I am handyman

Mama Massaro called the brother-in-law to come over and do some home repairs.

She has no faith in my handyman skills. I can’t blame her.

I guess she’s seen too much of stuff like this: A few years ago I bought a Brad Nailer –- think the Derringer of nail guns –- and an air compressor. A nail gun blasts like a gunshot when you pull the trigger. My small Brad Nailer makes more of a cough.

“I can’t use a hammer much because the tennis elbow flares up and I can’t even hold a pen to take notes with,” I told her.

“You know how many guys I’ve treated who shot themselves with nail guns?” she asked.

Like she’s a nurse or something. Wait a minute, she is a nurse.

So I was getting ready to staple some baseboard to the wall, and I held the gun up, pointing it away from her.

“Look,” I said. “This thing won’t fire unless you press it against what you’re going to nail. In fact, there’s a safety on it. It won’t shoot unless you hold the safety back like this.”

Cough.

“Heh. Heh. I’ll get some pliers out and pull that sucker out of the wall. A little spackle and paint and no one will notice. It’s just a little hole. Good thing I wasn’t aiming this toward the mirror.”

She shot me a look like she’d been sucking on a lemon and walked away.

So Reno showed up.

“What’s wrong?” he asked.

The garbage disposal quit.

And there’s a gap where the rug used to meet the bottom of the baseboard.

First thing, Reno crawled under the sink and clicked the reset button on the disposal and it cranked up like new.

Where the heck did you find that button, I asked.

“It’s on the side. It’s sort of hard to find,” Reno said.

A Republican budget proposal that doesn’t cater to tax cuts for the super-rich is hard to find. The reset button was more like impossible for me.

I had unloaded everything under the sink. I crawled inside the cabinet. I banged my elbows and knees. And then I hit my head. I was so inspired to cuss that I came up with a new phrase, but didn’t write it down and now can’t remember it. And I couldn’t find the reset switch.

Reno’s given name is Severino. And he’s the lesser half of Cathy’s sister, Sharon. They have a boarder who calls him Reno.

Disposal done, Reno and I headed off to the hardware store to get quarter rounds to cover the gap between baseboard and hardwood floor.

We went to work. My job is to track down the tools Reno leaves behind and then can’t remember where he put them.

I hauled out the miter saw. It’s electric and sweet because it has a laser eye. Only the battery wore out on it, so I suppose it’s more of a lazy eye now.

I had bought a wooden miter box some years ago. And I sawed through it.

So Reno cut and cornered the wood strips. He tried using a hammer on the cheap nails to secure the quarter rounds. Then I foraged in the garage and found the air compressor and Brad Nailer. We hooked it up. It was so easy that I even shot in a few nails.

Of course, the quarter round didn’t want to stay put on one shot.

“You have pliers?” Reno asked. “I’ll just pull it out with pliers. The quarter round will cover the hole. No one will notice.”

I learned something about home repairs that day. There’s a reason they call oak floors hardwood. It’s not so much that wood is solid hard, but it’s hard on the knees when you get down to hammer away. And they’re hard to get up from.