Saturday, March 12, 2011
WANT
Despite the fact that this video excerpt is essentially an acid trip on my favorite television show, and that the message is essentially counter to my entire personality, I do still kinda want it as a ringtone... And by kinda, I mean REALLY A LOT!
Sunday, February 20, 2011
Awesome things...
So I was made aware of this other blog where people are outlining 1000 awesome things. That is pretty awesome in itself... Makes it easy to locate a little awesome in the mundane any time I feel like I need a little more awesome in my day... Well, that page and this one... Basically they make me feel a little better about life. (Which is totally different than feeling better about yourself by pointing out the utter folly of others like this site, or maybe this one.
I've got a few things that I think are awesome in everyday life that they haven't covered:
1) When the shuffle mode on the iPod goes on a really great run of songs that just perfectly suit your mood or lift you out of a funk... Sure you can continually skip songs to get to the ones you want to hear more, but every once in a while, you pop that bad boy on, hit play, and BAM, instant musical success that just keeps getting more awesome as it progresses. For those of you old enough to remember tapes, think of it as the REALLY REALLY superior mix tape. You know what I'm talking about. The one where it was really evident that the tracks were carefully considered and arranged in a great order to maximize their awesomeness. (Yes, there are also plenty of great mix CDs, but it began with the tape dammit.)
2) That one day that comes along every season where you can officially recognize that the season is changing. You might not always recognize it, but when you do it's AWESOME... You step outside one day and you come to the realization that the new season is making its annual debut. Sometimes it's that first really genuinely sunshiny day after a long gray winter, or the first day where it's genuinely hot enough that you know in your bones that summer is here. And then there's the day after roasting all summer that you realize that it's sweater weather again and that you're about to spend weekends raking leaves and watching football (if that's your thing,) and as the temperatures drop, you can leave the windows open and shut the A/C off. Winter is a little trickier, because a little frost isn't really a strong indicator of winter... Winter is a seasonal change you can smell... It smells like firewood and even that is unreliable depending on how quickly the neighbors decide to get the wood-burning fireplace going... But there is a day in there where you just know. AWESOME.
3) Getting hit on (or complimented) by someone who you thought was out of your league... Married folks, this still applies to you. Nothing ever has to come of it, and yeah, that hottie might be turn out to be a total douche nozzle, but every once in a while somebody just hits on you or gives you a really great compliment, and it just lifts your whole day and makes you think, "Yep, I've still got it..." or if you're more humble, "Wow, I never knew I had it, but I guess I do." AWESOME.
Feel free to leave your own awesomeness in the comments... (Keep in mind I only worked up the ones I didn't see on the already REALLY long list, there is plenty of other awesome out there!)
I've got a few things that I think are awesome in everyday life that they haven't covered:
1) When the shuffle mode on the iPod goes on a really great run of songs that just perfectly suit your mood or lift you out of a funk... Sure you can continually skip songs to get to the ones you want to hear more, but every once in a while, you pop that bad boy on, hit play, and BAM, instant musical success that just keeps getting more awesome as it progresses. For those of you old enough to remember tapes, think of it as the REALLY REALLY superior mix tape. You know what I'm talking about. The one where it was really evident that the tracks were carefully considered and arranged in a great order to maximize their awesomeness. (Yes, there are also plenty of great mix CDs, but it began with the tape dammit.)
2) That one day that comes along every season where you can officially recognize that the season is changing. You might not always recognize it, but when you do it's AWESOME... You step outside one day and you come to the realization that the new season is making its annual debut. Sometimes it's that first really genuinely sunshiny day after a long gray winter, or the first day where it's genuinely hot enough that you know in your bones that summer is here. And then there's the day after roasting all summer that you realize that it's sweater weather again and that you're about to spend weekends raking leaves and watching football (if that's your thing,) and as the temperatures drop, you can leave the windows open and shut the A/C off. Winter is a little trickier, because a little frost isn't really a strong indicator of winter... Winter is a seasonal change you can smell... It smells like firewood and even that is unreliable depending on how quickly the neighbors decide to get the wood-burning fireplace going... But there is a day in there where you just know. AWESOME.
3) Getting hit on (or complimented) by someone who you thought was out of your league... Married folks, this still applies to you. Nothing ever has to come of it, and yeah, that hottie might be turn out to be a total douche nozzle, but every once in a while somebody just hits on you or gives you a really great compliment, and it just lifts your whole day and makes you think, "Yep, I've still got it..." or if you're more humble, "Wow, I never knew I had it, but I guess I do." AWESOME.
