Construction costs are currently skyrocketing

The youth of today love luxury, have bad manners, and despise authority. They contradict their parents, cross their legs, and bully their teachers.

The youth of today will still have to spoon out the mess of the generation before them - if it is not already too late. Therefore, I would not scold them too much ;-)

How did the quote go:
Hard times create strong men, strong men create good times, good times create weak men, weak men create hard times.
There is a lot of truth in it.

Where is that from? Crazy nonsense.

But that runs like a common thread through everything... nobody wants to go into skilled trades anymore, nobody wants to work in global field service anymore, nobody wants to do their own work anymore... this won’t work in the 21st century.

I have to say that I often have a similar mental block with manual work as I observed with my grandparents regarding technology. Aka, I often don’t really know where to start and think with every little step, "I have no idea what I’m doing here, HELP!" It’s not so much that I’m too proud for the work, but rather that I feel overwhelmed. And the easiest way out, if you can afford it, is probably "I’ll just leave that to the professionals..." We are trying to work against that (also for ourselves), but the fact is that as young adults we moved away and our focus was elsewhere for quite a while (university, starting a career, etc). We are now trying to learn a lot more on a smaller scale, but since we still have few contacts in skilled trades, we often lack the opportunity to gain experience where someone more practiced takes the reins and you follow instructions and learn how it works. (With the concentrated knowledge available on the internet, you can learn a lot, but you have to start from scratch every time – learning something completely from zero.) With bigger projects, our conclusion is often still "phew, better not." But yes, of course, to some extent this is a luxury and prosperity issue. I actually find it completely fine and understandable that people specialize. I don’t have the claim to suddenly become a craftsman on the side either ;) For myself, I just want to be able to do some things on my own, but it will never be "everything." Otherwise, it becomes problematic when we have strong imbalances in career choices that differ greatly from the needed resources. (But the "lack of people" will probably be a problem in many areas in the coming years, so it’s not just interesting in skilled trades.)

I have to install 22 handles just in the kitchen. I have already installed 9. How often do you think the holes fit perfectly the first time? Or how many times I had to heave the 56 kg fridge into the cabinet and out again until the door hung somewhat straight? Often it just has to do with practice. Practice and just doing it.

I have already installed 9. What do you think, how often did the holes fit perfectly the first time?

Did you order 5 additional doors right away or how is that to be understood? The drilling wouldn't have been too big or too small, more likely off target. But off target is off target, so misdrilled, slipped, or mismeasured… :rolleyes: