I look back on this and shake my head over all the worrying and
procrastination I got caught up in...
Well, for some reason, I was really scared to try to lay tile. I
built a little house with my own little hands, but those little
squares of ceramic scared the crap out of me. Because it was "finish
work", I reckon.
My next house. Bathroom: previous owner had put adhesive vinyl tiles
down. Pulled up the tiles, no problem. Tried to scrape off the
adhesive, big problem. Everything I read said to make sure you get
absolutely everything off the surface of the concrete, before you put
the tile down.
I'm not going to use any toxic chemicals for anything, and apparently
that's the only thing that will remove that adhesive. I tried
scraping, scrubbing, soaking and dusting with baking soda (which
*did* help), all kinds o' things. Then I just left it like that for a
long time, and got a few other projects done, worrying about it the
whole time.
It finally occurred to me that it wouldn't be the end of the world if
the tiles started coming back up off the floor. I could just soak off
the mastic and whatever came off the floor, and stick the tile back
down. And even if the tiles broke in the process, I could just do it
over again. Tiny bathroom, *especially no big deal.
The laying of the tile was a lot simpler than I somehow thought it
would be. Several months later, still looks great. That adhesive
probably *helped keep the tiles stuck to the floor.
Also, there were a couple of low spots, and instead of going and
buying some expensive, toxic, separate substance, I just troweled on
some thinset, leveled it, and let it cure before laying the tile on it.
"Perfectionism" can really get in your way...
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