On a more serious note than my post above, my parents, by their example, instilled in me an attitude of relative self-sufficiency and self-reliance. I only remember a handful of times when my dad paid someone else to do something as opposed to doing it himself. I was taught that, given a few basic tools, willingness to do a bit of actual work, and reasonable amounts of knowledge, common sense, and imagination, most of what we need done is well within our own abilities. My wife and I built our home from the ground up, entirely on our own. I'm pretty sure we never would have been able to do so if I'd been raised by someone who dealt with a leaky faucet by calling a plumber.