A ccording to Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, the number of Americans injuring themselves unintentionally with nail guns has tripled since 1991. In 2005, 13,400 DIY nail-gun nasties were reported: 92% in what they call the upper and lower extremities (hands and feet to all you nonMorbidity and Mortality subscribers), but a worrying 8%, or 1,100-odd, in scarier places such as teeth, corneas and the musculoskeleton.

The report makes riveting reading. The problem, it appears, is that Americans prefer a rapid-fire action as opposed to a boring old single-shot one. To them, it just sounds better.

Why is this relevant to us? Two reasons: one, it reminds us that Americans are stupid and power-crazy; two, since we copy everything the stupid and power-crazy Americans do, anyway, it is a warning. It’s only a matter of time before we start nail-gunning our musculoskeletons en masse.

I don’t have a nail gun yet, but I did buy a drill recently in order to build what, at the time, I optimistically referred to as fitted shelves. We were about to move, and a friend who knows about these things told us that if we got rid of our Ikea student book towers and replaced them with posh built-in ones, the value of our property would triple. Or something.

Background

• Bargain hunter: The new DIY

• Home improvement

• Driller killer

• I’m a DIY disaster zone

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When the youth in the drill shop looked me up and down with a you-don’t-have-a-clue-sir smirk on his face, then asked if I needed any help, I dismissed him in the manner of someone who knew everything there was to know about drills. Then, when I – okay, it was my wife – realised I’d bought the wrong type of drill (a silly cordless screwdriver), I went to another drill shop and bought the right type (a more impressive-sounding hammer drill).

Spurred on by the doubting Thomases in my family – “Why don’t we just get a man in, darling?” – I then set about the job with enthusiasm. Enthusiasm, of course, is one of the biggest factors working against the average DIYer. If we were less enthusiastic, we would be less likely to tackle big projects, like fitted shelves, and more likely to stick with manageable ones, like maybe hanging a small picture. Enthusiasm kills.

Anyway, I had the wall, I had the shelves, I had the screws and I had the Rawlplugs. All I had to do was fix the two-be-one-be-obi-wan-kenobi bits of wood in and – ta-da!

I don’t know if you’ve ever drilled a hole in a wall before – I dare say you have – but it’s a helluva hit-and-miss affair. I needed three holes, preferably in a row, per shelf. The first hole went smoothly, ruined only by a brief argument about how I hadn’t put any dust sheets down and, look, now the carpet’s got red brick dust all over it. The second was even smoother and duly rewarded with a nice cup of tea. But the final hole, the one that would make the first two relevant, was a nightmare.

At first I got nothing and nowhere. I stopped and wondered if I’d hit some sort of impregnable iron girder (because that’s the trouble with those pesky Victorian walls). Then I pushed harder. Still nothing. I changed drill bits, to a more ruthless-looking silver one. Still nothing. So I changed angle ever so slightly and, with a sudden and violent explosion, the drill careered a good inch up the wall, taking an apricot-sized chunk of masonry with it.

“Is it supposed to do that?” asked the audience.

“We can fill it,” I replied hysterically. “I’m not sure they make breeze blocks big enough, dear.”

So I moved everything up an inch and this time the middle hole went wrong. Not a lot, but just enough to mean the two-be-one-be wouldn’t go flush to the wall. No matter: we would just have to remember only to put paperbacks (or preferably things made from papier-mâché) on that particular shelf.

And the next one. The one after that I still don’t want to talk about. Suffice it to say that for a whole bum-tingling minute, I weighed up whether it would now be less disastrous to take the wall out completely. Perhaps a nice walk-through from the bedroom to the living room would also add value to the flat?

I rallied for the fourth and fifth shelves, after a proper DIYer friend called and told me drilling was all about confidence. You have to show the drill who’s boss. The good spell was only fleeting. For the second set of shelves on the other side of the chimney, my problems were compounded by the need to line them up with the first set.

“That’s not straight,” said the audience.

“That’s because the walls aren’t straight.”

“But it’s not straight with the walls or the other shelves.”

“I’ve gone for half and half.” “So everything looks crooked?” “Yes, so everything looks crooked. Don’t you have shopping to do or something?”

Then, when I was trying to hammer a screw a bit further in because it wouldn’t screw in any more, it slipped and I hammered my finger. And dropped the hammer on my foot (“I told you to wear shoes”), then stood open-mouthed as a crack travelled a good 2ft up the wall. If we knocked through on this side, it would be into the neighbour’s flat and that would never attract buyers.

I downed tools and drank to forget. The next morning, all enthusiasm gone, I finished the job. The audience agreed to do the filling and repainting if I promised that next time we would indeed get a man in. It was a very fair deal.

Then, Foxtons, they of the annoying Minis and sharp suits, came round. And the chap actually said, “Mmmmm, nice fitted shelves.” He also said, “Ahhhhh, nice heated towel rail,” so one mustn’t get carried away.

Nevertheless, my fitted shelves made it into the sellers’ details, just below bay window, just above sunny outlook. And the flat sold almost instantly for twice what we’d hoped. Well, okay, two months later for a fiver less than we’d hoped. But I think it was those shelves that eased the deal, rather than the smell of baked bread and the freshly cut flowers.

So now I’m thinking of buying a nail gun.

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