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a home + living guide for the post-college, pre-parenthood, quasi-adult generation

05.14.2001

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hammock heaven | 1 2 3 4
continued from page 3
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2. Next figure out how high you’ll want your hammock to be. Here’s where a friend will come in handy. Have the friend hold one end of the hammock at one support while you hold the other end at the other support. Once you’ve decided on the optimum height, mark where you’ll want to place the hooks. Bear in mind that when you actually sit in the hammock, it’ll bow and hang much lower to the ground. For example, my hammock, which measures 12 feet from reinforced loop end to reinforced loop end and 7.5 feet from spreader to spreader, has hooks spread 10 feet apart and mounted 5 feet high. When we actually sit in the hammock, there’s only about 6" of clearance at the lowest point. This works out just fine for us, but if you wanted more room between you and the ground, you could either place the hooks farther apart or mount them higher up.

3. Drill holes where you’ve marked the hook placements in step 2 above. Remember to use a drill bit that's the same size as your plastic anchors if you're drilling into concrete; use a bit that's slightly smaller than the diameter of your screws if you're drilling into wood.

4. Screw in the hookscrews/eyescrews. You can insert a screwdriver or any other sturdy long object through the eye to help tighten the eyescrew; with the hookscrews, a vice grip (best) or pliers will come in mighty handy.

5. If you’ve used hookscrews, just pop on the hammock as is. If you’ve used eyescrews, use the s-hooks as connectors and attach the hammock.

6. Now for the fun part: try out your new hammock. It’s very, very difficult to actually fall out of a hammock – those suckers are way more stable than they might at first appear. I’m a supremely clumsy person and still, I’ve never managed to actually get myself dumped on the ground when attempting entry. Just pull the hammock underneath you, and sit yourself down – gently! -- somewhere in the center. Lean back and swing your legs around and in, then wiggle around till you find a good balance (lying diagonally seems to work well). Kick back, relax, and enjoy!

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