Transaction Costs in Everything: Needs a Lift

 This request appeared on "Next Door," an app for communicating about neighborhood doings and information.

Many "shade tree mechanics" have their own set of ramps, some with hydraulic lifts like this one.

But if I could rent a real lift for (say) $44.95 an hour, and could schedule the time, I could get a lot more done very quickly. Oil change, tires, brakes; could do several things at once. Plus, the rental could come with a standard set of basic tools, which in the case of auto repair is both standard and quite specialized. Would need a way to check all the tools are there at the end, and are unbroken, but that should be possible if we can just use electronics to reduce (say it with me!) transaction costs.

Okay, the $44.95 is NOT HYPOTHETICAL! Anything I can imagine, some entrepreneur has already tried.  That one is in Denver, by the way. A video, if you are interested:

Given the labor shortages plaguing many parts of the country, we might see apps/facilities that rent out auto lifts, commercial kitchens....what else, folks?  The sky is the limit, if the sky were transaction costs.

Better late than never

5 years after I (with the help and encouragement of Mrs. A) built our headboard and end tables, I finally finished our bedroom set by doing the bench for the end of the bed just last week. You can clic the pics for more glorious images

Here's a close-up of the bench. All construction is just mortise & tenon with glue and a few wooden dowels for pins. No nails, screws, chewing gum.....

End table detail. The wood is mango from Hawaii and bocote from Mexico. The mango has a lot of curl in it:

Putting the headboard pieces all together simultaneously was a real challenge:

The legs for the bench were tricky to do, the stretcher is used as a through-tenon. I have to thank my friend and colleague Lex Holmes for his help and advice on this project.