I can’t help it - that header up there always makes me think of painting and decorating. It may be stretching a point, but there is craft in such simple things as slapping some paint on a door or wall-papering a room. Like most things, there are two ways to do it: rush at the job and get it finished, knowing that nobody will know the difference, or do it properly and get that feeling of accomplishment at the end.

If you want to feel good about your work, it’s worth finding out a little about how to go about it before you start. Take paint, for instance; invariably, someone decides that room A needs a bit of sprucing up, rushes down to the hardware store and comes back with some paint, ready to have at it. But there is paint and then there is paint. If you’re going to paint the walls, it is worth spending a little more money and getting the best quality of paint. You will save in the long run that way.

All paint is essentially little “bits” held in suspension in a liquid. The more expensive the paint, the more “bits” and the better the covering power of the paint. So a wall that might need two coats with a cheap paint will only need one if you’re using quality paint. Unless the good paint costs twice as much as the cheap, you’re already ahead. Add in the saving in time and you’re laughing.

Picking the right gloss paint for woodwork is much less of a chore - just grab the cheapest you can find. There is very little difference between the various types and a cheap brand can be made to cover as effectively as an expensive one. It’s true that non-drip paint does not drip - while it’s in the can. As soon as you start to spread it, however, the gel becomes liquid and guess what you’ve got - common old gloss paint! So buy the cheap stuff and I’ll tell you how to put it on so that it doesn’t drip.

In a later post, of course…

The world-famous British model-making kit company Airfix has gone into administration, prompting an outpouring of nostalgia for its products. Many older people have memories of assembling models of Spitfires and Lancaster bombers in their childhood.

Millions who grew up in the 1960s and 70s remember spending their weekly pocket money on plastic model kits and polystyrene cement on Saturday mornings.

Many also recall the chore of glueing, assembling and painting anything from Spitfires, Saturn 5 rockets, soldiers and sailing ships, to railway rolling stock, armoured vehicles, classic cars and even dinosaurs.

“Kids still love them and often parents enjoy playing with the kits with their children as it brings back memories from their own childhood. Retro-toys such as Airfix can help in promoting parent-children relationships in this way,” says spokesman Daniel Himsworth.

The BBC says “For speciality shops like the Swindon Model Centre, it’s really terrible news. But a spokesman adds that Airfix has been losing ground to computer games for about seven years (the company has also stopped introducing new kits and is just repackaging old ones). Airfix prices have also risen sharply in recent years.”

I remember Airfix kits in my own youth and had a few of them. I didn’t like working with plastic, though, preferring models made of balsa wood and paper, even though they didn’t look “real” as the Airfix models did.

Does anyone have any memories of Airfix kits?

I’m on vacation this week, but don’t worry, I’m swatting up on great crafts to bring you on my return in a few days.

Stay tuned for some terrific ideas for the fall/autumn season and the runup to Christmas and all the festive holidays.

Duncan Cairncross

It’s a runaway best seller in the UK, especially to baby boomer men, who are also buying it for their sons.

It’s Conn and Hal Iggulden’s The Dangerous Book for Boys. DBB, as we’ll call it, summarizes all those activities and crafts that boys used to do before TV, computers and video games came on the market. Many of them are now effectively banned by the Health and Safety “police” who dog our lives and make them unnecessarily miserable — especially for boys.

For North Americans, I should tell you the book is very Britain-oriented, in that it contains bits from Shakespeare and poetry from Kipling and other patriotic poets and authors.

Nevertheless, it contains a lot of Boys Crafts, which is why I like it. For instance, how to make “the greatest paper plane in the world”. Now there’s something to know about.

How to construct a battery, build a treehouse (oh, the danger!), make a bow and arrow (is this a terrorist’s manual?), make water bombs (it is a terrorist’s manual), and invisible inks, marbling paper, understanding girls (very coyly done), tricks with dogs and skimming stones on lakes.

In short, my sort of book. If you want to know about “The Golden Age of Piracy”, it’s all here. From making a pinhole projector and a crystal radio to grinding an italic nib, it’s a veritable treasure trove.

So, if you’re interested in boys’ crafts, or crafts for Real Men, you know where to go.