WHEN buying our first house back in the early days of the C***ic T***r, my wife and I decided that one of the upgrades it needed was a new wooden floor in the livingroom. Not a wood-effect floor, practical and cheap as that might be. This would be the real thing, preferably oak.
But people warned that wooden floors were problematical if not done right. So at first we resisted the lure of the flooring shop that had recently opened just up the road, one of many new businesses spawned by the building boom. It was certainly tempting, with its attractive “tongue-and-groove” jointed products and its affable proprietor Bob (not his real name), who sounded like he knew his stuff.
Against which, it so happened that Bob had already installed flooring (wood-effect) for somebody else we knew. And that, while there were no problems with the actual floor, his workmen had hit a pipe while nailing on skirting boards, causing a flood. This, of course, could have been mere bad luck.
Even so, we did some research and looked further afield. At one point, I was even in talks with a man from Kilkenny. But like many tradesmen then, he was too busy to fit us in any time soon. So finally we ignored the misgivings and went back to Bob who, when he came out to measure the room, seemed genuinely excited.
The floor would look fantastic, he said, adding that when he was finished – with our permission – he might even photograph it for use in his promotional material. Then we agreed a price. And after that, Bob handed the job over to his two very entertaining assistants, Laurel and Hardy (not their real names), who went to work.
Bob was right. The floor did look great, for a week or so. Unfortunately, the wood had not been fully seasoned and this was summer-time. So very soon, the boards started to expand. First they just groaned and creaked, as the tongues sought out extra space in the grooves. Then, when there was nowhere else to go, they started to rise in ridges, giving the floor a corrugated effect.
Not sure whether to call Bob or a lawyer, we tiptoed around the problem for a while, walking in the valleys where we could do less damage, as the ridges grew ever higher. Eventually, however, it began to look like a scene from a B horror movie: Attack of the Killer Floorboards. So we left an urgent message on Bob’s mobile.
The suspicion that ours was not the first such emergency was confirmed when Laurel and Hardy arrived very soon afterwards. Short of having a blue flashing light on their van, they couldn’t have displayed more urgency. Despite which, they were just as cheerful as they’d been the first time, while they took up the skirting boards again and chiselled bits off the floor’s edge to allow the expansion they had not provided for previously.
It would be all right now, they promised when leaving. And sure enough, it did look like new, for a while. But it was still summer and, within days, the boards were creaking again. Before long, new ridges had risen. I realised grimly that our floor had become a metaphor for the economy, with double-digit growth rates and an infrastructure bursting at the seams. So not sure what else to do, I rang Bob again.
Once more Laurel and Hardy rushed to the scene, still cheerful although now showing some signs – if you looked very hard – of embarrassment. The skirting came off again. The floor was again let out. When they left this time, there was a tacit understanding that our next meeting, if we had one, would be in the not-so-small claims court.
In fairness, at no stage of their extensive hammering operations did they hit a water pipe. And apart from the odd swelling during warm weather, or – conversely – the cracks that opened too wide during winter, the floor settled down finally. Sad to say, though, Bob never did come back to photograph it for the brochure.
Some time afterwards, in fact, his store closed. I can’t remember when exactly. But I was driving past the premises one day when I noticed that it now hosted an “adult shop” instead. At the time, this provoked the dreaded question from one of my children: “What’s an adult shop, Daddy?” Which, before I could answer, was dealt with by another sibling: “It’s a shop where they sell comics for grown-ups, isn’t it?” (That was much better than anything I could think of, so I just agreed.) The adult shop is still there today, having lasted longer than the flooring place did. But whether Bob or his friends are involved in it, I can’t say. Probably not. There are no obvious synergies between the two lines of business. Except that, according to the urban dictionary, “wood” is a technical term much used in adult cinema. And no doubt the replacement store’s products include a certain amount of tongue-and-groove-joint fitting too.
In any case, the change of use is eloquent. I can’t pass the shop’s neon sign these days without reflecting on how quickly the country went from boom to bust. Meanwhile, having learned a hard lesson about wood-flooring, I’m glad my wife and I stuck with carpets elsewhere, including the upstairs hallway, which is still what’s known in the business as a “soft landing”.