Beware Flying Hammers

Let me preface this story by stating I've caught a wicked sinus infection thanks to all my allergies, with the added bonus of PMS thrown into the mix. So I'm feeling just peachy!

Last night, despite feeling miserable, nose running faster than Man O' War ever could, and cramps that would have felled Mr. Universe, I decided to work on my living room floor. Remember how I bought all that laminate flooring back in February? Yeah, it's still sitting there, pretty much untouched.

I had, at some point in early March, taken the contents of one box out and laid the boards out on the floor after tearing up a strip of carpet. However, I did realize that the laying of laminate flooring was not a one-woman job. So what was I thinking last night??

To tell the truth, the PMS hormones were running amok and my thinking was askew, possibly due to the added affects of all the Benadryl. I've been unable to get a family member to volunteer to help, so last night became an "I don't need them! I don't need anybody!" kind of insanity. (Did I mention that today's my birthday? That's another added dose of craziness.)

Anyway, I pulled up what I had already put down, started over, and made my first cut to finish out a row. I second-guessed myself and ended up sawing the board incorrectly, but whatever. I finished the row and started the next one with the piece I had miscut. Finished out the second row with help from Izzy and Jake. (And of course I mean that in the loosest form.)

The third row is where I went over the edge. Now, for those of you who have laid your own flooring, you see where this is going. You know I've been wrestling with those stupid little plastic tabs you place between the edge of the flooring and the wall so you keep your 3/4" spacing correct as well as getting the edges of each piece to line up. The first piece went down okay, the second piece took some hammering to get it in place, and the third, well, somehow as I was hammering it into place, it threw off the entire first and second row. All the joints were messed up and the only way to fix it is to take everything apart and start all over again.

This is the point at which my rubber mallet went flying across the room. Did you know those things bounce? I avoided the boomerang effect and burst into tears. Once again, I had to admit I needed one other person in the room just to, at the very least, stand on the boards and weight them down as I work on the next row. I stomped out of the room muttering about how every man I've ever known in my life has been a major letdown. (Hot shower and cup of tea time, perhaps?)

Moral of the story--don't try to lay flooring while sick and PMSing.