going have to come up with a good one mind, because the only way to repair this is to chip the plaster off the wall around the damaged cable and get an electrician in.   

I’m not going to be able to cover up wet plaster that well, nor the fact that the wallpaper is missing.  Never mind, I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it – maybe I could surprise him and say I was going to redecorate.  Mmmm…I might just be able to pull it off, the bedroom does need redoing. 

OK, where is that bloody tester?  Just in case there are wires behind the skirting board.  It’d be just my bloody luck to do exactly the same thing again, now wouldn’t it? 

++++ 

“Josh, can you give me a hand?  I thought I’d put the Christmas lights up, we can run the cable in through the spare room window.” 

“Christmas lights?  Do you think that’s a good idea?  It’s blowing a gale out there, you might fall off the ladder.” 

“It’s a bit windy, it’s hardly a gale.  Come on, I’ve got the ladder out, it won’t take us that long.” 

“I don’t know… you’re always going on at me about safety.  Let’s give it a miss today - the wind might have died down a bit by tomorrow.” 

“What’s got into you?  I thought you wanted the lights up.  At least you did last weekend.  You moaned like hell that everyone else had their decorations up already and we hadn’t.”  

“And I still do….its just that I don’t think it’s safe to do at the moment. If I tried that, you’d say I was acting irresponsibly, that’s all.” 

“Well, let’s live a little dangerously shall we?  Come on, it won’t take us that long...” 

“No… I suppose you’re right.  I’ll hold the ladder.” 

++++ 

Now what the hell am I going to do?  I’ll have to find a double plug. I’m sooo glad you’re finding this funny.  I think there’s one in the sideboard somewhere.  Ah, yes…here it is.  Better get upstairs, open the window and plug the cable in before he does.  If he sees the extension cable he’s going to wonder what’s going on. 

“CAM, I’m just switching the lights on, you go outside and see what they look like.”

++++  

“Josh, did you switch the Christmas lights off?” 

“Mmmm?” 

“OK, sleepy, I’ll do it” 

“’K.”  

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“NO!, I’ll do it, you…clean your teeth.” 

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“Why have you plugged the extension lead in? You don’t need it to…..in fact, I think I’d like to know why there appears to be a hole in the skirting board that wasn’t there a few days ago. It appears to have the extension lead running through it…. into our bedroom.  What have you been up to?” 

“Nothing….nothing at all.  OK….. don’t give me that look.  It was an accident.” 

“Accident?  What sort of accident?  What have you done?” 

“Er…well… it’s a long story.  You’ll laugh when I tell you.  I wish you’d stop looking at me like that.  There’s no need, you know…I was going to tell you anyway.” 

“Really?  Had you chosen a specific day for this revelation? A surprise Christmas present by any chance?” 

“You’re a right sarcastic sod, do you know that?  It’s totally uncalled for.  Look, I had a bit of an accident. I drilled through the cable when I was hanging that picture.  It’s no big deal.  It just slipped my mind, that’s all.” 

“Ahhh…and you didn’t think you’d tell me about it at the time….last week maybe?  When it happened?  Your memory appears to be getting worse.  I wonder why that is?  So how did you manage that then? Because I’m sure that after the last time, when you didn’t bother with the cable tester, that I made you a promise.  If I remember right, I told you that if it happened again I’d come up with a unique way of implanting it into your memory.” 

“Look, there’s no need to get waspy.  I can assure you it won’t happen again.” 

“Oh, yes, I fully agree with you. I’m very sure it won’t happen again.  Go and get me the paddle and bring it back here.  I think you should be looking at that extension lead when I make my impression.”

++++

Why are you still here?  You can sod off, all of you, go on.  If it wasn’t for you distracting me in the first place, I wouldn’t be in this mess.  No, you bloody well can’t watch. 

“OK, I’m coming!  There’s no need to shout.”