Hot take: hitting 100 home repairs in a year means you're either really handy or really bad at maintenance

Honestly, I kept a log of every DIY fix in my 1920s bungalow near Denver this past year and I hit exactly 102 projects. Half were small stuff like patching plaster cracks and tightening loose door hinges, but the other half were bigger like replacing a corroded water heater line and redoing a bathroom vent. Tbh, it made me wonder if I'm just unlucky with an old house or if I'm actually making progress by catching problems early. Ngl, I feel like hitting that number means I'm either in control of my home or it's falling apart faster than I can fix it. Which side do you land on with your own repair counts? Does a high number mean you're proactive or just always fixing stuff that breaks?

Had to choose between a cheap slow cooker and a mid-range one for my new apartment

I picked the mid-range $50 one because the $20 model had a glass lid that looked too thin, and now after 3 months it still hasn't cracked or given me any trouble, has anyone else had a lid break on them with a cheaper brand?

Talked to my neighbor about his sump pump and it clicked

He told me he tests his sump pump every spring by pouring a 5-gallon bucket of water into the pit. I never even thought to check mine until it was too late last August. Do you guys actually run maintenance on yours or just hope for the best?

Messed up the subnet mask on a VLAN config and took down half the office

Honestly, I was working remotely from a coffee shop in Denver and fat-fingered the subnet mask on a new VLAN, which created a routing loop that killed access for about 40 users for 20 minutes. Had to SSH in from my phone and roll it back while the help desk was blowing up my Slack. Anyone else accidentally nuke their network from a laptop in public?

My field shovel snapped right in half on a dig near Santa Fe last weekend

I was prying out a broken pot sherd from compacted clay and the handle just gave out, so now I'm stuck using a trowel and a rock for the rest of the week, has anyone else had a cheap tool fail at the worst time?

Used to spend $12 on fancy pasta sauce, now I make my own for $3

I was the guy buying those $8 jars of Rao's for Sunday spaghetti, felt fancy. Then I tried simmering a $1 can of San Marzano tomatoes with garlic and basil for 20 minutes last month, tastes way better. Anyone else discover a simple swap that saved them serious cash without losing flavor?

Hit 100 pages in my bullet journal this morning - didn't expect that

Spent $200 on a drysuit repair kit and it totally backfired lol

So I got this fancy vulcanizing patch kit for my drysuit thinking I'd save cash on shop repairs. The latex glue was a pain to spread and the patches peeled off after two dives in 45 degree water near Seattle. Ended up paying $350 at a shop to fix the same leak plus the damage I made worse haha. The kit aimed to patch small tears but the instructions were super vague and my glue job was lumpy. Now I'm stuck with a half-used kit and a lesson learned that some jobs are better left to pros. Anyone else try DIY drysuit fixes and regret it?

That old guy at the library sale swore I'd regret skipping the 1965 paperback

There's this retired librarian who hangs around the local library sales in Phoenix. He told me to grab a beat up copy of 'Stoner' by John Williams for 50 cents. I passed because the cover looked boring and the pages were yellowed. Six months later I saw it on a 'best novels you never read' list and paid $12 for a used copy online. He was right, it's one of the best books I've ever read. Anyone else had a random stranger at a book sale steer you right or wrong?

Walked through the Garment District in LA and got totally overwhelmed

I visited the LA Garment District for the first time last Saturday and it was nuts. Every store front is packed with fabric, zippers, and trim but nobody talks about how hard it is to find ethical suppliers there. I asked three different vendors where their denim comes from and got blank stares or lies. How do you guys even start figuring out if the materials are sourced decently when everyone is just pushing the cheapest stuff?