Here’s how we partied it up New Year’s Eve:

Home Depot run. (Relax, we went to McDonald’s afterword. Wait, that’s not a New Year’s Eve hotspot either?!)

I have a love-hate relationship with big-box, do-it-yourself stores. Really, it’s more hate than love, but for the sake of an interesting read, let’s put on our rose-colored, STEM glasses. It’s heaven. One can find the supplies to carry out one’s calculations and engineer anything from a shed to a homemade rocket. It’s a blank slate–even better, it’s got power tools and raw materials!

My hatred stems from being sent to find this and that for the latest fixer-upper projects my rocket scientist insists on doing himself (Don’t get me wrong, I love it! It may be a hassle, but it’s cheap!) Even utilizing their amazing app, through which my husband can send me the aisle and bay number of the item requested, they’re sure to keep it from being too easy.

Take a few weeks ago, I had to run in to get a few items needed to finish the basic construction of our backyard storage shed. It was just a few items, and I had in my hand the exact location of each in the store. But I knew better than to be hopeful for a quick trip through Home Depot. Such a thing does not exist.

I probably made my way up and down aisle 24 at least 5 times looking for bay number whatever, with lumber as far as the eye could see. I was looking for roof edge flashing. I gave up, and wandered around a bit till I discovered ANOTHER AISLE 24!! What? What’s the point of numbering the aisles if there are more than one of each number IN DIFFERENT LOCATIONS?! Am I the only one to whom this does not make sense?

Needless to say, I found it, got out of there, lived to tell of other Home Depot Adventures. Cheers, to do-it-yourself-ers and their projects!