Idiots at Home Depot
 

>>And don't get me started with the idiots at Home Depot who load up the F150 with lumber and plants and then back up while you're backing up, and you've got to watch the idiot in front of you with the minivan full of petunias and juniors backing up.

I am fully convinced that if you took an average of the IQ of the people in any Home Depot parking lot, you would get a number right around room temperature. In October. With the Air conditioning on.

There is a main street that leads south up to a home depot parking lot near to where I live. The exit from the parking lot faces west. Clear stop sign and no left turn sign that doesn't allow people to turn north.

Of course, every time that I head south past that entrance some boob in a F150 or Explorer waits until I am 15 feet away and whizzes through the stop sign and turns left.

PS, why are people who drive Fords stupider than other people?

Idiots at Home Depot
 

I think the Home Depot sucks the brains out of whoever walks in the front door. It's just that the people with the F150's and Exploders have less of a brain to start with. So I'm at the Depot last night (I feel dumber already) having killed yet another house plant and the boob next to me sets off his car alarm. Yes, the horm works, please turn it off. Boob can't figure out how or why his alarm is going off (it's the button on your keychain stupid). While he's freaking out, the cart with his fertilizer rolls away from him and hits the car behind him (good thing it wasn't me, I would have killed him). So he goes to chase down his fertilizer while the damn alarm is still honking. Brings back the cart and puts it in the SAME DAMN PLACE AS BEFORE as he tries to open the door. Stupid's cart starts to roll away again and the comedy continues until I have finally cleared my way out of there.

You're right.

Idiots at Home Depot
 

BTW, don't buy plants there. The quality is much better at a nursery--harder to kill at least.

Idiots at Home Depot
 

Yeah, I usually buy the nicer plants at one of the nurseries in the area, but we just happened to be there buying 2 stroke oil and I had just killed a $3 plant so - I bought a .99 for the atrium which seems to get too hot for some of the plants I have chosen.

Idiots at Home Depot
 

I'm so off the Home Despot bandwagon. I was on it for the first year of home ownership. Then I realized that the totally unpleasant shopping experience and dusty and crunched boxes and shit weren't worth the 0 cents I was saving compared to, say OSH or the corner hardware store.

As for the infectious stupidity, I think it's the natural effect of warehouse stores of all kinds. My wife came home from Costco yesterday with five pounds of grapes. Five pounds! WTF?!?

Idiots at Home Depot
 

I made the mistake of going to Lowe's on an errand for the M-I-L. The unpleasantness and unhelpfulness of the staff made me long for the comparitively friendly environs of Home Depot.

Idiots at Home Depot
 

The OSH by our house is a shithole so we avoid it. It looks like it was built in the 60's and never restocked or cleaned. Lowes is too far and there are 2 Home D's within 10 miles of me. While I hate the Home D and miss the Eagle Hardware (before being purchased and ruined by Lowes) the Depot is all I have.

Atticus - 5 pounds of grapes is all you can get at Costco. And it probably cost as much as 1 pound at Safeway. Maybe you can get her to go back, buy some more and start that wine making business.

As an FYI, Costco is trying to get into the high end furniture business to compete with the chains who regularly rip you off for furniture.
Get your $10,000 bed at Costco

I SOOOOO Hate Home Depot
 

First of all, now, I only go to HD when it's an emergency -- Like I have no light bulbs and its 1000 PM.

Second, I can't find shit there.

And if you ask someone to help, the staff there generally are 2 steps stupider than the clientelle:

Q. Where are the light bulbs?
A. I don't know, I work in paint.

Q. Where are the light bulbs?
A. I don't know, I'm on my break.

Q. Where are the light bulbs?
A. I don't know, I work in light fixtures.

Q. Where are the light bulbs?
A. What's that?

Third, The lines are ALWAYS at least 30 people long.

Fourth, they never have the stuff I need there. Each year when it's time to put in the window air conditioners, I can't find weather stripping, etc. For the past two years, I simply go to my friendly neighborhood True Value hardware store, where I ask for "Everything I need to put in a window air conditioner" and they get it for me. And I'm in and out in 60 seconds, rather than 60 minutes. Yeah, I pay about $2.00 more but it's well worth it.

Fifth, shit is always mispriced.

I have never been to Lowes.

