Floor bored.

The following is a short list of the most challenging things I have done with my body. 

1. Half marathon
2. Triathalon
3. Natural birth
4. Vipassana meditation course
5. Laying plank wood floors

Only one of these have thoroughly kicked my a$$, and only one of these I SWEAR I WILL NEVER DO AGAIN. Can you guess which one?

Laying floors goes something like this:

1. Measure the length of board needed.
2. Cut the board.
3. Bring the board to the room.
4. Squat to vacuum under where the board is going to go as nailing the previous boards just got your already-vacuumed spot dusty.

5. Squat to squeeze three strips of viscous goo the length of the board.

6. Change the bottle of liquid nails every 5 minutes.
7. Place the board and fit it to the others.
8. Kick it until it fits.
9. Use a nail gun to shoot two nails every 18".

10. Repeat 10,000 times.

My husband volunteered to do steps 1 and 2 because he's a gem.

As you can imagine, I can barely type this. And it wasn't the FIFTEEN combined hours of squat-stand-squat-stand-bend from the hip-stand-bend-from-the-hip-squat that did me in; my lower half is pretty good at doing major feats of endurance. It's my hands. And my neck. And my shoulders. And my hands. And my neck. And my shoulders.

Power tools are deceiving because while they eliminate the joint motion required to get the job done (think big arm swing to slam a nail into a piece of wood), the force needed to get the nail into the wood is still being created by the machine. And now the body has to brace against that amount of force. It's a ton of muscle tension with hardly any movement and the results are not working for me at the moment. Also, the gripping of the glue gun is. no. joke. I have a huge swollen muscle on my right hand from pulling the glue and the nail-gun trigger a billion times.

So it's the end of day two. I still have one more day to go. Fortunately I've got a hot bath waiting for me as well as my very own advanced copy of Jill Miller's The Roll Model. Holler!

If you were looking for the definitive guide to self-fascial care, here it is. This book is dense and amazing, and frankly I can't even write any more about it right now--I'd rather be doing it. The Trapezius Tamer, that is. And something for my hands.

P.S. My husband wanted my to write that laying floors goes more like this, and that he took care of steps 1 through 5:

1. Walking to the room to measure the length of board needed, which requires squatting and mathematical precision.
2. Walking to get a board and then carry it to the saw.
3. Cut the board with a craftsman's precision.
4. Wipe it clean.
5. Walk the board to the room because Katy is busy texting everyone how hard she's working.
6. Glue.
7. Go missing every 5 minutes "looking for more liquid nails."
8. Place the board and fit it to the others.
9. Complain.
10. Pull the trigger on the nail gun a dozen times.
11. Complain again.
12. Repeat 10,000 times.

Shut up.

We also moved this pile of wood from the living room (which needs floors tomorrow) to the bedroom that already had floors (thank goodness).

 Then I took this picture.

 

Good night.