I took the office van up to the Frisco office yesterday with a few of my tools in the back, plus screws and polyurethane glue, to do a furniture repair.

The conference table that needed repair stands on two legs, each a big slab of particle board. The truly stupid thing is that these legs were only secured with three 1.25" screws to the 2 x 6 particle-board beam that runs under the length of the table. Talk about bad engineering! The screws had pulled out when the table was moved, and the leg also separated from the table top. So I had to flip the table (with help, because it's massive), disassemble the loose leg, and reassemble it, using 3" screws and polyurethane glue for reinforcement.

But of course, my drill battery was about dead, and I had forgotten to load the spare battery and the charger, so I went to Home Depot to see what I could do. A twin-pack of regular batteries is $59, no charger included. Two newfangled lithium batteries with a charger (they require a special one) would have been $120. And a drill with two lithium batteries and a charger was $99. So I bought it, and now own three cordless drills, four chargers, and four batteries... Sounds like the Department of Redundancy Department.

(This morning I discovered that I have a 10% off coupon for Home Depot in my briefcase. Too bad I didn't think to check yesterday...)

When I got back to the Frisco office, I discovered that the new batteries were completely dead. I put one in the charger and went to hang a cork board in another room. By the time that was over, the battery had enough juice to finish the table. I found someone to help me turn the table over and put the glass back on, I packed up all my tools... and then found out that there was a table with the same problem in the next room.

So I rebuilt that one. Twice. It separated from the table top when we flipped it the first time. I hadn't used extra screws to attach down the plate that goes on top of the leg and screws into the table top. Four 3" screws and fresh glue left it more securely fastened, and then the table held together. (I wish I had done that on the first table.)

The office van's inspection sticker was dated 4/2009, so I took it to a local auto dealer where the office has an account and got it inspected. They took me to McDonald's in their courtesy vehicle, since I had worked through lunch, and I sat and ate my double cheeseburgers and drank lemonade and read the May issue of Touchstone. The music in McD's was loud and unpleasant. After about an hour, a driver came to pick me up. I got back to the Dallas office just before 5:00.

*****

Monday nights is church softball. I slipped twice in last week's game, so I went to Academy Sports to look at cleats. They had a few brands that go up to size 14. The first and only pair I tried was on clearance for $9.94. It had metal cleats, so I had to spend an additional $6.99 for plastic replacement cleats. But $17 for a pair of cleats that will probably last the rest of my life (as little as I play) is not a bad deal.

By the time I got to the park, it was almost game time. I took a drill with me to the field and changed the cleats in the stands as the game before ours finished. Then I put the drill under the dugout bench with my regular tennis shoes during our game.

The cleats made a big difference in security on the sandy infield. Unfortunately, they didn't miraculously turn me into a hitter. I grounded out both times I was up. And we lost again, albeit only by two runs this time.