etherboot: trouble w/ bootp

[ac <aoc@vii.dyn.ml.org>]

i followed the docs verbatim, but just can't get it to work. tcpdump -i
eth0 reports no activity; ifconfig eth0 (rx) tells me the requests are not
reaching the server. i've checked whether bootpd and tftpd are running and
they do appear to be:

netstat -ua
Active Internet connections (including servers)
Proto Recv-Q Send-Q Local Address           Foreign Address         State      
<snip>
udp        0      0 *:nfs                   *:*                                 
udp        0      0 *:tftp                  *:*                                 
udp        0      0 *:bootps                *:*                      
</snip>

below is a brief-in of what i've done. 

1. compiled the kernel for client  
2. cat ../floppyload.bin 3c509.lzrom > /dev/fd0 
3. created the /tftpboot and /tftpboot/192.168.2.2 directories
4. executed the nfsrootinit script 
5. commented out these lines in /etc/inetd.conf

tftp dgram udp wait root /usr/sbin/tcpd in.tftpd -s /tftpboot

bootps  dgram   udp     wait    root    /usr/sbin/tcpd  bootpd -c
/tftpboot -d9 /etc/bootptab

6. edited /etc/bootptab

gridlock:ht=ethernet:ha=006008406224:\
rp=/tftpboot/192.168.2.2:sa=vii.dyn.ml.org:\
sm=255.255.255.0:gw=vii.dyn.ml.org:ht=ethernet:\
hd=/tftpboot:ip=192.168.2.2:bf=vmlinuz.gridlock

7. tagged the image

mknbi -x -k zImage -o /tftpboot/vmlinuz.gridlock

i also made 4 different copies of the rom on disks just to be sure
there's nothing wrong with floppies, but still no go. i've prettymuch run
out of ideas here, as you can see, so any help at this point would be
appreciated. thanks in advance.