gentoo on a laptop

I'm trying to install gentoo on my Dell Inspiron 1100 (I know, I know, but it was cheap =P).

I got all they way through the install manual, right up to where you "emerge grub"...at that point it gives me this error message:

>>> Merging sys-boot/grub-0.94-r1 to /
cat: /proc/mounts: No such file or directory
cat: /proc/mounts: No such file or directory
*
* Cannot automatically mount your /boot partition.
* Your boot partition has to be mounted rw before the installation
* can continue. grub needs to install important files there.
*

!!! ERROR: sys-boot/grub-0.94-r1 failed.
!!! Function mount-boot_mount_boot_partition, Line 53, Exitcode 0
!!! Please mount your /boot partition manually!

!!! FAILED preinst: 1


I'm almost positive I did everything up till now correctly, so I'm totally baffled. I've tried umounting and remounting the boot partition, same with proc, but to no avail. At this point I'm thinking of starting over...seeing as how I haven't rebooted in days cause I've been setting this all up, do I have to start completely over, or can I recover anything? I.e. do I have to re-bootstrap and everything?
(or even better, can anyone think of a way to get emerge grub to work?)