Feel free to leave your own awesomeness in the comments... (Keep in mind I only worked up the ones I didn't see on the already REALLY long list, there is plenty of other awesome out there!)
Thursday, February 17, 2011
If being me is wrong, I don't want to be right...
So I am going to keep this brief.
I don't want to be a grownup. Not at all!
Unfortunately, I think that's what is happening.
The other day, I got a valentine card from my dad. Sweet.
The card had $20.00 in it. VERY sweet!
Since I operate on a debit card based system most of the time, I don't make a habit out of carrying cash. The next day, I could feel that crisp $20 bill burning a hole in my pocket. So I went shopping! You want to know what I bought?
1 giant box of kitchen trash bags
1 bottle of conditioner
2 different kinds of bathroom/ multi-surface cleaner
4 rolls of scotch tape
Yeah.
As I walked out to my car, I realized what had just transpired, and I immediately drove myself to my mother's office.
"Feel my forehead!"
"Ok, why? Are you ill?"
"Maybe, just feel my forehead! Am I feverish? Do I have some horrendous disease? Am I going to have to move to a leper colony?"
"You feel fine and you look fine to me... Why are you here? Why do you think you're ill?"
"I just bought trash bags, cleaning products, conditioner, and tape with the money dad sent me as a valentine... I must be ill! Because I KNOW there is no other reason I would ever spend gifted money like an adult!"
"Sorry, kiddo. THAT. JUST. HAPPENED."
"CRAP! I DON'T WANNA BE A GROWNUP! AND YOU CAN'T MAKE ME!"
And with that last statement and a little stomping fit, I felt just juvenile enough that I was able to carry on with my day.
...And then I went and spent money (that I actually earned myself) on books, which is an age-neutral activity for me, but still improved the day as a whole.
I don't want to be a grownup. Not at all!
Unfortunately, I think that's what is happening.
The other day, I got a valentine card from my dad. Sweet.
The card had $20.00 in it. VERY sweet!
Since I operate on a debit card based system most of the time, I don't make a habit out of carrying cash. The next day, I could feel that crisp $20 bill burning a hole in my pocket. So I went shopping! You want to know what I bought?
1 giant box of kitchen trash bags
1 bottle of conditioner
2 different kinds of bathroom/ multi-surface cleaner
4 rolls of scotch tape
Yeah.
As I walked out to my car, I realized what had just transpired, and I immediately drove myself to my mother's office.
"Feel my forehead!"
"Ok, why? Are you ill?"
"Maybe, just feel my forehead! Am I feverish? Do I have some horrendous disease? Am I going to have to move to a leper colony?"
"You feel fine and you look fine to me... Why are you here? Why do you think you're ill?"
"I just bought trash bags, cleaning products, conditioner, and tape with the money dad sent me as a valentine... I must be ill! Because I KNOW there is no other reason I would ever spend gifted money like an adult!"
"Sorry, kiddo. THAT. JUST. HAPPENED."
"CRAP! I DON'T WANNA BE A GROWNUP! AND YOU CAN'T MAKE ME!"
And with that last statement and a little stomping fit, I felt just juvenile enough that I was able to carry on with my day.
...And then I went and spent money (that I actually earned myself) on books, which is an age-neutral activity for me, but still improved the day as a whole.
Saturday, February 05, 2011
Starts and fits...
So I finished painting in the office. And upon moving the bookshelf into the corner where I wanted it, I would have felt a reasonably warranted deep sense of accomplishment, but then I took a minute to look around.
My god! Is this my house? It looks like a bomb went off in here!
I surveyed the damage and essentially came up with the analogy that the place looked like I imagine a house would look if you left an 8 year old home alone for a week, only instead of hot wheels and sundae sprinkles strewn about, it was apparently the home of an 8 year old with a propensity for junk mail, bills, receipts, and dust.
I should note that I don't lend much credence to the idea that we should all be living in homes that are cleaned and polished to the point where they are ready for a professionally-styled photo shoot for "Better Homes and Gardens." I'm all for a home having a lived-in look where you're not afraid to touch anything, but good lord, being able to find a chair somewhere on the main floor that isn't within a foot of a pile of miscellaneous crap might be nice... And I couldn't do that. There was literally crap EVERYWHERE.
