12 April 2013

Tramampoline!

I don't have time for much blogging these days, but I don't want to lose all of my regular readers, so dear comrades, here is an old story of mine. It's perfect for today because today I had to attempt to order replacement parts for this.

June 2010


Saturday: Got up, went to the Farmer's Market, got the very best cherry tomatoes in the world and ate two pounds of them in two days. No, really. Myself. Also got some sugar snap peas. Ate them, pods and all. Crackle had a few, Tony had a few. OYG YUM. Then we went to Canadian Tire and bought Crackle a trampoline. Brought it home and then Tony suggested a walk at Witty's Lagoon. He suggested this because he loves me. He hates hiking. Being allergic to everything doesn't help. Also, Crackle loves hiking and it tires him out nicely. So we walked the beach trail from the parking up in the left corner down to the beach.

Crackle and I walked in the water a bit and then we all walked back. Bit of a hike, that. I got a bit of a sunburn on my arms. Pop on his cheeks. Not much though. Thanks be to sunscreen.

Sunday morning, I got up early (for me on a Sunday), skipped church, and set to work on the trampoline

Okay... so it took me 7.5 hours. And why? Because I'm an idiot, that's why. What happened? First thing is to set up the ring around the outside. Basically, it's 6 curved pieces, joined by t joints. You just cram the curved pieces into the t on each side. So, that is so much easier said than done. Why? Because when one gets to the last piece, it doesn't want to go in very easily, and forcing it just pulls the previous one out. So I duct taped them (after swearing, getting Tony to help, sending Tony away for saying, "It's shit. Let's take it back" after 5 minutes of trying, trying again, swearing some more). That let me force the last piece in.

Perfect. Next, is the legs. Put the legs which are vaguely W shaped. Really low middle part of the W though. KWIM? So, these go in with one of those push-button latch things that you push down, slide the two poles together, and then the button pops up into a hole. So I start and WTF? The holes don't line up!

Tony: I told you, it's a piece of shit! Take it back!.
Me: No. This is stupid. It... SHIT! The T joints are turned around.
Tony: *laughter*

Unmentioned by the instructions, the T joints must be all turned in the same direction, and the hole must face inward. So I took it all apart, turned the T joints around, forced all the curved pieces in. Put the legs on. Flipped the thing over, and got the jumping mat out so I could attach the springs.

Me: NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

The curved pieces were on upside down. The spring holes were underneath instead of on top. O.Y.G. (aside: Oh Your God is my new favourite thing to say.)

So, I took it all apart again, turned the Ts upside down, effectively turning all the pieces around. Cram the rounded pieces in again. Put the legs... SHIT! When I flipped over the Ts, I inverted them. Stomp around swearing. Death glare to the laughing Tony.

Okay. So at this point, I'm mad, but this thing is NOT going to get the best of me. I took it apart again, carefully made sure all the Ts lined up, put the legs on, flipped it over, got the mat out and started on the springs. So... I'm not a very strong person, and the "Spring Hook" was missing. So I put on 4 of them and Tony did the rest. He used one spring to pull the other on. Worked well enough, and the good people in China provided us with two extra springs. YAY. So, Tony got those on, and I got the spring pads and covers on.

Break time. I got Pop down for a nap, and got a bit of lunch. Mostly those cherry tomatoes and some almonds I roasted too darkly the day before.

All right, Trampoline... let's get the enclosure on.

Now, the way the enclosure is attached is the poles of it are clamped to the legs of the trampoline about half way down. The enclosure poles don't touch the ground. They're clamped with a U bolt, with self-locking nuts on the prongs of the U. The bottom of the U is on the outside, so all the nuts are on the inside. PITA. So I grab the ratchet and socket set. Well shit. The sockets aren't deep enough. The instructions say to use an electric screwdriver. HUH? All I've got is a wrench. There are twelve nuts to attach, from behind. With a simple wrench? That won't go all the way around because it'll hit the other prong of the U? Forget it.

To Canadian Tire! Well, first to Rona, because it's easier to get in and out of. But the person there though that a vice grip was the only possible tool. Okay, so she's a possible tool. Anyway, I left and went to Canadian Tire. Stomped around the sockets grumping that there were no "long ones". Who knew? "deep" is the right term. Not me, apparently. So... finding help in Canadian Tire is like usually finding something at the bottom of a pool. You think you see it, but it slips away from you. And if you do grab one? Slimy. Well, I found one after some time, and behold, he was really REALLY good looking. Must be new. So I told him what I was doing and what my problem was. And he looked at me with this combination of amusement, pity, and respect that I found quite amusing myself. So, he took me over to the tools in automotive and found a deep socket in the right size. Not quite deep enough we thought, but it was the only possibility because the racheting wrenches didn't come in 11mm and the deeper sockets didn't either.

Home we go with my new 11mm deep socket for $6. YAY! Much better than the vice grip idea. Tony helped me get those on, because by then, I was a bit tired. Got those on, got on the net, and VOILA!

Tramampoline!



Woke up Monday morning and moaned in agony. Muscles I forgot I had hurt. Oh well... took a couple of Advil (after trying the herbal stuff that generally works)
Me: "Crackle, let's go jump on the trampoline!"
Crackle: No
Me: *silence* No seriously. Let's go jump.
Crackle: No
Me: Oh. Your. GOD!


(Note from now: Huh. Crackle still had the word "No" back then. I'd forgotten that!)

It all worked out in the end. Crackle adores the trampoline. He spends all summer on it. He spends half the winter on it. I bought new pads and a new net for it today after spending some interesting time on the phone with the Canadian Tire rep who insisted it had to have 4 legs, despite my staring at it telling him it for SURE had 3, and then locking myself out of the house - and the kids IN it - while trying to get the "version number" off the 3 year old tag on the mat. Thankfully, I'd left the front door unlocked.