Used to think you just had to muscle through stubborn ones but yeah, a small angle tweak makes a world of difference. Changed my whole approach after that.

Whoa hold on, I gotta push back a little on calling it "fine the first time." If your wife saw it level and it looked good to her, it probably was straight enough! But three tries isn't bad at all for a heavy mirror. Those big anchors in drywall can be super tricky. It took me four tries to hang a coat rack in my garage last month, and my wife just shook her head the whole time. So don't take it personally, she probably just didn't want you stressing over a few inches of tilt. At least you got it up and it didn't crash down!

Just set clear boundaries upfront next time and pay attention to how they handle pushback. That’s what saved me from getting played by a smooth talker.