Things that didn't go as planned (aka disasters)

[Deadeye]

I already shared with you my brush with insects when bringing a honeymoon gift home from the far East.
It's a grey Thursday, so if laughing slightly condescendingly at someone less able than yourself will warm the cockles of your heart a little, read on.

It was a grey Thursday one November a few years ago. The Brains (who, you understand, is also The Power, The Money and The other half) had decided that the study floor was cold. It was stripped boards, sanded badly so they occasionally snagged your socks, with the usual knot holes and gaps between.

In truth it was a bit draughty, so I suggested carpet. The Infallible (who is also the Brains) said, no, let's fill the gaps. So I tried to caulk the gaps, with mixed success - anyway, The Chilly said this wasn't enough and insulation beneath was needed.

So I mutter and un-caulk the floor and lift the boards and mutter some more and cut and fix Celotex. It takes all weekend. And then I refix the floor, muttering, and wonder why things never fit as well when you reattach them.

Then I go to the living room to announce my triumph to The Judge. As she got up to come and inspect we heard the cat in the dining room. Now, the dining room door was shut and the cat is not allowed in there because he views the only decent curtains we have as a climbing frame. So I opened the door to chase him out... except he wasn't in there. Then we heard him again... in the living room...

...under the floorboards.

Little turnip had gone exploring while I had lunch and wandered around under the house until I'd relaid the floor.

By now I'm all for leaving Little turnip (the cat; not to be confused with our son) where he is and just buying air-freshener as required. However, The Compassionate says that's not going to happen. So I do more muttering and pull up a chunk of floor. However, Little turnip is also known as Stupid Cat for a reason, and can't find his way out.

So finally, I make the hole bigger, squeeze down and squirm along the earth under the floor until Stupid Cat runs across my face and out to daylight.

I reverse squirm, reverse squeeze, mutter some more, replace the floor and emerge covered in cobwebs and dirt to find Little turnip being comforted on the sofa, from where I receive instructions to shower and then hoover.

DIY isn't like you see it on YouTube videos.

Come on - cheer me up with yours.

 

[sammy.se]

haha, brilliant

 

[Phil Pascoe]

I did once close up a stud wall with the cat inside.

 

[lurker]

I was working under the floor (floats about two feet) installing new wiring. My access was via a hole I had built into the hall floor.
The cat had been down there with me for part of the morning. Anyway finished the job and screwed down the trapdoor I had made for the hole, put tools away. Shower and change.

Hour later wife says where is the cat?
Oh pipper , got out the tools, put old clothes back on and opened up the gap, called the cat, nothing.
pipper, got under the floor with a lamp, nothing.
Crawled back to the hole, looked up and there was the damn cat looking down at me.

 

[Steve_Scott]

Not as bad but I’ve left a phone on studwork that was then closed up... to be fair I don’t think there’s a single stud wall in the uk that doesn’t have a tape measure, roll of ptfe, pencil, remnants of builder’s lunch, etc entombed within...

 

[lurker]

About three years ago, I found a full packet, except for one, of woodbines sitting on a nogging of a stud wall that I was removing.

 

[owen]

I was working under the floor (floats about two feet) installing new wiring. My access was via a hole I had built into the hall floor.
The cat had been down there with me for part of the morning. Anyway finished the job and screwed down the trapdoor I had made for the hole, put tools away. Shower and change.

Hour later wife says where is the cat?
Oh pipper , got out the tools, put old clothes back on and opened up the gap, called the cat, nothing.
pipper, got under the floor with a lamp, nothing.
Crawled back to the hole, looked up and there was the damn cat looking down at me.

Funny that, I've taken floorboards up before and found a mummified cat body underneath! You got lucky :lol:

 

[disco_monkey79]

I bet there wasn't any health warnings on that packet! The woodbines, I mean. Not the mummified cat...

 

[user22161]

Had a (self-employed thankfully) painter doing the outside of our house. Half way up the ladder, his toupee blew off and the id iot took a dive after it. Fortunately, he only broke his shoulder but badly bruised his side as well.

 

[Distinterior]

I was in the process of fitting a kitchen for a Client about 15 years ago. I had to get up into the loft to turn off the water from the tanks.
The client kindly opened the loft hatch, pulled down the two section aluminium ladder and locked the ladders together. .....Up I went until I got about halfway up and the two ladders suddenly became unlocked and one section slid against the other trapping my hands between 2 rungs with me hanging there with my weight holding eyerything together!!!!! I couldnt move up or down and I was in agony. I eventually managed to extricate myself after what felt like an eternity and promptly passed out on the Clients landing.......I couldnt have been out for long, but I woke up to find her about to call an Ambulance coz I think she thought I was dead!!!!!

I've still got the scars across my fingers showing the damage...!!

Ever since, I've always checked to make sure the sections of a loft ladder are correctly locked before I step up and I never trust anyone else when they say they have checked it themselves.

 

[AJB Temple]

Some 20 years ago when No1 offspring was just a baby, I was fixing some electrics upstairs in the farmhouse where we lived then. We had a live in nanny. I had turned off the circuit breaker board, master switch and the relevant circuit switch, put a sign up to say do not switch on, and explained to Mary Ann (said nanny) NOT to touch it because I was working on the wiring.

A while later I found myself unexpectedly on the floor upstairs having had a really amazing electric shock, which knocked me straight down. Eventually I went downstairs and banged my head very hard on a low beam across the landing.

The nanny had switched the power back on. She had wanted something to run. I never really quite understood what she was doing but it was a shocking lesson in always treating everyone else in the house as if they are an silly person.

