Here’s a little bedtime story for you lovely readers:
Once upon a time, a beautiful princess named Ivory got a wild hair to put in her own laminate floors. (After all Princess TL did it ten years ago, so how hard could it be?) She borrowed a chop saw and bought an inordinate amount of quickly discontinued Pergo. No room for mistakes!
Prince Mr. Ivory entertained the mini-princes and princess and protected them from the evil laminate dust while Princess Ivory laid board after board in place. She even did her own doorways (called transitions) with a concrete drill.
When it was finished, the whole kingdom turned out to praise Princess Ivory’s fine job. Even Duke Handyman, who didn’t do floors because it killed his knees, bragged on her to his Handy-friends and customers. Everyone was impressed with her amazing skill.
Everyone except the hundred year old washer (hereafter referred to as Ken). Prince Zachary and Ken waited until the hullabaloo died down and the whole kingdom finished their celebrations and went back to life as normal. Then, they struck. Three days after the festivities, Princess Ivory started a load of laundry…and Ken dumped 40 GALLONS OF WATER into her newly floored hallway! Thinking fast, Princess Ivory disassembled part of the floor and propped it up with towels and a fan to dry underneath the uber-sensitive particle board. She saved all but the seams, which swelled and peeled in a most impolite fashion.
Visitors could not see the damage unless Princess Ivory pointed it out to them directly and made them stand with their heads cocked in the hall lamplight. “Ah, yes, there it is. It’s not bad at all. In fact, if you hadn’t put a spotlight on it, forced me to wrench my neck, and scoot over it in bare feet, I’d never have noticed!”
Princess Ivory regained her floor-installation joy. This infuriated Ken, who was now in a retirement home with Duke HandyMan. Ken then put an evil spell on Tiny Prince Zachary which induced him to dig under all of the hall transitions with keys and then break them into thirds. (Of course it was Ken’s spell…my child do that on his own? Bah.)
Then, if that weren’t enough, Ken called upon his cursed impolite seams to burst from their shackles and refuse to join end to end with anyone! Disobediently, sliding at will from one end of the hall to the other with the slightest foot traffic, exposing the red underlining!
So, Princess Ivory replaced her abused transitions, which were immediately pried up again, and attempted to rejoin the maimed end boards which refused to cooperate.
Princess Ivory felt quite defeated….
TO BE CONTINUED
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