TheBanyanTree: No Release Remodeling Hell

[Jena Norton]

I should never have gloated over our progress on Day Whatever of the Project from Hell. The Do-It-Yourself God has sent more plagues our way, testing our resolve.

First there was the realization that we needed molding, but didn't have any. We didn't have even half the floor down and were reviewing the video when we had this epiphany. The space between baseboards and subfloor varied a bit around the perimeter of the room.

What's the problem, you ask? Why not run down to the local Do-It-Yourself Temple and get it? The problem is my flooring is special order. Takes 2 weeks to get it. 

Char apparently doesn't like the look on my face or the variety of swear words coming out of my mouth in at least 3 languages (I'm not multi-lingual, but I can swear in several languages fluently). She declines to accompany me to the store because I plan to be very obnoxious. She prefers to go fold laundry.

Now, you probably think I forgot to order molding. True, I didn't order it, but it wasn't my fault. When I selected the flooring, I asked the Customer Service Technician what ALL I needed. I described in great detail what the room was like, gave him the dimensions, and asked him to order whatever I needed to do the job. Obviously, he made a major faux pas.

Let's just say that after talking to a manager, Luke the CST was not going to enjoy his return to work after his day off. They knew who waited on me because my order was still in the computer. So, they're supposed to expedite the order and pay for the express charges.

Now it doesn't really matter when the molding arrives. We have had a couple of new glitches. Glitches??? More like take it down and start over. But it turned out to be a good thing. Sometimes bad things help us find out more bad things, which is a good thing.

The glitch we discovered is that we didn't place the 1/4" spacers the right way. These are for natural expansion of the flooring and are placed all around the perimeter of the floor next to the walls. We placed them vertically rather than horizontally, thus making much larger spaces than 1/4" next to the walls on all sides we had finished. The molding would not cover these gaps.

So, we started taking the planks apart to start over. This went very quickly, of course. We decided not to worry about those pieces we had cut to fit. After all, given the variety of lengths, some were bound to fit, as were all those odd little pieces we saved.

A really bad surprise awaited us as we got to the first planks we'd laid down, the planks from hell. Underneath some of them was WATER!!!! There was no water underneath the boards around them. There was no water between the floor and the underlayment. There was no damp spot on the concrete. There was no water any place else. Just there.

We dried the area and the boards, then laid down a few boards in the same spot to see if there would be moisture the next day. We are baffled where the water came from.

At that point, we decided we needed a drink. And even though we wanted to, we didn't cry. We tried to look on the bright side, saying it was good we found the moisture and it was good we didn't have to undo the whole floor, only 3/4 of it.



Jena, Full Moon Warrior Princess