A Mickey Mouse Operation

We are running a Mickey Mouse operation, I have no doubt about it.

That's the term my grandfather would use. He would use it when something was cheap or suspect. For example, that car that you bought that has now broken down 6 times after leaving the lot, well, you bought that from a Mickey Mouse dealer. Or the people that made your computer that is now infected digitial gonorrhea, that's a Mickey Mouse operation.

Or the 7 foot homemade pole that I have in my hand. That is certainty Mickey Mouse.

I'll admit, I haven't unpacked all of my tools yet. That's a problem but the truth is I don't have any place to put them. So as a result, sometimes I am forced to use other instruments that were not designed to be tools. Such as a butter knife as a screwdriver. Big time Mickey Mouse.

This time it's that my ladder is about 6 feet too short to go where I need to go.

The problem with buying a foreclosed house is the amount of repairs that need to be done. In this particular case, the dryer vent leading to the outside is blocked, stuffed with lint and god knows what else. I'm guessing it's where the last owners stuck left over body parts from there massive killing spree. I might find a gold tooth.

The dryer vent has a plastic covering over it that I suppose is supposed to block birds and whatnot from getting up there. However, it does an equally good job of keeping things in. Believe it or not, it's something designed that works to well. It is the Alcatraz of dryer covers, not Mickey Mouse at all. Only my solution to the problem is.

The vent is on the backside of our house, where our walk out basement comes out. As a result, it's about 3 stories up instead of 2. My ladder can't reach it, which probably has saved my life as my ladder buckles a little every time I lug my pudgy frame on it. But this has to be fixed because otherwise we can't dry the massive amounts of laundry that my family comes up with. Seriously, it's like I'm working at a laundry mat, only without the drive through service.

I fully blame the kids and the wife for this one. They all go through a minimum of 3 outfits a day. I wear the same jeans for 3 days in a row. This isn't me this time. I mean, god damn, can we all just manage not to drop something red and wet on ourselves?

My solution is the pole of destiny, the mickey mouse tool that I have made out of a broom handle, a 3 foot scrap of wood, a coat hanger and a roll of duct tape. Duct tape should never be given to any man, ever. With a roll of duct tape a man is convinced that he can fix anything and it will hold. All because of Apollo 13 where they fixed a filter and made it back. We all think we can do that. It's given us some false sense of hope. Surely if duct tape can fix millions of dollars of machinery, I should be able to create a tool, no problem right?

It's not the genius of NASA engineers that fixed the space shuttle, it was duct tape. We totally forget about the combined experience and intelligence of everyone involved and give full credit to duct tape, the greatest invention ever. It should be banned from all households unless you have a degree from MIT and you can prove that you have never used it to tape a buddy to a wall.

But it's not banned and I've got it into my head that my 7 foot constructed Pole of Destiny can do this job without killing me or maiming my family. I will probably only lose an eye. Then I will sue the makers of duct tape.

The scrap wood is taped to the broom handle. On top of the scrap wood is the remains of a coat hanger that I have bent into a hook. I got this idea from constantly using the same coat hanger to dig the large amounts of hair out of the shower drain. Again, I am bald. This one is not my fault either but somehow I end up with the job. Mickey Mouse all the way.

I climb up on to my ladder to about as high as I can go without an oxygen mask and a Sherpa to guide me. Now it's time to see if the pole will work. My wife is "helping" by having the phone ready with 9-1 already dialed making it a little bit quicker should something go wrong, which it probably will. This is how my wife normally "helps". I think she does not have any confidence in duct tape.

I push the pole up and use my years of game playing, which has given me tremendous hand/eye coordination, to thread the end of it through the opening of the cover. Tension builds, the ladder groans. A lone bird flies by. I pull.

Poof, a big wad of lint comes out.

I am AWESOME! I am not running a Mickey Mouse operation! I am running a finely tuned 500 power horsepowered masterpiece of parenting! I throw my hands up in the air in victory, almost fall off my ladder just as Hossmom was dialing the last 1, and get ready to complete the task at hand with my pole of destiny.

As I get ready for round two of lint cleaning and walking on water I notice that my pole is about a foot shorter than it was a minute ago. I look up and the coat hanger part of my pole has come loose and is currently hanging from the vent.

Shit.

I am running a Mickey Mouse operation.