[GUNR]

1. If the required number of zip ties = N, then the amount in the bag will always = N-1.

2. The split pins you buy will look thick enough in the store, but the heads will slide through the hole    when you try to fit them.

3. When stepping over 3 tool boxes and your wife's eBike to reach for a grommet, you will inadvertently spill the contents of an open box of pop rivets just far enough away that you can't reach for your extendable pocket-pen-magnet.

4. When your wife sees you cursing about not finding those split pins and she then finds them where you have already looked; that's bloody Murphy at work again. (the ex-wife would have said "one doth not so much look as doth peruse").

5. If you have no option but to work near a long narrow grating, you can bet your left ball that when that split pin that you were feeding in while balancing on your elbow (like Marquez through a corner) the combined mysteries of centripetal force and gravity will propel that very split pin at light speed towards and into said long, narrow grating.

6. You have 4 jobs on your list and find that 3 of those jobs are postponed until you can replenish what was once a surfeit or 5mm Allen keys due to some genius using a rattle gun to 'secure' plastic to alloy with hard stainless steel domed Allen screws. Special mention must go to 'The Chaps from Chennai'.

7. Due to (6.) you suddenly discover that Murphy (or a wicked witch) has cast a spell on all of your Allen keys and they now display a consistency of cheese; but only on their ends...

8. You realise why it would be highly unlikely for anyone to make off with your GT535 tail light when it requires a key to unlock the left side cover, pull the ejector cord to remove the seat, 10mm socket and ratchet to remove 2 bolts from the inside of the mudguard, 12mm socket and extension with ratchet to remove tail light bracket side bolts, 10mm open ended spanner to undo nuts on tail light unit and finally unplug electrical connector. Nope, my tail light is safe tonight!

You guessed right; the tail light replacement was the only job on that list that wasn't postponed (obviously didn't require an Allen key...)

[Adrian II]

In my experience the garage floor sees itself as some sort of implacable pagan deity and demands a constant sacrifice of dropped or dislodged tools or components, the smaller and more fiddly examples of which will always land in the most inaccessible or poorly swept parts. Murphy might be its high priest.

A.