Yeah saw a blog post once where someone said skipping the grain test is like building a house without checking the foundation. Seems about right.

Honestly, the best finds are the ones that save you from yourself. I once spent an hour trying to drill a new hole, only to find a perfectly good, abandoned cable run right next to it from my own job the year before. Forgot I even put it there. Those old labeled wires are a gift, but finding your own past work and realizing you're the good and bad previous installer is a special kind of humble pie.

Ray's baking soda trick saved my bacon at a backyard cookout once.

That "small flame shot out" part would've made me drop it... my sister's flat iron started smoking last year and left a burn mark on her bathroom counter. She said it smelled like burning plastic for hours.

Wait, you stuck with the toddler art for two whole months?