Don’t be afraid to try to fix a thing if you know it can’t hurt you, and you know you can’t break it any worse than it is.

There. This is my lesson to you. I just had to turn that into a teachable moment for Zoe, too.

This year, our house is 16 years old. We’ve lived here for two now, and the garage door opener was installed when it was built. And that means that for 14 years, the people who lived here before us were apparently content to live with a garage door opener that would fail to close every fall and winter afternoon, every year, because the sun was angled right to screw up the sensor.

Honestly, I’m slightly ashamed I went two years before fixing it. But then after ten minutes of effort, it’s solved once and for all. And all I had to do was switch the damn sensor sides so that the receiver isn’t being blinded by the damn sunlight. It’s now safely in the shade, while the laser-shooty side can happily shoot lasers through sunlight all day long and not care.

And it wouldn’t even have been ten minutes of effort if I hadn’t had to undo the electrical tape they’d used to repair the casing on the one side. They actually tried to fix it before, but couldn’t come up with the right answer. Or maybe someone ran into it I don’t know, who cares.

Of course, all of this comes to mind because I’m watching Wheeler Dealers again and it’s given me the impression that I know how to replace the suspension on a Porsche 993. Wonderful show, that. Teaches you enough to be dangerous.

In retrospect I guess the key point is knowing whether it can hurt you, or whether you can screw it up worse. WHATEVER SHUT UP.