In the last episode of King Fu Plumber he whipped out his trusty "tool with no name" -- that $12 thing that allows you to remove fittings from the inside. Wow, now THAT''S specialized. Later this weekend Michael was down in the basement, and when he came back up from the holds he reported, "Dude, we got a lot of tools".
These two things got me thinking a lot about tools. Fetish objects, bundles of loaded memory, coveted gadets. My father always taught me it's a lot easier (and exceedingly important) to use the right tool.
On a camping trip with a few of my gear-head frineds, we somehow got on the subject of "kit" and how there was a kit for just about any actvity. Cycling, camping, skiing, backpacking, and kayaking all require kit. We joked about what does and doesn't make for good kit for the rest of the trip. In essence it boils down to this: kit is the minimum number of things to cover a given situation without having taken too much. It's an art form. Never excessive, always just right.
Same thing holds true around the house. I have this bright orange bucket that I use to load the kit for the task at hand before slogging up whatever set of stairs separates me from the job. This for the most part works great, but here's the rub: in order to make the chiseiling kit or the plumber's or whatever, you gotta have the makings of ALL kits. Which, by definition, is bad kit.
What's the critical tool in my house kit? I first gravitated to the shop vac mostly because I like it (even though it doesn't fit in the bucket). but the truth is something simple like a tape measure is always part of the kit.
Then I went to favortie tool. Could be the bisquit joiner. Could be a couple of old chisels. Couldn't really single one out and make it stick up above all others. There it is again -- kit. The elegance of combining tools for a given situation matters more than any one element.
On a similar note about kit, in our household we have the suitcase competition. The person who packs in the smallest bag but who is the best dressed in any situation while on the given trip wins -- the kids compete with their friends when they go on school trips and we all compete internally. My kids are very scornful of people who travel with too much stuff -- and I am too.
Posted by: ivy | 2006.01.31 at 11:06
is that a challenge? let the utah kit competition begin!
Posted by: openwound | 2006.01.31 at 12:58
Well, I hadn't intended that as a throwdown --but .....
Posted by: ivy | 2006.02.05 at 17:51
I want to give the owner of tihs blog a suggestion, i have made a video for you, in which i have explained how i found a way to pull some good traffic.. just watch the video
Posted by: M Umer | 2013.01.28 at 19:42