Pretty well all my life, I've had to be the master of DIY. Most people around me didn't even have the brains enough to realize that this was not one of their talents. As such was especially the case with my parents, as well as my brother (who they thought was such a genius), I found myself living in the most phenomenal conditions of utter futility. There wasn't an appliance or fixture in the house they didn't find some way of hopelessly screwing up. Thus I would wait until they were away somewhere, before venturing to put things right. Whenever they'd start looking for some kind of tool, that's when I'd take off, as far away as I could get until that dark cloud of cosmological disasters was out of sight. I remember one day, my brother, insisting on advancing his driving lessons, got in a row with my father over using the car. Well not only was this car a disaster on wheels (as one would expect of those "lunch-box" Fiats), but with those two wanting to play crash test dummy, heaven forbid! I was quietly redeeming the miss-wiring of a lamp when I overheard the argument. My father was telling him that the battery had to be changed first. This seized me with an ironic grin upon realizing the inevitable consequences, as it was my brother (despite taking an electronic engineering course) had already toasted various appliances of his own. Needless to say, after much calamity of cursing and tools being thrown about, I heard a brief "clack" followed by a louder "PAFF!" I peered out the window, in time to see the smoke seep out from under the hood. Quickly I dropped everything I was doing, and fled for the back door as the words errupted-"
You idiot, I don't fucking believe it! How could you do that?!...that's totally impossible!". Don't ask me how, but my brother got the poles of the battery reversed. Upon hearing this, I almost fell off my bike laughing...although I knew damn well I'd have to chip in a couple of thousand for a new wreck.
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