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I have developed a foolproof way

3K views 36 replies 27 participants last post by  TheDane 
#1 · (Edited by Moderator)
I have developed a foolproof way of locating a lost tool that is holding up a job without it. I lost a set of 4" scroll chuck jaws. Ordered a new set hoping for speedy delivery. This mornings email assured me that delivery of a replacement set was scheduled for today. Anticipating that I went into the shop to assemble all the other tools I thought I would need in case there was other tools that would have crawled away into some unlikely location just to hamper any progress again. Wouldn't you know it, the first tool I pick up was the wayward jaws hiding in the wrong place I had stored them last use. But I guess I will never ""NOT"" put them in there place again. I think my feeble old brain is just over full of to much nonsense stuff!
 
#2 ·
Brother, Jack you and I must have the same condition; Sometimers. Some times I remember sometimes I don't.
I have misplaced tools for days, searched high, low, far and wide then given up. Only to find them is the most obvious of places. Really makes one shake their head don't.
Hang in there buddy we'll get thru this.
My best,
Bob
 
#6 ·
Jack Lewis,

My condition is similar to yours, though perhaps more acute. I can have just had a tape measure, tri-square, ruler or pencil in hand. I set it down and, needing it 5 minutes later, look where it is supposed to be. It is not there, so I spend untold time looking for it. I keep my shop uncluttered and generally clean to avoid these never ending searches. That helps but obviously not enough. After a few minutes to an hour I find the wayward tool, right where I left it.

My conclusions are that my brain leaks from time to time and that the wayward item is always in the last place I look. Perhaps one day I will wise up and look in the last place first. That would save a lot of time.
 
#9 ·
I swear …........... hmmmm, yes I do but that's not where I was going with this. Ahhh …... oh ya, I swear that I do not have alzheimer's but I do have a serious case of oldtimers. lol
 
#10 ·
That's kind of the way it works for me as well, although in my case I usually don't find the original until I've used the replacement once or twice….making a return impossible (or not moral, you pick).
 
#11 ·
Have you ever searched for that smallish 12 ft. Stanley tape measure and found it…in your hand? I have.

And how many times have you scoured your bench top looking in vain for your safety glasses and realized that you were actually wearing them? Guilty as charged.

Not to mention that every time I'm in Home Depot I think that I need a backup of that 2-part epoxy so I throw one in the cart. When I get home I discover I've already got 3 backups.

Sheesh!
 
#12 ·
When the time comes for the estate sale, most people will wonder why I had so many tape measures. Woodworkers will know.
 
#13 ·
Not to mention that every time I m in Home Depot I think that I need a backup of that 2-part epoxy so I throw one in the cart. When I get home I discover I've already got 3 backups.

- Ripper70
My parents have done that with seasoning mixes. I've done it with 1/2" sockets.

The only solution I can think of is to make a whole another kind of shopping list: things NOT to buy.
 
#19 ·
I d like to know if somebody has developed an app to enable folks like us to track the amount of time we spend looking for stuff. Not that I would recommend buying it, because it might be really depressing if we actually knew.

- wabower
How about an app that reminds you what you came to get, when you get to the place you went to go, to get the thing that you can't remember why you came?

I'd pay good money for that.
 
#20 ·
The other day I was putting things up getting organized and set my glue bottle on the small table of my harbor Freight disk sander that sits right in front of me on the tablet, I got to needing the glue and looked all over that shop looking for it.
I'll bet I sat there and looked though it ten times then not seeing it got up to look from a different angle and still not seeing it!!!
It was 6" higher up than my mind would accept so it was invisible to me.
I finally did find it and man did it hurt to realize where it had been all this time.
 
#21 ·
hear you bro…been there done that. many times moving shop, yu find tools/materials etc you forgot was there. Like going to a garage sale of a person with your own tastes only yu don't have to pay agin! Trubble is yer so focused on moving that you cannot appreciate the moment!

And then you find the round-to-its, the stuff you wanted to accomplish but life got in the way. Whole other set of thoughts feelings etc.
 
#23 ·
I always have a problem finding my caulking gun. I run downtown and buy another one. A few weeks later I find the old one. Next time I go to use some caulk I can't find either caulking gun. Ok, cheap enough….I run downtown and buy another caulking gun. It keeps happening. Now I must have 4 or 5 caulking guns hangind up in the rafters down in my basement. I have done this with other tools too. Glad I'm not the only one that can't find stuff.
 
#25 ·
I mostly want to know where the 16,000 pencils I ve purchased over the years have gone.

- jumbojack
Have you checked behind your ears? That's where the ones I can't find always are.

It's always the last place you look where you find stuff.
 
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