Some Assembly Required

Some assembly required.  One of the phrases that strikes fear and trepidation into any parent’s heart and mind.

I remember many Christmases where Captain and I were up long after the kids putting this or that together just so Santa could get all the credit!

But it’s also a danger phrase for married couples.  Some years ago, we needed a new grill, so off we went to Menards to shop around.  Found one that was all we needed and just a bit more but still in our price range.  Now here is where Ms. Spendthrift butts heads with Mr. Skinflint.  

Me...I’d have paid $50 to have the Menards dude assemble it for us and then taken the assembled item home.  Nope, Captain was in fits thinking about spending that kind of money for something “any idiot can do.”

We get the box home and open it up.  First thing I reach for?  The instructions.  First thing Captain reaches for?  The screwdriver.  Dude...you need to look at how it goes together before you start!

He grabbed the instructions to read them--in the most loose form of the word--and went back to his screwdriver with an aside to me:  “It says it only takes 30 minutes to put together.  Piece of cake.”

Friends, it was three hours later, half a dozen extra screws and nuts left over, and divorce attorneys on speed dial before we got the thing put together!  

The next time we needed a grill, I ignored Captain and went and found a Menards dude to ask them to assemble it for us, at the going rate, only to find out that service is no longer offered.  Great…

Wanna hear the funny part?  I can get into an argument with myself when I am assembling something!  Because we do not have cable or satellite TV, we depend on a rooftop antenna.  This is a project I have done a handful of times now.  I have to use the back patio, a 52-by-16 foot slab of cement because that is the only place big enough for the assembly.  

Pals of mine, I read the instructions--out loud no less--and I still get confused!  There are wing nuts, short screws, allen screws, clamps, and who knows what-all spread all over the place.  And I’m out there arguing with myself:  “You are dumb...that clearly said an allen screw and you grab a phillips screw.  What is WRONG with you?  You need a keeper!”  Anyone walking by would have called the nearest psychiatric facility to come and pick me up.  Captain, he walked by and said “Did you read the instructions first?”

This is why he gets my multi-use tool thrown at him occasionally.

Back in the day when we were first married, someone gave Captain a kit to build a small, table-top size windmill.  You want to talk teeny-tiny screws?!  My mom helped me put that one together which went well because my mom is extremely good at that kind of stuff.  Well, except for when I tightened a screw and got her finger pinched between the frame and the screw!  Ooops…

Recently, Mama Bear picked up a used crib for us to have here when Cubby stays overnight.  The pack-and-play just wasn’t cutting it anymore.  Because it was used, there were no instructions, so we had to skip that step in the process, and Mama Bear and I were going to just wait and do it another day...as if the instruction would magically drop from heaven for us!  Captain was having none of it; might as well get it done right now.

So he starts asking for this screw or that screw and this piece or that piece.  It all came together nicely, I must say!  Problem?  Captain ended up on the inside of the assembled crib!  He was like Mike Mulligan and his steam shovel, Mary Ann...which, ironically, is one of Captain’s favorite children’s stories!

We were going to leave him in there but took pity and lifted the crib frame up so he could crawl out from underneath of it.  We got the mattress in and put Cubby in, where she proceeded immediately to start jumping.  Since nothing collapsed or broke, it was a job well done by Captain!

We have all put those Ikea computer desks together or a Sauder bookshelf from Wal-Mart.  Those are hard enough for me--I don’t know about you--that I am thankful there are smarter people than me who put “real stuff” together, like buildings and bridges and cars and houses.  

Maybe this is a good place to announce my newest “some assembly required” project.  I am working on assembling some blog posts into a book.  Because the publishing company platform didn’t mesh with my vision for a book, I am doing the self-publishing thing instead.  This truly falls into the some assembly required slot.  You have to do the manuscript, do a front cover, do a back cover, and then put it all together inside the magic of a website with user-friendly tools and voila...out the other end comes a book!

Wish me luck!  I’ll let you know when the finished product comes off my assembly line, I promise.