The Roller Shade

My desk at work is very close to a window. This afternoon when I went to sit down in my chair, I rolled a bit and lightly bumped into the window covering. It sprang off its track and tumbled down on me. I was fine, and after closer inspection, all the pieces of the roller mechanism were in good condition. If nothing broke, I should be able to pop that thing back up there, right?

Right.

I love stuff like this. Little puzzles. I love it. I quickly figured out how this particular shade worked and where everything would fit. However, there was one piece that I could not get on. I knew exactly where it needed to go, I just couldn't figure out how to get it there. While I'm playing with this piece my coworker comes up to me, sighs, shakes her head and says in an oh-silly-Myriah voice, "You need some help with that?"

No. My answer is no. I'm doing just fine, thank you very much. Also, this thing fell on me, which means I get the pleasure of solving this puzzle. DO NOT take that away from me.

Outwardly I said, "Uh, sure."

She took over and I went back to work. Back to work in the space that she was now occupying, which made things a little cramped and a little difficult to completely ignore her and not worry about the outcome of the window shade like I had promised myself when I said, "Uh, sure."

But I cared! I wanted to be the one to put it back together! So I looked with bated breath as she said, "Oh, I know what the problem is, we are missing a piece!" And then she looked around for the missing piece. I found it my duty to point out to her that we were not missing any pieces, and if she wanted proof of my statement, she could look at the other properly assembled window shade on the next window over. Yup, we had an example.

We went through this rigmarole a total of three times. Finally, she got the window shade up and said, "There, it's up!"

I looked over with jealousy burning in my eyes and said, "What's that piece on the file cabinet?"
All jealousy gone.
Exasperation setting in.

"Well I got it up, didn't I?"

"Yes, but it's not complete."

"Well, I can't get that piece on. It's impossible. This is good enough," and she walked away.

After about 20 seconds of unsuccessfully pretending I didn't care, I sprang up and said, "Can I give it another try?" Like I'm some meek, small-willed person. Yeah right. GET OUT OF MY WAY SO I CAN FIX THIS THING! Within a minute I had it all figured out. All the pieces were in their proper place, and the shade works fabulously.

I will rest well tonight.