I SOOOOO Hate Home Depot
 

What really iced the cake for me was the introduction of those "scan it yourself" checkout lines. These cheap-ass sacks of shit can't pay another three people $7/hr to drag my bag of screws across a laserbeam? Will we be doing our own dentistry next?

I SOOOOO Hate Home Depot
 

Yeah, that cracked me up. They won't pay somebody to clerk your stuff and put it in a bag, but they'll pay people to watch you scan your stuff and help you out when you screw up. I don't see the difference, but that's the new deal with them.

I SOOOOO Hate Home Depot
 

We have had self-scan at the grocery store for about a year now. Part of me says "WTF isn't that supposed to be part of what I am paying for?" but then I suck it up because it is usually quicker to use the self-scan.

I like HD -- it is amazing how much shit I didn't realize that I needed before I went in there. ;)

I SOOOOO Hate Home Depot
 

I love the self-scan at the grocery. It's quicker, and I'm in and out in no time.

HD takes a lot of my money, and I've never had a complaint from there, but then I drive an explorer, so I'm probably one of the assholes.

I SOOOOO Hate Home Depot
 

Is it an honor system? How do they know you're not "forgetting" to scan some items?

I SOOOOO Hate Home Depot
 

That's why there are people there to "help" you by watching.

I doubt the accuracy rate is any lower than the checkers who do it for you.

My biggest issue with Home Depot is that it's been invaded by the large cos. Sure, you can get lots of hinges, so long as they're made by stanley. or insulation, so long as it's made by certainteed. My other issue is you can't buy just one of anything. It's all in packs. I needed a couple feet of PVC pipe. Could I buy that? No -- you have to buy a 10ft length, and that doesn't quite fit in the car.

It has its role; unfortunately, it's driven out of business a lot of the other bit players.

I SOOOOO Hate Home Depot
 

At the grocery store, the item goes on a scale after it is scanned. You can't scan the next item until the first item goes on the scale, and if you take it off the scale before the transaction is completed, the system yells at you and the person overseeing the whole process comes over to "help". Plus there's that whole Clerks psychology of assuming someone's watching the whole thing. Parinoia inspiring honesty, etc.

Idiots at Home Depot
 

But they have a one-year guarantee that you can't kill it. I have taken back several plants for nice fresh ones when the thing died and I honestly couldn't attribute fault to myself. I think Lowes has the same deal now and even Walmart got on the bandwagon. Of course, this won't help those of you whose sense of shame would prohibit such a return.

For bedding plants, go to Walmart - they are about half the price and they are just fine.

-TL

Idiots at Home Depot
 

Most nurseries have that deal as well.

Idiots at Home Depot
 

that's true. It's just that it's a pain in the ass to dig something up, find something to put it in and that damn receipt.

Idiots at Home Depot
 

Yeah, usually the receipt gets me. But it's the same for anywhere. ONce the plant's dead, though, any ol' grocery bag will do. And I just rip it out by the stalk.

I wonder how many returns of annuals HD gets every fall.

Primer recommendation
 

OK, so paint isn't really a gadget, but I don't really know where else to post this. I am going to be painting a room in the near future. The walls are a ghastly bright orange, with black trim. The end game is to have off-white walls with white trim, per Mrs. dL. Does anyone have a recommendation for a good high-cover primer to drown out the orange and the black, respectively?

Primer recommendation
 

This has always been the primer of choice (Or so I'm told), or one of its related options (they vary for finish and paint type, IIRC):

http://img.epinions.com/images/opti/...resized200.jpg

(btw, I'm going to throw this into the DIY thread).

And more BTW: Orange and Black? Wow. Why not wait until Nov. 1 to repaint? Or at least until the reunion is over. Go Tigers.

Primer recommendation
 

Thanks, Burger, I forgot about this thread. As for the colors, all I can say is that the previous owners of the house has interesting taste. Other rooms feature colors such as bright purple, sea-foam green, and bright yellow.

Primer recommendation
 

How long have you been living with the orange and black? That would drive me nuts.

Primer recommendation
 

We haven't moved in yet. That would drive me nuts too.

Primer recommendation
 

As a personal aside, I have now decided that painting is one of those things that I enjoy so little that I am more than happy to hire professionals to do. Let them deal with it, while you deal with figuring out how to wire up the place for gigabit ethernet.

