I remember the time I was framing an addition for someone and was installing deadwood, often called nailers or backing. It's installed along places where the sheetrock in ceilings will end between a joist to give the end of the sheet something to nail to rather than just flap in the breeze.
Scrap and otherwise useless wood is generally used. It's a good place to use it up because nobody is ever going to see it and it is needed.
Anyway, this one time I was framing and grabbed a bowed, scabby looking stud and cut it up and headed inside with it and the homeowner took one look at what I was carrying and said he wanted no junk in his house!
I explained that the reason I was using it is because it was junk that he had paid for and that's the proper place to use it up. He was inconvinced.
"You can't nail to air," I said. He looked confused so I picked out a piece of the deadwood, grabbed a nailer and drove a nail through it. When I let it go it fell to the subfloor with a thud. I picked it up and pulled the nail and told him to follow me. We went over to the plate I was going to put the deadwood and showed him how things worked.
"It's not the kind of place you want to use clear vertical grained fir or mahogany," I said.
He looked dubious and said he wanted quality products so I pointed out that what I was doing is exactly what they do in million dollar mansions. He settled down a bit and thought about it and decided, "Yeah, maybe." I knew he was going to ask around. I completed my task.
Later when the sheetrockers hung the rock one of them commented that I had not been lazy and cheaped out on installing the deadwood nailers. I guess one of them said to him, "You can't nail sheetrock to air."
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