Apparently when I set my sights on one task, it applies blinders to every other household chore until the main task is complete. I mean sure I take the trash out before it starts to stink, but I can't really remember the last time I swept the kitchen floor.
And so, today at roughly 2:45 central time, it mentally hit critical mass. And as I attempted to pull the broom and dustpan out of the pantry, and was promptly assaulted by a falling griddle pan, it quite simply caused a mini-mental-meltdown. (Whoa, alliteration.) And this meltdown came at one of those inopportune times when I really would have rather been watching all the college basketball that was on, because its Saturday, and watching college basketball is what I DO on Saturdays in the winter months.
As I swept and mopped, I cursed myself for letting it all slide so much. I am usually so on top of cleaning up after myself as I go, not letting things get so out of hand that a meltdown is necessary, but today, at the expense of my preferred Saturday activity, I did chores like a real grown-up. Laundry is going, the bathroom isn't unsightly, the kitchen floor has been swept and mopped, (though the kitchen still looks like crap until I can get the rest of the bad paneling ripped out, and the walls replastered and painted.) And so the meltdown was quelled to a degree, at least momentarily. (The kitchen floor will be redone at some point in the not too distant future too, but in lieu of replacing the whole thing today, at least the existing surface is reasonably clean.)
I am so glad that I hate the commentator staffing the better games today, so that I can watch hoops and run the vacuum cleaner at the same time!
My god! Is this my house? It looks like a bomb went off in here!
I surveyed the damage and essentially came up with the analogy that the place looked like I imagine a house would look if you left an 8 year old home alone for a week, only instead of hot wheels and sundae sprinkles strewn about, it was apparently the home of an 8 year old with a propensity for junk mail, bills, receipts, and dust.
I should note that I don't lend much credence to the idea that we should all be living in homes that are cleaned and polished to the point where they are ready for a professionally-styled photo shoot for "Better Homes and Gardens." I'm all for a home having a lived-in look where you're not afraid to touch anything, but good lord, being able to find a chair somewhere on the main floor that isn't within a foot of a pile of miscellaneous crap might be nice... And I couldn't do that. There was literally crap EVERYWHERE.
Apparently when I set my sights on one task, it applies blinders to every other household chore until the main task is complete. I mean sure I take the trash out before it starts to stink, but I can't really remember the last time I swept the kitchen floor.
And so, today at roughly 2:45 central time, it mentally hit critical mass. And as I attempted to pull the broom and dustpan out of the pantry, and was promptly assaulted by a falling griddle pan, it quite simply caused a mini-mental-meltdown. (Whoa, alliteration.) And this meltdown came at one of those inopportune times when I really would have rather been watching all the college basketball that was on, because its Saturday, and watching college basketball is what I DO on Saturdays in the winter months.
As I swept and mopped, I cursed myself for letting it all slide so much. I am usually so on top of cleaning up after myself as I go, not letting things get so out of hand that a meltdown is necessary, but today, at the expense of my preferred Saturday activity, I did chores like a real grown-up. Laundry is going, the bathroom isn't unsightly, the kitchen floor has been swept and mopped, (though the kitchen still looks like crap until I can get the rest of the bad paneling ripped out, and the walls replastered and painted.) And so the meltdown was quelled to a degree, at least momentarily. (The kitchen floor will be redone at some point in the not too distant future too, but in lieu of replacing the whole thing today, at least the existing surface is reasonably clean.)
I am so glad that I hate the commentator staffing the better games today, so that I can watch hoops and run the vacuum cleaner at the same time!
Monday, January 31, 2011
Every nook and cranny...
So I've made no secret of all the projects I've been working on around the house. I've cleaned out years of clutter and outdated items and papers. I've scraped and patched and painted and rearranged furniture. I've updated window treatments, and shower fixtures. I've scrubbed years of normal use off the items that I intend to keep around. I've moved furniture again. I've scrubbed soot off the stone face of the fireplace. I've pretty well exhaustively handled most of the visible areas of the house to optimize the fashion and function of the spaces on my extremely limited budget.