Since then I have used lock down cabinets. 8)

 

[HappyHacker]

I was commissioning the computer controls on a flow meter calibration rig the customer had built. As I was visiting a customer and was not doing any thing dirty I was wearing a suit and tie. The rig consisted of a multi thousand litre water tank with a 30 ft head, a massive pump and lots of 9" pipework with a few electrically controlled valves. You're getting ahead of me aren't you?

I powered up the rig and had everything running flat out, the computer display was showing a nice diagram of the valves open and pump running when the pipework broke resulting in a very large fountain. I panicked, uttered a few deleted expletives, and pressed the emergency stop. Mistake No 1. This stopped the pump but the fountain only decreased in size slightly as it was now being fed by gravity from the tank but it was still rivalling the fountains at the Las Vegas hotels in volume if not in height. The emergency stop had also turned the computer off and the electrically controlled valves were now stuck open. The lever to manually turn the valves off was under the fountain as were the valves. Mistake No2 - Not walking out and saying I went to the toilet and it was OK when I left. The customer returned just after I had turned the valves off to stop the fountain and found me looking like a drowned rat and an inch of water on the floor. He asked why his feet were wet. I don't know where the rest of the water went and did not bother finding out. He went and got a 6ft high three phase wet vacuum cleaner to suck up the water on the floor, I got a wet drive home.

 

[Stigmorgan]

So, about 4 or 5 years ago while working in the construction industry I had finished a 14 hour shift and whilst riding my bike home I could hear my drive chain was a little loose, once I got home I put the bike up on the paddock stand and adjusted the chain tension, whilst there I decided to clean and lubricate the chain, so with the engine in first gear, wheel spinning I spray the chain with WD40 and rev the engine a little to clear the chain of debris, this is where I get stupid, I take a cloth and wrap it around the end of my index finger (your starting to see where this is going aren't you) I press the cloth against the middle of the chain to dry the WD40 off before putting the lubricating wax on, what you need to remember here is that I had worked 14 hours that day before a 1 hour ride home So i was tired to say the least, my mind started to wander and I suddenly felt like something had bitten my finger and the bike engine had stalled, when I looked down the cloth was hanging from the sprocket and chain, (this is where it turns into a comedy sketch) I looked down at my finger expecting to see a bit of a mess, I knew the sprocket had bitten me but was not ready for what I saw, I had to do a double take because when I looked down I had a perfect cross section of my finger on show, bone surrounded by flesh surrounded by skin, that's right, the bike had torn the top section of my finger off at the joint, I clearly remember muttering the words "oh $h1t", I then calmly turned the bike off, locked the garage up and walked to the house, knocked on the door (this always sets our dogs off barking), she who must be obeyed answered the door shouting at me for winding the dogs up, I calmly said to her "sorry, I've Just cut my finger off" to which her response was an incredulous sarcastic "f*** off" (she clearly thought I was winding her up) so holding my hand up in her face I replied "No.... I've cut my finger off" ( told you it was like a comedy sketch) at this point she starts panicking and calls 999, I just was through to the bathroom, turn the cold tap on, sit on the floor with my hand under the tap and wait for the paramedic. Now I should probably point out that as a first aider I know the correct course of action would have been to wrap the finger in a clean cloth not hold it under water but I was really thinking clearly. The surgery to close the end up was very interesting to watch, the finger tip was never found, I think rats must has had it away. I have lots of photos if anyone is interested #-o

 

[Freddyjersey2016]

On Wednesday this week, I moved a box of paint tins on a shelf in the workshop, in doing so I dislodged a 7 pound anvil which landed on my foot. Just very pretty brusiing and a limp for the time being.
Today I am having a proper clearup in there...

 

[Racers]

On Wednesday this week, I moved a box of paint tins on a shelf in the workshop, in doing so I dislodged a 7 pound anvil which landed on my foot. Just very pretty brusiing and a limp for the time being.
Today I am having a proper clearup in there...

You are Wile E. Coyote and I claim my £5.



Pete

 

[AJB Temple]

Stig. FFS mate. That is an awful story. ( I am a biker as well so I can just imagine this so clearly).

 

[Deadeye]

So,... the finger tip was never found, I think rats must has had it away. I have lots of photos if anyone is interested #-o

Ewww.
That's not cheering me up; that's giving me nightmares

 

[wallace]

I worked at a place that supplied steal toe boots as part of the ppe. Our boss would give us grief if we wore those boots for what he called extra caricular activities. I was building my workshop out of the trench blocks. It was muddy so to stop my work boots getting muddy I wore my wellies. I was carrying the blocks to restack them and dropped one just as I was standing on another block. My big toe was squashed between two blocks, resulting in a nasty open fracture and two weeks off work

 

[Yojevol]

In our first house we had ducted warm air heating. I can't remember the reason why, but my weekend's diy demanded that I remove one of the living room air outlet grills. Mid afternoon decided it was time for a cuppa. Our little tom kitten' Snoopy, would you believe, decided it would be fun to entertain us during our tea break by looking sweetly from behind the other air grill in the sitting room. There was no way he was going to be coaxed back to the open duct so I had to remove the second grill. Kitten came out all covered in cobwebs but purring and showing his appreciation at being rescued.
Finished the now cold cup of tea and put the grills back on. Where's the last screw gone? Searched all around the sitting room floor. No sign of it. Wife remarked that our young tot of a daughter had been playing happily on the floor whilst I was on the diy. Concluded logically that the screw must have gone down a small human duct. Rushed to A&E; quick x-ray; missing screw located. Doctor advised not to worry, it'll pass through.
Next morning's nappy change delivered the lost screw. Quick sloosh under the tap and back into its rightful place holding the grill secure.
The joys of pet owning parenthood, eh.
Brian

 

[Sheffield Tony]

Hey, that's not a proper disaster. You got the air ducts swept out, and even found the screw ! Pretty good result really.