Once upon a time, it was easy to spend days and nights working on various household projects. I would decide to do something and then just jump right in. So, for example, I needed to replace windows in one wall, then I would go get the windows and lumber I needed. The next day would see those windows replaced. But, of course, there are always nagging details that need to be cleaned up, and sometimes those things linger. You know, details like patching drywall or installing moulding.

Frankly, I don’t like those little details. I’m fine with patching drywall, provided I have a roomful of it to patch. And I’m equally fine installing moulding, but the same condition applies. I don’t like doing small amounts of these things, perhaps because the set up time is the same for a little as for a lot.

I had hoped this year to get more of my kitchen started and finished. I have been working my way around the house, as time and money permit, replacing windows and siding and fixing the interior finish, but I’ve been stalled for quite a while in my kitchen. I have about 30 feet of aluminum siding to strip, one window to fill, one to replace, some drywall to patch, and do a quick and easy installation of patterned plywood as the exterior finish (already primed, to later be painted). All of that should take me a day or two. But it’s close to impossible to start doing it.

If this was a job site, everything would have been done long ago. Especially over the last few years, I’ve become very efficient at getting work done on job sites. So much so, I barely remember being at any of them. And when I moved into this house, I could view it as a job site. That attitude allowed me to have the same level of energy in dealing with the various things that needed to be done. And the truth is, the majority of the work I did on this house was done within the first couple of years. Then I became somewhat sedated by the place. I look at what I need to do and think, ah, I’ll just do something else.

I need to set myself up a task list and find some way to enforce that I get it done. The first item on the list should be to rearrange my basement workshop.

The unfinished end of my basement was obviously a workshop for the previous occupant, also. He had a picnic-table topped workbench, a big set of shelves along one wall, a few smaller shelves scattered around, and some bizarre arrangements that had to be for storing wood and other things. As in, he had an enormous thing that had shelves four feet deep. Taking that apart yielded a truckload of 2x3s, which I’ve been using ever since. Anyway, much of what he had in place is still there. But I should get rid of it all, since it’s completely preventing any real organization of the room.

But as soon as I think of doing that, I go down there and take a look at the mess. I’m not sure there’s anything that drains motivation more quickly than realizing you need to spend the best part of a day cleaning and sorting before you can begin doing what you really intend to do.

And that’s another problem with the other household projects and the main way in which they differ from construction job site projects. On a job site, if something is in the way, you shove it to the side and do what you need to do. In your own house, the stuff that’s in the way normally doesn’t have anywhere else to go. So, you can get so incredibly distracted dealing with the junk that’s in the way, you lose all ability to get any actual work done.

And the more of this you allow to happen, the worse the situation becomes.

My conclusion: if there’s work to be done on a house you are buying, try to do the work before you move in. Or buy a house that requires no major changes. Work creeps up as the years pass, things that were good become no good, other things break. Get everything done sooner rather than later, since you’re probably going to have to do it all again later, anyway.