I moved into my house 13 years ago, and my first purchase was the window blinds required by the Homeowners Association. They have been fine for these many years, until one morning a month or so ago. As I opened the horizontal Venetian blinds, one side dropped down, then the center dropped. I knew the other remaining side wouldn't stay up for long. Out came the ladder, and I carefully figured out how to take the whole blind down from the window to have a look. As I did that, pieces of plastic fell on the floor. There was nothing large enough to identify what it had been. I collected these in a plastic bag and headed to Lowe's where I had purchased them.

When I showed the young man my bag of pieces, he had no idea what they were either. He said I needed to speak to Mrs. Smith, but she was on vacation. So after the required time period, I went back to Lowe's and asked for Mrs. Smith. She had just gone for lunch, so I waited. Another customer was ahead of me, so when Mrs. Smith turned up, she dealt with the other lady first. She was purchasing a blind for a little-used bathroom in her home. Deciding on the color, the fabric, the size took half an hour. It was a fascinating process. Then the customer wanted to make sure that someone came to install it. The instructions and assurances took another half an hour. I sat patiently watching this process and marvelling at the determination of the customer and the patience of the clerk.

Finally, it was my turn. I handed her my plastic bag of pieces. She laughed, but she knew what they were. No, they didn't sell what I needed, but she found it on the web and gave me the information I needed to replace them. She assured me assembly was easy. That point could be debated. If you knew what it looked like in the first place, maybe it was easy, but all of my pieces were broken so it wasn't quite as clear. The blinds sat on my bar stools for nearly a month before the parts were ordered and finally arrived this week. The parts themselves were cheap (and plastic). To order the 3 I needed for this blind, was about $10 and shipping was $8. So, I ordered enough for ALL my blinds.

I decided that today was the day! Me and YouTube managed to get it worked out. Of course, the parts they worked with didn't look at all like mine, but I worked it out. It took about 45 minutes, but now that I have experience and know what it should look like, I could get on much more quickly next time, provided I remember. I installed the parts and reassembled the blind and hung it up. It isn't perfect, but it is functional. Here's the photo to prove it!