Author Topic: Been feeling pretty good about my "in-sourcing" lately....until today  (Read 3081 times)

MatthewK

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So inspired by the do it yourself attitude, I recently started changing the auto's oil myself, repaired a coolant leak in my wife's van, Installed two new casement windows in our basement and various other things around the house, and I must say it feels pretty good. Then today happened, first floor toilet leaking water into basement. I figure"I've got this". Replace wax ring maybe and be all set. Well after removing toilet, then vinyl, then subfloor and now down to floor boards and it's soaked all the way through. Maybe I "don't have this". Kinda feel like a chump but I had to call a pro, I'm not up to this level of cutting away floor, putting in patch etc. That's not the end of it, also found out my 150,000 mile Subaru is going to need about $700 worth of work consisting of wheel bearing, rear sway bar, front sway bar and bushings, ball joints...So in my anger and feeling of defeat, I broke out  the old timey cylinder push mower and cut my grass with that versus my fancy highpowered wheel chair lawn mower (tractor). I now feel I reclaimed a teeny bit of badassitty.

COEE

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Re: Been feeling pretty good about my "in-sourcing" lately....until today
« Reply #1 on: August 10, 2016, 08:31:59 PM »
Chin-up... the more you do the better you get... I've had to call in the big guns from time to time.  I've also saved thousands of dollars doing things myself.

I once spent hours in the crawl space trying to clear a clogged toilet.  And got a face full of raw sewage.  Gross.  After all that work and humiliation - I still had to call a plumber.  He cleared the problem in about 20 minutes... and didn't even break a sweat let alone get dirty.

Moral of the story - sometimes you win, and sometimes you still have to fork over the cash... also never EVER flush tampons down the toilet.

LeRainDrop

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Re: Been feeling pretty good about my "in-sourcing" lately....until today
« Reply #2 on: August 10, 2016, 08:34:55 PM »
I once spent hours in the crawl space trying to clear a clogged toilet.  And got a face full of raw sewage.  Gross.  After all that work and humiliation - I still had to call a plumber.  He cleared the problem in about 20 minutes... and didn't even break a sweat let alone get dirty.

It's like when you can't get the lid off a jar and then someone else opens it without a problem.  "Oh, I must have loosened it for you first!"  ;-)

pbnj

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Re: Been feeling pretty good about my "in-sourcing" lately....until today
« Reply #3 on: August 11, 2016, 06:41:24 PM »
Consider yourself harass by all the money you didn't spend on the above projects that would normally have been outsourced! 

pbnj

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Re: Been feeling pretty good about my "in-sourcing" lately....until today
« Reply #4 on: August 11, 2016, 06:43:48 PM »
Badass.  Not harass.  Sorry, hate the autocorrect on the phone.

RobFIRE

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Re: Been feeling pretty good about my "in-sourcing" lately....until today
« Reply #5 on: August 12, 2016, 01:39:07 AM »
I wouldn't be worried about that. There is a balance to what you learn to do yourself, time invested and money saved, versus what you pay others to do, convenience and no risk at cost. Clearly useful if you can cover the routine and basic tasks yourself, avoiding paying $50 or so for a 5 minute job that comes around every few weeks or months. That's worth it. However, if your car needs a specific repair, it may be that you will never own a car that needs that repair again, whereas a mechanic does one of those a week. Is it worth you spending potentially days to learn and do that repair, sourcing second hand parts yourself to save a few hundred $ or so? If you really like cars, then maybe yes. Otherwise, I think there are times to accept that paying for a professional is the right choice.

Matt Ridley (evolutionary biology author) wrote in his "Rational Optimist" book that specialisation is a key part of what has transformed humans from subsistence living to a modern lifestyle. I agree with him. While outsourcing everything (e.g. buying prepared food all the time rather than cooking for yourself) isn't right, neither is it right to feel you need to do everything yourself (you're not going to insist on mining your own iron ore, smelting it, making your own nails for a DIY job you do yourself are you?).

Dicey

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Re: Been feeling pretty good about my "in-sourcing" lately....until today
« Reply #6 on: August 12, 2016, 10:25:36 AM »
Ha! DH is extraordinarily skilled and even he hires another pro occasionally. Sometimes it just makes more sense. Be glad you can afford it and move on.

 

Wow, a phone plan for fifteen bucks!