Theory vs. reality!

Last Sunday as I was trying to re-set one of my electronic weather station, I rushed onto our deck from our kitchen but totally forgot about the screen door. I kicked it out, damaging its two lower nylon rollers. Distraught by my stupid move, I began to do some research on how to fix the damage. I stumbled on that video by Prime Line, the after-market company that replaces these rollers.

Seduced by the smooth and apparently easy presentation, I went to Home Depot to get the parts I needed. My screen door is about 9 years old, so it had seen better days, is slightly bent in parts and no longer in its prime. To start with, I found the two old rollers that needed replacement extremely hard to extract. The most difficult portion of the job however was to replace the new rollers. It took me a good 30 minutes plus some immense grief to get the job done.

At one time a roller exploded and I had to put the hub back in place (I had to repeat that about 3 times). What helped me eventually was to pry open the spring loaded clip a tad more and I was able to have the bugger finally snap in place. Not an easy job for the faint at heart. Fortunately, I didn't have to kick the cat (we don't have one anymore) or say unpleasant things to my wife who was patiently holding the screen door (she would have kicked me if I had!)  All this to say that a smooth lesson in theory can stand miles apart from the grim facts of reality...