Hah, yeah same. I grew up in a house built with hand tools sometime around 1910 (family bought it from an old lady whose father built it), not a single corner was square (though things were generally good vertically by some miracle), but it wasn’t noticeable until whenever were doing major work.

Also learned that lath and plaster needs some special consideration when screwing/nailing things for securement, as the lath (wood strips) could split, causing a subsequent crack in the plaster. Basically for screws or bigger nails, it’s a good idea to drill a small hole first to lessen the pressure, or do a bigger hole and use a spring bolt anchor.

I once measured a 80s-communally-built event space with a laser meter (it was useful to have digital floor maps for event planning). No measurement was a perfectly round number. No angle was perfectly right. Nothing really lined up. Except… there was this one set of stairs leading up to the stage. It was perfect. Every step was exactly the same in all dimensions, to the millimeter. It was perfectly level. I always wondered who this stair craftsman was, who prided themselves on doing such professional work among the presumed chaos. :-)

Lathe and plaster is my actual arch enemy. Both my parents and my in-laws have it in their houses, and I'm the go to handy man.

Hate hate hate hate hate