A new trend or, more precisely, a new cultural phenomenon is emerging in DIY. You must have seen the signs – girly is the new butch, pink is the new black and hard-nosed businesswomen are making serious calls on teensy pinkalicious mobiles. And now the shops are full of the cutest little pink tools. Pink garden implements. Pink multi-tools. Dear wee pink briefcases full of pink hammers, spanner sets and measuring tapes.
New Zealand company
Hello Dolly has one of the best ranges. I draw the line at the pink tool belt (not even the matching mother and daughter versions available at pinktoolbelts.com tempted me) but I must admit to owning the thirty-piece tool kit, which really is useful for all those little jobs around the house. I have the stud finder too (no, not that sort of stud) but I found that a necessary antidote to all that pinkness was a great big cordless drill kit from
Mitre 10 – follow the power tools link.
Now pay attention here: you don’t need a hammer drill, though it will give you credibility. And cordless screwdrivers are just dumb. You want a kit with two batteries, 14.4 volts, and pay nothing less than $60 or you will be sorry. Buy some decent drill and screwdriver bits and you will be ready for anything. But what sort of anything?
Bunnings Warehouse has a good range of downloadable tip sheets covering topics such as fixing leaky taps, regrouting bathroom tiles and mixing your own concrete. They also run Ladies DIY nights at your local store. This may sound patronising but it isn’t. It’s not your fault that you don’t know which end of the hammer to hold – get in there and learn, ladies.
But, if that all seems a bit blokey and overwhelming, there are sites designed for DIY women, by DIY women.
Be Jane, for example is updated frequently but when I looked, the headline article was “What guys hate about your bedroom” (stuffed toys and lots of frilly pillows apparently) and the featured project was building an outdoor barbecue. This has good clear pictures and simple instructions that will actually work, which is not as common as you might think in sites of this nature.
ToolGirl is also useful. It bills itself as “luminous prose about power tools, home repair, creativity and making stuff”. That may be just a little excessive – however, the videos are amusing. I particularly enjoyed the one that addressed the vital issue of preventing dried-up caulk clogging your gun nozzle.
DIY is on my mind because this week the strip lighting for the bookcase stopped working, the waste disposal unit went dead and the gas elements refused to light. Now gas is not the province of the DIYer, no matter how enthusiastic. And I’ve given up on electrical repairs after I installed the heated towel rail backwards (it turned off when the switch was on and vice versa). But waste disposals – no problem! I googled “waste disposal unit won’t turn on” and instantly found all sorts of useful help.
My favourite for simplicity and layout was from the
BBC h2g2, which is based loosely on Douglas Adams’
The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. Not that it is about science fiction comedy; rather it is a guide to life, the universe and everything with “Don’t panic” written on the front in comforting pink letters. Anyway, h2g2 says if the unit doesn’t start when switched on, check the reset button. Reset button? Good advice but still no joy. Check the fuses. Check it hasn’t come unplugged. Check the wall switch. If all is OK, unit is busted. So, with the help of
About.com (garbage disposal installation), I put in a new one in an hour. And it worked. Yeehaw! Go girl.