What haven't I done? Well... The less visible areas leave something to be desired. If it is an area that I have less-than-daily interaction with, it has admittedly taken a bit of a back seat. Sure, I cleared out the kitchen cabinets and drawers. Sure, I cleared all of the unusable nonsense out of the bathroom cabinets. And yeah, in a kind of fluke move, I did really clear out an area of the basement that can function as a bedroom in a real pinch... I mean there is a bed there, (two in fact,) and there are some shoddy paneled walls and a ceiling covering the pipes, wires, and duct work for the rest of the house, but it is still undoubtedly very much a basement, and not a long term solution for a guest room situation. That really only leaves the rest of the basement, the ACTUAL guest room, and most of the closets.
This became particularly salient to me when I went in search of my old yoga mat... I knew I had seen it in the office a little while after my initial move-in and settling period. I remembered seeing it leaning against the bookshelf after I moved the book shelf in there. I knew it was in the house. I looked in the office. (Mind you the office is in a particular state of disarray at the moment, as the office became a catch-all for spring yard sale items, and for my tools and supplies during previous projects, and all of that is also in a particular state of confusion as I have repeatedly moved much of the already confusing contents because I've also been patching the plaster and working on repainting in there too...) After nearly two hours of what I thought was a relatively exhaustive search, looking around the office, my bedroom, my closet, the entirety of the basement, even the trunk of my car. No luck.
During my initial survey of the office, (where I focused much of my attention since I couldn't remember moving it out of there in the first place,) I looked in the closet in there. I shifted around box fans that haven't been used since late summer. I lifted old coats that had been relegated to that closet to keep them out of the way until I can get rid of them properly.
After 2 hours and three re-checks of that closet, I found the missing mat in a box with the wrapping paper that I didn't pull out to use at Christmas time.
This all really just renews my need for the wintry nonsense to hurry up and get it all over with, so that I can have a yard sale and get all this crap out of here!!!
I know this post was boring. But come on, its either this, or we go back to dead air... Something has got to be better than nothing, even something this spectacularly dull.
What haven't I done? Well... The less visible areas leave something to be desired. If it is an area that I have less-than-daily interaction with, it has admittedly taken a bit of a back seat. Sure, I cleared out the kitchen cabinets and drawers. Sure, I cleared all of the unusable nonsense out of the bathroom cabinets. And yeah, in a kind of fluke move, I did really clear out an area of the basement that can function as a bedroom in a real pinch... I mean there is a bed there, (two in fact,) and there are some shoddy paneled walls and a ceiling covering the pipes, wires, and duct work for the rest of the house, but it is still undoubtedly very much a basement, and not a long term solution for a guest room situation. That really only leaves the rest of the basement, the ACTUAL guest room, and most of the closets.
This became particularly salient to me when I went in search of my old yoga mat... I knew I had seen it in the office a little while after my initial move-in and settling period. I remembered seeing it leaning against the bookshelf after I moved the book shelf in there. I knew it was in the house. I looked in the office. (Mind you the office is in a particular state of disarray at the moment, as the office became a catch-all for spring yard sale items, and for my tools and supplies during previous projects, and all of that is also in a particular state of confusion as I have repeatedly moved much of the already confusing contents because I've also been patching the plaster and working on repainting in there too...) After nearly two hours of what I thought was a relatively exhaustive search, looking around the office, my bedroom, my closet, the entirety of the basement, even the trunk of my car. No luck.
During my initial survey of the office, (where I focused much of my attention since I couldn't remember moving it out of there in the first place,) I looked in the closet in there. I shifted around box fans that haven't been used since late summer. I lifted old coats that had been relegated to that closet to keep them out of the way until I can get rid of them properly.
After 2 hours and three re-checks of that closet, I found the missing mat in a box with the wrapping paper that I didn't pull out to use at Christmas time.
This all really just renews my need for the wintry nonsense to hurry up and get it all over with, so that I can have a yard sale and get all this crap out of here!!!
I know this post was boring. But come on, its either this, or we go back to dead air... Something has got to be better than nothing, even something this spectacularly dull.
Tuesday, January 25, 2011
Dear Mother Nature, (an open letter)
I know that you hear the same grousing every year... "Oh, it's too cold in the winter!" and "Oh it's too hot in the summer." I know you must get tired of everybody giving you guff for the standard weather of a given season. I'm sorry about that... Take it for what it is worth and write off most of it as people being too lazy to be bothered with living in an area that has a climate that they find more agreeable. That's usually the case.
As someone who has lived in areas of extreme cold in winter and relocating to areas of extreme heat in the summer, as well as growing up in a land of reasonably balanced whole seasons, I'm not going to bother with such a petty complaint. I know you've got enough on your plate trying to convince the non-science-minded conservative politicians that global warming is real, and that it really is all our fault.
