Why do men tinker?......

POGS I wouldn't have known whether to shout or cry, I love strawberries.

Mishap same with mine. I have fixed all sorts of practical things about the house and garden, (not computers) while he is still faffing around telling me how and why my relatively simple solution will not work and how it has to be done properly.

Mishap

You lucky devil, mine didn't even 'give it a thought'.

Well- my OH once cleared out a whole bed of raspberry canes which he thought were "just sticks."

Hubby and I have been in the garden today.

I took a stroll around after tea to 'admire' my hard work.

What the!!!!

I asked him where he had moved all the strawberyy plants. 'What strawberry plants" said numpty. He had dug them all up and taken them to the tip. About 20 plants gone to strawberry plant heaven.

I think I said something like " Oh don't worry sweetheart". NOT.

I blame Blue Peter and here's one I made earlier.

DH can just about turn the computer on, so no problems with botched attempts to solve things there!
He is great at decorating and anything to do with wood. Fortunately he knows his limitations and only does very simple electrical stuff, he won't touch plumbing.
He will however attempt to mend things like the petrol mower which can often result in repeated mutterings of 'bloody game !' and pieces that he has no idea how to reassemble.

And today he spent about 4 hours tinkering and the end result was that neither computer could log on to the net, except for one web address which kept leaping up at us. It has taken a long time for it to be rectified. Sigh.

Oh how I do agree about the computer! Every time he heads towards my laptop I leap to its defence - he is always updating something or adding something and believe me, it truly always does mean that my desktop gets covered in unnecessary icons, new delaying items keep popping up etc. All in the name of progress - how I wish he would just leave it alone!

I used to dread it when my husband deemed it fit to 'update' my computer. I don't let him these days, as no good ever came of his fiddling about. I like things as they are - my motto is if it ain't broke, don't fix it. Appalling grammar - sorry. I believe it's genetics with males anyway. Bless them. Superior sex? Please!!

My ex-H had two left thumbs. I finally started doing it myself - and still do!

My OH will look at a job, frown and say - that is going to be a problem, we will need to take the whole door off, realign the hinges etc. etc. Meantime, I ring the guys who installed it and they come round and spend all of 5 minutes turning a screw and all is well!

My heart really does sink when he starts doing stuff, especially computer-related as it always goes wrong. Biting my tongue is becoming harder as the years pass!

My heart sinks when I hear the words "it's only a five minute job". Inevitably it means at least a day with several trips to shops to get bits, lots of fury and swearing.and whatever goes wrong is always my fault. Doesn't age and experience teach him anything?

My man never does a job when it needs doing, I have learnt over the years not to be around him when he is working , I get told off so leave well alone and stay out of the way. We had a new toilet seat and basin taps to be fitted , taken nearly three years and the toilet seat didn't work out and ended up being thrown away, ie the NEW one , the taps were fitted by a plumber thank goodness.

I suggest we get in a qualified man to do jobs but he's not keen on that at all.

I don't NAG him about jobs to do , we redecorated our bedroom one year and this was when we were new to decorating , the new wall paper came off the walls as quickly as he had pulled the old off, went storming out so I had a go and did find it wasn't as easy as it looked but persevered.

If he is cooking I stay clear of the kitchen as it always appears to be my fault that he has dropped something or he has spilt etc etc...

I honestly am not full of criticisms and over the years have learnt to keep quiet and stay out of the way.

When he does anything he can usually do it well it's just getting him started that is the problem he likes to think about things first and I am a kind of "lets do it now or yesterday" sort of person,my dad was a tinkerer and he even had lawnmower engines in the kitchen he used to drive my poor mum to distraction with his lawnmowers,who on earth needed 7 mowers for a postage stamp sized piece of lawn

Actually your man, AKA Mr N , is not bad at Small jobs round the house also with the computer, he is getting better as he gets older. [They do say though practice makes perfect].
Only thing, lot of huffing and puffing , then much praise has to be heaped on him !
Love him really.

My DH was brilliant at fixing, building and decorating - but couldn't find his way round a computer, or anything electrical! It was always left to me to set up the computer, DVD player, TV etc which I'm not bad at - so we had a good division of labour. Now if something breaks I stand looking at it for a while trying to figure out what to do and then - very often - I ring my wonderful brother in law!

My ex left the tinkering to me. Fortunately I knew the difference between the things I could and couldn't do. DS1 is competent; DS2 managed to pull a radiator off the wall which necessitated the summoning of an expensive emergency plumber. He learnt a lesson that night.I can see the makings of a tinkerer in one of the GSs!

Not sure what is best- mine is very happy to deal (rather than tinker) with any computer problems and is very good at it and able to solve any problems.

But with the house, plumbing, electricity- he would never dream of tinkering... so either I have to tinker- or call a tradesperson ...

He sounds like a nightmare Flower !

It's not known as DIY in our house, more a case of, BIY (break it yourself)

|My ex (wonder why he's an ex) used to tinker on a grand scale. A full stair case across the door to the loft in our bedroom. Dr nearly knocked himself out when visiting my sick child.

Went down one morning to find the sink had been moved across the kitchen and the door to the kitchen boarded up and plastered.

Just got used to this when he (in the middle of the night) moved the sink back again.

Imagine how annoying it is to be wander around the kitchen in the early morning, bleary eyed trying to find the blasted sink.

He now apparently 'tinkers' with his boat. He has dropped two engines overboard. Flown another out to Ireland to replace said engines and dropped that one overboard too. He has (not tinkering) rowed out to his boat on the river Stour to forget the keys. Came back, rowed out again with keys but buy then the tide had gone out and he was marooned in a sea of mud with my children on the bank. He tied a string to his big toe then to a rubber dingy, my (then little children - 3 and 5) were in dingy. He fell asleep and they sailed out on the outgoing tide. He was woken by my eldest son, ran to the rescue, ran back to take his watch off, swam out and was 'rescued' by a motor boat who also rescued the children. This at Weymouth.

Sorry to divert post but it all comes back in a horrible 'flash back'

They say and Ex is and ex for a reason. I have many.

My sympathies too. OH decided to fix a leak in our upstairs shower, the next day he decided to do the same downstairs. This meant we both had to use upstairs shower which should have set by this time. Unfortunately upstairs shower still leaks so we are now minus showers completely.

Confused? - me too

I feel for you, happily my OH has no such notions he certainly wouldn't touch the computers and generally knows his limitations so keeps 'tinkering' to a minimum.