A tile tale

How long does it take two people, a man and a woman who are married, to buy twelve boxes of ceramic tiles for a bathroom floor?

Three months.

Okay, so that isn't the world's funniest joke, but we finally have our bathroom floor tiles after so much tearing of hair.

The story of the new bathroom began last September. We bought the new suite, Brian put down the cork tiles, did all the plumbing and it looked as if completion date was nigh.

Then we had a leak. Not one of Brian's joints, but on a proper plumber's joints. Hot water. VERY hot water. It melted the cork tiles. We decided they were a bad idea.

Which is why, in December, Brian went into a tile shop and brought home three samples. We liked one of them, it looked nice in the bathroom, so we decided to buy it. Brian took the samples back.

That is the point at which he should have bought 12 boxes of tiles, but he didn't, because Christmas with all its incumbent expenses was nigh, as was January with the promise of sales.

So, in January, we visited Focus. We found the tiles and we disagreed. They were £5.99 per pack in the sale. But I didn't like them. I wanted nice, warm charcoal grey slate effect tiles. Bri said they were too dark and instead plumped for tiles the colour of sun-bleached, dead camel bones on the Sahara.

"We have a black dog," I reminded him, envisaging chasing said dog and his four muddy paws around daily with a mop. Surely the tiles should match the dog?

Impasse. We both sulked. For three months.

So yesterday we headed to the first of our three nearest Focus stores. Focus in Cardigan didn't have my favourites, or Brian's. But they did have a third choice, a possible compromise.

"Let's see what they've got in Haverfordwest," suggested Bri, thinking fondly of breakfast at Vincent's on the way.

It was the same story in the Haverfordwest Focus too.

"Let's go to B&Q," we suggested. In Carmarthen.

"Yuk," I said looking at tiles supposedly made to look like slate, but in fact looking and feeling like concrete. One benefit, we supposed, was that they eliminated the need to pumice one's hard skin.

"They give me the nadgers," said Brian.

So we went to Focus. The third Focus of the day, in the third county of the day. We decided to buy the compromise tile, of which there were hundreds.

"How much?" we asked the handle-bar mustachioed man who was in charge of the tiles.

Miraculously the Carmarthenshire tiles were twice the price of those in Cardiganshire and Pembrokeshire.

"Something doesn't want us to buy these tiles," Bri said. We left.

On the way out of the estate, tile-less and despondent, I spotted a tile shop.

"Why don't we go there?" I asked.

"That's where I got the samples from last year," he said.

They had 14 boxes left of our original choice. We bought 12 of them.

So how long does it take a husband and wife to buy bathroom floor tiles?

Three months, three counties, hundreds of miles and many 'discussions' in the tile aisles. Then we bought the first ones we saw.