Project Garage Part I: Introduction
By Sarah Forst
If you've ever heard my explanation for why I paint my fingernails- to cover up the grease I get under them from working on cars all the time- you can understand why a large garage had always been my dream. After months of house hunting, one builder developed a plan that would allow for a 4 car garage. Of course, eventually the driveway and street will probably have more cars than can fit in the garage, but for the time being…
I'm a “shop”-aholic – Northern Tools and Harbor Freight catalogs stuff the mailbox; weekly (or daily) trips to Sears Hardware, Home Depot, and Lowes; browsing a chat list specifically for building a dream garage. The FedEx and UPS guys even have their own key! Days are consumed with mentally designing the layout, adding up the drain on Mr. Piggy Bank, and envisioning the day when the garage would resemble a (blue light special) tech center. As the house progressed from foundation to windows and siding, the garage became less a dream and more a reality.
Since Monster Garage, freebie style, isn't too probable, thus begins Project Garage, budget style. With all the money that is already poured into the pick-pockets that will occupy the 4-car space (and driveway and street…), my meager salary left me less than those dancing, suit-wearing monkeys at the carnival. That Ingersoll-Rand air compressor would look so nice next to the Lincoln Tig welder and in front of the Bend Pak floor lift, but let's be reasonable- unless MotoIQ goes IPO, I am SOL.
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| If you build it, they will buy more cars to fill it! |
I didn't have a spare arm and a leg to pay the builder what he was asking to finish the garage. By (one of the fifty) state code, all walls that are connected to living spaces must be insulated and drywalled, but the few spaces that connected to the outside were as naked as a race car's interior. An added benefit in my opinion, because it makes it real easy to daisy chain a few more electrical outlets to the side wall for the price of the wire and receptacle boxes.
