Wednesday, October 18, 2023
When setting up to do the thing takes longer than doing the thing
While on route to the weekly lunch with some former cow-orkers, my car notified me that the front left tire was low on pressure. 'Tis not a problem, I thought, as we have an air compressor and tire attachment at Chez Boca.
Once back at Chez Boca, I began to set up to inflate the tires with said air compressor and tire attachment. The tire attachment, easy to obtain. The air compressor? Not so easy, as it was nestled in the middle of the garage among various wood working and gardening tools. I ended up having to hoist this 50 pound (23kg for those unwise in the ways of Imperial measurements) tool up and over some obstacles.
Then, power. The power cord on the air compressor is pretty short, and the nearest outlet that I could see was in the middle of the garage, nestled in the middle among various wood working and gardening tools (it's a long, horizontally mounted power strip along a table). All I had to do was find an extension cord.
And lo', next to the garbage can was a nice sized spool containing an extension cord. One end was visible, the other end, not so visible. In the end, I had to unspool the entire cord to find the other end—perhaps 50′ (15m for those of you not living in the U.S., Liberia nor Myanmar) spilled out across the floor.
Then a couple of minutes to get the power, air hose and tire attachment hooked up, and I was ready to inflate some tires. I think I spent about fifteen minutes total setting up.
Two minutes inflating tires.
Then another five minutes putting the tire attachment away, air hose coiled up, respool the extension cord, and hoisting the air compressor back into it's place in the garage.
Twenty minutes to do a two minute job.
Sigh.
