Socket To Me

OK, let's deal with this toaster thing.

My mother asks every day if I've fixed it. Yesterday Steve and Andrew both asked Linda if I'd fixed it. My father's only comment to me was that he couldn't understand how anyone could spend that much for a toaster. Knowing me as he does, he hasn't even bother to ask if it's fixed yet.

Robert wrote to me a few days ago: "If you cannot get it back together why don't you ship it and/or bring it to CA. I can put it back in working order for you. It would be a lot nicer if it had an i-pod dock and speakers added while you have it apart. You could listen to your favorite Henry Mancini songs while making toast."

And last night Linda told me to just bring it to the people who repair toasters, and she would tell everyone I had fixed it myself.

That is never going to happen. By the end of this week, you are all invited over for a toast party (bring your own butter), because I am going to fix it. It's not as if I have been totally procrastinating. I've tried a couple of times to fix it, and in each instance I've reached the stage where I have to remove those two very small nuts you can see in the picture from Peter Eland's website.

All right, all right. I know this is only the second step - and the least complicated - and you might be thinking I would have made a bit more progress by now. But I just haven't been able to get these nuts loose with the few tools I have. (And do you know how hard it is to write about them without making it all seem like a dirty joke!)

So I went out yesterday and bought a socket set. It looked to have lots of little sockets and I figured one would be perfect.

Naturally, my next step is to go back to the hardware store, toaster in hand, and have the guy figure out what I really need to get it loose. I don't mind buying the socket set and not needing it. As I told Mom, you never know when you're going to need one. She was kind enough to agree and not point out that I hadn't needed one in the first sixty years of my life.

Going back to the hardware store is not a wasted trip, though. I have to go, anyway. While I was there yesterday I forgot to buy a new wireless doorbell. I had accidentally damaged our old one while trying to figure out why it was no longer ringing when the button was pushed.

I had assumed it just needed a new battery, but I don't think that's the case because I could make it work once inside the house. That is only convenient if you're happy to have visitors come in, ring the doorbell and then go back outside waiting for you. But I need a new one anyway since the one I removed can't be put back because I kind of ruined it while taking it down to see if I needed to replace the battery.

I must admit I like this handyman stuff, although I am finding it takes lots more time than I assumed it would. Anyhow, I will tell you when the toaster is fixed so stop asking. But if you come to the toast party, just knock loudly if there's no doorbell.