I swore my tape measure was fine for 8 years, then a $4 yardstick in my garage set me straight
I always told people the whole "measure twice cut once" thing was just something old guys say, and I trusted my eye and my tape measure to be close enough on every job. Then a few weeks ago I was building a small set of shelves in my garage in Boise and nothing lined up, off by almost a quarter inch on one side, and I kept blaming the wood and my saw. My neighbor let me borrow his cheap metal yardstick and when I held it against my tape I saw the first inch was chewed up, like the hook had bent somewhere along the way and I never caught it. Turns out I had been adding a little error to every single cut for years, and nobody ever said anything because most of my work was close enough that people didn't notice. I still think eyeballing gets you further than people admit, but I was plain wrong about my own tool being honest with me. Now I want to know, how often do you all check your tapes against a fixed ruler, or am I the only one who went way too long without doing it?