Primer recommendation
 

Thank goodness. I am very relieved for you.

Primer recommendation
 

I'm in the process of picking out paint colors for a room. I'm going with a mustardy (dijon not french's) yellow and hoping that in ten years, whoever moves in isn't going to be cursing my name.

Primer recommendation
 

Thanks. Here's hoping that the primer is as good as advertised...

Primer recommendation
 

Fuck wires. I'm not going to bother. I am going to install one of these and be done with it. All we have are notebooks, anyway, so there really is no point to a wired system. We do very little peer-to-peer networking within the house (where gigabit ethernet would have an advantage over 802.11g), so I don't really see a need.

Primer recommendation
 

Who knew that picking colors was such a project? We just bought our first house, and my wife has busted out the inner Martha turned up to 11.

Primer recommendation
 

I bought this book to help with the color selection. It has thousands of colors that you can put side by side to see how well they go together.

There are a good 15 paint chips in the room that I'm planning on painting, and phase two of color decision may be going out and buying a quart of the top three colors and putting a swipe or two on the wall to see how they look in situ.

Shop tools.
 

Thanks for reminding me there was a DIY thread.

Anyone have strong feelings about brands of power tools? I'll be in the market for a compound mitre saw and possibly a circular saw, but the only thing I can remember from my blue collar days was that Craftsman tools are shit. Feelings about Porter-Cable? I like that they're advertised on Norm's show, but I hardly think PBS taking your money qualifies as a product endorsement.

Primer recommendation
 

Absolutely do this. Paint chips are wholly inadequate for telling how it will look, and I've found that generally teh colors are more intense in real life than on the chip (because it's a bigger area).

Even better is to buy some heavy stock paper/cardboard and paint that--two coats. Then tape it up on the wall in different places with different light..

Primer recommendation
 

I like the stock paper idea. The room in question is really sunny, but it will also serve as the home theater at night, so I have all sorts of different light situations that might come up.

Thanks!

Shop tools.
 

Bosch or Milwaukee. I would buy PC air tools, but not electric. The Rockwell years killed them in terms of quality, and they haven't made it back yet.

(ETA - my fifteen-year-old Craftsman 8-1/4 circ saw gets lots of use, and just plain won't die. I weant a new, shiny one, but can't justify it as long as this thing just keeps going. I don't understand your Craftsman comment at all.)

Shop tools.
 

Back in my blue collar days, the Big Boss was an airborne vet. The man knew his power tools, and still had both of his thumbs. He said he was more afraid of our shop's Craftsman table saw than he was of the VC. Some part of me suspected this was hyperbole, but I've looked askance at them since. I'm happy to reconsider. Sadly, the nerds at Consumer Reports don't have much on power tools, so I'm a little helpless in this department and had to draw upon the announced prejudices of others --- his was the one I remembered because it was so colorful.

I vaguely remember another co-worker's preference for particular welding gear, but my home improvement needs have not required me to draw upon my 45 minutes of Welding 101. Yet.

Shop tools.
 

I keep on wanting to learn to weld, but I have grave fears that I'd burn down the house if I got anywhere near an acetyline torch.

Primer recommendation
 

We just put up a similar color in a room, and one piece of advice: if the color is even kind of dark, use a foam roller. I'm trying to remember the name of the kind we used, but it's the little white rollers at Home Depot.

For some reason, warm colors in even medium tones go on really, really patchy. Our yellow-orange took four coats (last one with the foam, which fixed all the splotches) to get passable, while the blue in a slightly darker tone in the next room took an easy two coats with a regular roller no problem.

Primer recommendation
 

Also, a color that looks great can change drastically when put next to your rug/tile floor/pergo.

We found that all of the colors we did looked slightly greener on the walls than we had expected due to the fact that our floor tiles are really really slightly peach.

BTW, we have a bedroom painted a mustardy color I love, called Amber Waves by Benjamin Moore.

Primer recommendation
 

Red is really really sucky at hiding. Something about red pigment. Match the nap of the roller to the smoothness of the wall. The smoother the wall, the shorter the nap. About 1/4" or 3/8" should do it for decently laid drywall. Dunno about foam, but I would assume you need a really smooth wall to use it.