Around my house, there is no such thing as a simple project.

There was the "weekend" project of sanding and refinishing my dresser, which took more than a year and was completed by my aunt and uncle. Then there was the installation of wood flooring in our house two years ago - I still haven't replaced the molding.

In short, my track record isn't that good. So, I'm not sure why I thought a Saturday morning last month would have been any different.

With the rising gas prices, I decided to change the oil in my car by myself. I hadn't done that for several years, because of a realization that it wasn't worth the hassle - oily hands and clothes, lying on the dirty garage floor, etc.

Apparently, I had forgotten those bits of wisdom. I was under the delusion that since I needed to save a few bucks, this would be a good idea.

I pulled my car into the garage and took off the drain plug and the oil filter, which in turn made my hands black with oil. Go figure.

Once the oil was done draining, I put the plug back in, tightened it and put on a new filter. The filter didn't seem to fit right, so I pulled it off, looked at it and tried again. That time, it appeared to go on just fine. I took the car off the jack stands, filled it with oil and shut the hood.

Feeling quite impressed with myself that the project hadn't taken too long, I started the car and backed it out into the driveway. At that point, I saw the 2-foot-wide light-brown swath of oil on the garage floor and driveway.

Aaargh!

After my disbelief, I sprang into action - putting the drain pan underneath the car before any more oil leaked out. I yelled for my wife's help and she brought out paper towels and went to the store for some cat litter.

"Don't get too big of a bag," I told her, hoping after she saw the mess I had just made, she wouldn't bring home a 50-pound bag of the stuff.

Now, cat litter is a great invention, for cats, as well as for wanna-be mechanics like me. Many auto parts stores sell a product specific to cleaning up oil, but cat litter works well, too. Just don't use clumping cat litter.

My wife returned with a small bag of Tidy Cat and I spread it on the oil. Then, I crawled back under the car and pulled off the oil filter. With it came the gasket from the old filter.

Note to all budding mechanics: Whereas one gasket seals the filter to the car, I can honestly tell you that two gaskets are one too many.

With just one gasket remaining, I put the filter back on and added three quarts of oil - the equivalent of what was covered in cat litter on the ground. The car hasn't leaked since.

We left the litter on the oil for a couple of hours before sweeping it up. Shockingly, all the oil was gone. In fact, the area is now cleaner than the rest of the garage floor.

Of course, then I had a bucket of oily cat litter that I didn't know what to do with. So I called up Julie Jackson, recycling analyst and program specialist for Albany-Lebanon Sanitation and Corvallis Disposal. She told me to bring the bucket to the Household Hazardous Waste event in Albany from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. Friday, Oct. 14, and Saturday, Oct. 15, at ALS, 1210 Montgomery St. S.E. The corresponding event in Corvallis is Saturday, Nov. 12, at Corvallis Disposal, 110 N.E. Walnut Blvd.

In all, the project took an oil filter, an adjustable wrench, a drip pan, eight quarts of oil, paper towels and one bag of Tidy Cat.

Once I get rid of the cat litter, my oil change will be officially completed - in about seven weeks. That's a pretty good timeline for me. On to the next project!

Mark Peterson is a former assistant news editor at the Albany Democrat-Herald. He and his wife are raising two young children in a 1,200-square-foot starter home, and he could really use his own sanctuary in it. New home improvement projects are always on the horizon, either planned or spontaneous via the curveballs that make life interesting.