I'm not going to ask you to up and change the system that has worked for you for eons. I am however asking you to cut me a friggin' break when it comes to this snow! I mean, yes, it's winter, and I live in a climate that enjoys all four seasons and winter has its place. It's supposed to be cold. It's supposed to be dreary and gray. It's even supposed to have snow and ice. (And I'm sure you love watching all of the little kiddies rejoice in a day off from school so that they can go sledding on the nearest hill.) I'm fine with all of these things. I am just asking for a break on this snow thing... Sure it can snow. Sure it can be cold. But can you do me a slight favor and let me go a week without the snow? Can't you just double up a couple of these weather systems that are only doling out one or two inches and give me a week or two off? I mean if it ends up translating into dumping 4 inches all at once, that's fine with me. I just want a morning where I don't have to sweep off and scrape down my car. Clearly I don't mind the snowy driveway, or I'd have had it shoveled myself long before that punk kid came around to wake me up on a Saturday morning wanting me to pay him to do it. I'm ok with one or two REALLY BIG snow events where the kids can celebrate an early spring break and have a whole unplanned week off, I'm even ok with several small to medium snowfalls, but this piecemeal, a dusting overnight, an inch here, an inch and a half there, bullshit has to stop!
You're just teasing the kids with, "Oh it's snowing at bedtime, maybe you won't have school tomorrow," only to let them down when they wake up and see that the roads are clear and the lawn is covered with just enough of a dusting to piece together a piss-poor excuse for a two-foot-tall snowman. Either really lay it on thick so that we can really build a truly proud giant snow penis on the local university quad, or just don't bother. You don't have to hustle spring along or anything. The cold and gray days can stay for their seasonal duration, but just quit jerking us all around.
Thanks for your time, I hope you take this under advisement.
Lizzle
As someone who has lived in areas of extreme cold in winter and relocating to areas of extreme heat in the summer, as well as growing up in a land of reasonably balanced whole seasons, I'm not going to bother with such a petty complaint. I know you've got enough on your plate trying to convince the non-science-minded conservative politicians that global warming is real, and that it really is all our fault.
I'm not going to ask you to up and change the system that has worked for you for eons. I am however asking you to cut me a friggin' break when it comes to this snow! I mean, yes, it's winter, and I live in a climate that enjoys all four seasons and winter has its place. It's supposed to be cold. It's supposed to be dreary and gray. It's even supposed to have snow and ice. (And I'm sure you love watching all of the little kiddies rejoice in a day off from school so that they can go sledding on the nearest hill.) I'm fine with all of these things. I am just asking for a break on this snow thing... Sure it can snow. Sure it can be cold. But can you do me a slight favor and let me go a week without the snow? Can't you just double up a couple of these weather systems that are only doling out one or two inches and give me a week or two off? I mean if it ends up translating into dumping 4 inches all at once, that's fine with me. I just want a morning where I don't have to sweep off and scrape down my car. Clearly I don't mind the snowy driveway, or I'd have had it shoveled myself long before that punk kid came around to wake me up on a Saturday morning wanting me to pay him to do it. I'm ok with one or two REALLY BIG snow events where the kids can celebrate an early spring break and have a whole unplanned week off, I'm even ok with several small to medium snowfalls, but this piecemeal, a dusting overnight, an inch here, an inch and a half there, bullshit has to stop!
You're just teasing the kids with, "Oh it's snowing at bedtime, maybe you won't have school tomorrow," only to let them down when they wake up and see that the roads are clear and the lawn is covered with just enough of a dusting to piece together a piss-poor excuse for a two-foot-tall snowman. Either really lay it on thick so that we can really build a truly proud giant snow penis on the local university quad, or just don't bother. You don't have to hustle spring along or anything. The cold and gray days can stay for their seasonal duration, but just quit jerking us all around.
Thanks for your time, I hope you take this under advisement.
Lizzle
Saturday, January 22, 2011
A bleary-eyed Saturday morning rant:
To the kid who woke me up wanting to shovel the driveway, a few customer service pointers:
1 Don't show up before noon on a Saturday, its a weekend, people want to sleep in. Furthermore, you're 2 days late. The snow showed up on Wednesday night... If you really gave a crap about making any cash, you'd have been out on Thursday and Friday. (and don't you give me that, "But I was at school" bologna, I saw the local news, and we both know that you didn't have shit else to do either day because school was cancelled!) And further still, by Saturday morning, the folks who want their driveway shoveled have either shoveled it themselves, given the job to the other annoying teenager who had the brilliant idea to come out shortly after the snow quit, or have driven on it repeatedly turning it into ice, and thus something that you want no part in attempting to shovel.
