Second Saturday - The Wall

"The bad workman blames his tools." - Proverb

The confidence I built last Saturday wielding power tools dissolved yesterday when our task was to build a wall. Perhaps the most fundamental project in home building, the thing might just as well have been the insurmountable Berlin Wall to me.

At least I know what bothers me about it — numbers. I do not work well with numbers. It may be a mental hang-up as my Mom pointed out during a recent phone conversation. Whatever it is, I always flashback to middle school and high school math classes when I was the only one that didn't get it. Everyone else flew right by me.

So, my eyes crossed when Gary of Lowe's began talking about measuring "16 inches on the center" for studs, but actually you measure 15 3/4 inches to adjust where siding will be nailed.
(Www.doityourself.com explains that, "This 3/4 of an inch adjustment is made so that the edge of your first piece of sheathing or siding will come to the outside edge of the corner stud rather than the center of it. All sheathing [except the first and last piece] needs to fall on the center of the studs to provide a nailing surface for the adjoining piece of sheathing.")

Oookay?

Oh, wait, but first you had to "sight" the wood to turn the "crown" up. At this point I'm assuming the crown is the natural bend in the wood?

Then there was my confusion with the corner studs — we used two studs sandwiching blocking — and having to compensate there for overlapping walls.

I was hopelessly lost. I melded into the crowd until it came time for nailing. Nailing I can totally do — just show me where.

And this is where the leaders separate from the followers. Group dynamics have begun to form — there are the ladies that have worked on do-it-yourself projects like this before and jump in with gusto, nodding knowledgeably with every bit of information Gary shot forth. Then there are the others. I'm in that group. My previous experience includes nothing more than nailing hooks into walls to hang pictures and following step-by-step instructions to assemble book shelves and DVD racks with pre-drilled holes.

But by God, we got that wall up and secured into place. (With practically no help from yours truly.)

And I feel bad. I feel like I'm letting the Women Build team down by not getting how to build a wall. In order to redeem myself, I am going to march myself into Lowe's this week and ask to be shown again.

I am going to get it.

Check back on Sunday, Sept. 30 to read my blog on the third class covering exterior siding installation.