The duck fixed it.

Home repair and improvement can be daunting and intimidating. Fortunately, I have discovered one truth during my life. If you have a modicum of common sense and can read a tape measure, you can fix just about anything. There is really only one other skill you must possess to become a successful, all around, do it yourself repair person. You must be able to master the art of duct tape. You must be able to successfully pull, hold, tear off, and apply a three to four foot length of tape exactly where you meant to put it before you can refer to yourself as a duct tape Professional. Once you have mastered the art of duct taping, it is all down hill from there.

Duct taping is an art that goes all the way back to when the first roll of duct tape was sold and the first homemaker desperately used it to stop the leak in her vacuum cleaner hose. Realizing the amazing results, this same homemaker crawled behind her dryer and fixed the lint hose. From there, duct tape became the cornerstone of every repairperson’s tool kit. Most professional Handymen will actually hide the roll in the bottom of their toolbox so you will not realize it is part of their home repair arsenal until it is too late and the problem has been resolved.

Some people are adept at pulling long strips of tape off the roll and applying it exactly where they want it. They do it quickly, without it twisting up and sticking to itself and other things. They have it down to an art and make it look easy. My wife has developed such a knack that she can completely winterize our home in a single afternoon using nothing more than some cardboard and a roll of duct tape. Others, the ones who actually believe it is called duck tape, will never get the hang of it and will waste entire rolls trying to stop the drip under their sink or keep the police from pulling them over for their muffler smoke. These people can be easily identified by the long strips of missing hair and tacky gray gunk left on their arms by the tape they peeled off themselves. I am one of those people with one exception; I know how to pronounce it and therefore appear to be in the other group.

In today’s fashionable world, you can buy duct tape in a variety of designer colors. With this bold new line of colorful duct tape comes thousands of new and creative things you can do with it. For your convenience, I have listed just a few of them for you. I am sure you will find these ideas useful and will discover for yourself many handy tricks as well.

Designer picture frames: Putting colorful duct tape around the four sides of your favorite photograph makes an exciting new frame. If you leave a little of the tape hanging over the edges, you will not need a nail to hang it. Just stick it to the wall.

It makes a great time machine: Using small, one-inch strips, you can tape the skin on your face back to see what you looked like twenty years ago or will look like after your face-lift.

A wonderful new way to bikini wax: Do I need to explain? Wear earplugs.

A helpful dinner catcher! Do you feel like having Duck a l’Orange for dinner but you don’t not have a gun and can’t catch the fast little suckers? Well, chase them no more. Go to your local park and when no one is looking, put strips of duct tape on the ground. Make sure you place the sticky side up. Sprinkle breadcrumbs next to your duct tape trap and quickly hide in the bushes nearby. You may want to borrow a good duck hunting call to get them moving your way.

Now that you have your succulent feast ready to go, you’ll have to deal with those stubborn feathers. Presto, you have an instant duck plucker. Simply wrap duck in duct tape and peel.

As you can see, there are many uses for duct tape. So good luck to all you do it yourselfers out there and remember, when in doubt, get your duck tape out!