2) Under no circumstances are you to pound on my front door like you're the police. Do you have a gun and a badge? No? Oh, you say you're only 15? Then quit pounding on my goddamn door like that! The only reason that the citizenry allows the police to pound on doors like that is that they are armed... And for all you know I am armed. frankly you're lucky I opened the door at all, let alone opening it without some manner of weapon in my hand, a la Clint Eastwood telling you to get off my lawn.
3) If I didn't answer the door after the first ring of the doorbell, three more isn't going to make me move any faster. One ring is sufficient. Those who intend to ignore you are going to ignore you anyway, those folks who intend to answer the door after the first ring will not respond kindly to your repeated and overzealous assault on that poor little doorbell button, and my last nerve... You're going to make more money and piss off fewer customers by learning to knock rationally or ring once, WAIT for a few seconds without continued knocking or ringing and when it is prudent to do so, just move on!
Oh and don't come back in the spring you little pissant! I mow my own lawn, and frankly, I don't trust you anywhere near my garage. Now seriously, BEAT IT!
1 Don't show up before noon on a Saturday, its a weekend, people want to sleep in. Furthermore, you're 2 days late. The snow showed up on Wednesday night... If you really gave a crap about making any cash, you'd have been out on Thursday and Friday. (and don't you give me that, "But I was at school" bologna, I saw the local news, and we both know that you didn't have shit else to do either day because school was cancelled!) And further still, by Saturday morning, the folks who want their driveway shoveled have either shoveled it themselves, given the job to the other annoying teenager who had the brilliant idea to come out shortly after the snow quit, or have driven on it repeatedly turning it into ice, and thus something that you want no part in attempting to shovel.
2) Under no circumstances are you to pound on my front door like you're the police. Do you have a gun and a badge? No? Oh, you say you're only 15? Then quit pounding on my goddamn door like that! The only reason that the citizenry allows the police to pound on doors like that is that they are armed... And for all you know I am armed. frankly you're lucky I opened the door at all, let alone opening it without some manner of weapon in my hand, a la Clint Eastwood telling you to get off my lawn.
3) If I didn't answer the door after the first ring of the doorbell, three more isn't going to make me move any faster. One ring is sufficient. Those who intend to ignore you are going to ignore you anyway, those folks who intend to answer the door after the first ring will not respond kindly to your repeated and overzealous assault on that poor little doorbell button, and my last nerve... You're going to make more money and piss off fewer customers by learning to knock rationally or ring once, WAIT for a few seconds without continued knocking or ringing and when it is prudent to do so, just move on!
Oh and don't come back in the spring you little pissant! I mow my own lawn, and frankly, I don't trust you anywhere near my garage. Now seriously, BEAT IT!
Wednesday, January 19, 2011
I'm siding with the Admiral on this one...
The Apocalypse is totally imminent!
Now it's not just birds and fish... We've upped the ante to large mammals!
Hope you have a nice day!
Now it's not just birds and fish... We've upped the ante to large mammals!
Hope you have a nice day!
Tuesday, January 18, 2011
A new week, a new project...
So last week, I busied myself with installing a new rain head in the shower. To anyone who has ever installed a shower head, I'm betting you're thinking to yourself, "Why on earth would that take someone a week to do?" Well, I'll tell you...
I initially found the aforementioned rain head while actually out shopping for other things... (Namely, a vacuum cleaner that actually sucked things up and didn't overheat in the process of doing said sucking, and thus didn't end up causing my house to smell like a slaughterhouse populated solely by dust and death.) So while I was perusing the aisles, I happened upon a rain head that was drastically marked down. (I assume that most of you have never priced rain heads; I assure you that they don't typically sell for anything near what my tight budget would normally allow.) So, having found this bargain, I snatched it up without a second thought. (I also got a new vacuum, and I have to admit, it is kind of badass since it winds it's own cord up when you're done!) Anyway, back to the reason my project took as long as it did. Upon getting home with my new treasures, I immediately went into the bathroom to install the new shower head. I was excited to give it a whirl!
