Sink or swim

After contemplating for weeks, I finally got off my butt and bought a pedestal sink to replace the leaky, rust-stained thing I had in the hovel's lone bathroom.
A Father's Day gift card from Lowe's covered the majority, the rest came from Mr. Checking Account.

Pop Quiz: How many times did Mr. Bad Example have to go to the hardware store, not including the initial trip to Lowe's?

Answer: If you guessed three, you win . . . nothing. But you are correct.

In all my misadventures in Home Improvement, I've never, I repeat, never gotten it right on the first try. It stands to reason -- if I could get it right, I would be a plumber, carpenter or handyman.
But I soldiered on.
It's funny how removal, usually, is the easy part. I say usually because I've gone to put in a water line for an ice maker only to have the ancient copper tubing crumble at the wall, water spraying everywhere and the shut off valve nowhere to be found on the property.

This time, however, there was no real drama.
1. Turn off water? Check.
2. Unscrew all lines? Check.
3. Remove sink and cabinet? Check.

Cleaning ensued and the process of installing the loomed.

After removing everything from the package, Problem No. 1 surfaced -- the water supply lines weren't the right size at the wall. So instead checking to see if there were any other problems, off we go to Ace for a remedy.
With Problem No. 1 solved, sort of, I was back at it piecing the lavatory sink together.
Only to find out the hot-water supply line with half-inch at the faucet and three-eighths at the wall. Round 2.
Only this time, I decided to make sure I didn't need anything else. Learning, slowly, but learning.
And find something I did. It seems the P-trap, that's the curvy thing at the bottom of the drain for you non-plumbing types, was about a half inch off. If the P-trap lines up with the wall drain, the down-spout drain didn't meet the P-trap at a perpendicular angle. And vise versa.
Back to Ace.
It's funny how you're greeted the second and third time in a hardware store on the same day -- "Didn't work, huh?" the clerk who helped me the first time asked.
I wonder if they have a tally sheet to see how many times dumbasses like me return.
Well, we found the right hot-water line and a flex P-trap line. Then I was off to pick up No. 2 at a birthday party. No more going back to Ace for me today -- they closed at 5 p.m. and it was already 4:15 p.m.
So pick up the kid, make small talk and head home to finally finish my project?
Yeah, right.
The flex trap had gender issues -- both sides wanted to be female. Shit, I can't have a lesbian sink. I need it fixed.
Back to the scene of the crime -- Lowe's.
Return the faucet hardware (the one that came with the sink turned out to be OK after all) and look for a non-transgender P-trap. Gotcha.
Then like magic, things start coming together. Lines connect, putty is put in place. Water is turned on and . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . it drains. No leaks (for now, the realist in me knows it will leak eventually).
But for now, I have a sink that works, isn't rust-stained and stops dripping when you turn it off.
And it only took six hours to install. A new record.