Upon completion of the installation process which took a mere 5 minutes of my precious time, I remembered what I discovered the last time I installed a shower head in this particular bathroom. (I installed my other shower head pretty much as soon as I moved in because the grandparents were still using an unsightly variable spray head that looked like it had just stepped out of 1976, and based on the calcium deposits that made it spray every direction except onto the person standing below it, I found it likely that it had not been properly cared for or cleaned since it was installed all those years ago. But I digress... The lesson I learned upon installing the predecessor of the rain head was that apparently when this house was originally built, Midwesterners were considerably shorter than they are today. I figured this out because the shower arm, (the bit that pokes out of the wall through all the original tile that I don't want to go to the trouble or expense of ripping out and/or replacing,) sticks out through said tile at about 6 feet in height. If it stuck straight out, relying on a shower head to provide an angle, that would be fine by me. I'm shorter... and if I were to have tall overnight guests, they would have to be content to bend down to get their hair wet or pay for a hotel stay... entirely up to them. But the shower arm doesn't just stick straight out. It sticks straight out for about 6 inches, and then it has an unreasonably steep bend so that the end of the pipe comes out around 5'8" which is more problematic. Furthermore, if you add the drop of a couple inches so that a shower head can occupy actual space once attached to the end of the pipe, we end up right around 5'5"-ish, give or take. At 5'5"-ish, we're low enough that EVEN I would have to duck under it to get my hair wet, which is wholly unacceptable. (Especially when you want to get the full effect of showering under a rain head.)
So, I did a little homework. I figured out exactly what I needed to do to remedy this situation. (I even asked a plumber friend of mine about my options!) Upon completion of my research, I determined that a simple solution could be found at my local home improvement store in the form of an adjustable shower arm extender which affords me the opportunity to change up the height and angle of the original fittings.
Unfortunately we had a 2 day break in the action due to inclement weather and shoddy road conditions... Upon determining that the roads were sufficiently passable, I ventured to the same poorly organized home improvement store mentioned in previous posts. I found the part that I needed with relative ease. (Nothing like the tape and toilet seat debacle!) So I purchased the item at a reasonable price and went back home where I promptly installed it.
You would think that would be the end of the story, wouldn't you?
Yeah, you would be wrong.
After completing the installation (roughly a 10 minute process,) I turned the knobs on the extender to adjust the angle of the arm... And though I am not typically possessed of super-human strength, I managed to turn the knob so hard that it just flat out broke off. Knowing that I just bought the damn thing, and that for all I knew it was a freak occurrence due to a flaw in the metal, I returned to the store and exchanged it for a new one. Upon returning home, I installed the second one. I adjusted it, and had no problem. I then showed my mother how I had spent my day, and her inspection yielded a nod of approval. She then wanted to see it work, so she attempted to adjust it. And then SHE twisted a handle off.
Clearly this was a design flaw and poor manufacturing. So I took it back to the store, got my money back, and looked at a different home improvement store only to find the same poorly made brand. At that point, I said to myself, "I'm not operating on the 'third time is a charm method' I am going to look at reviews online and purchase one that is built to do the job right." And that's what I did.
Then I was abducted for three days worth of "we're going to improve your sour jobless mood with some sponsored retail therapy" shopping trips and lunches with momma, so yeah, the shower head was my only project last week.
This week's project: the office and all the horror that that entails! (The office has become a scary catch-all kind of room during my other projects, and was densely populated with odds and ends even before my other projects began.) So this week will be dedicated to clearing out the nonsense, repainting the white walls a far more interesting shade, and then putting the items back into the room in a more amusing and functional fashion.
You know what they say about idle hands!
I initially found the aforementioned rain head while actually out shopping for other things... (Namely, a vacuum cleaner that actually sucked things up and didn't overheat in the process of doing said sucking, and thus didn't end up causing my house to smell like a slaughterhouse populated solely by dust and death.) So while I was perusing the aisles, I happened upon a rain head that was drastically marked down. (I assume that most of you have never priced rain heads; I assure you that they don't typically sell for anything near what my tight budget would normally allow.) So, having found this bargain, I snatched it up without a second thought. (I also got a new vacuum, and I have to admit, it is kind of badass since it winds it's own cord up when you're done!) Anyway, back to the reason my project took as long as it did. Upon getting home with my new treasures, I immediately went into the bathroom to install the new shower head. I was excited to give it a whirl!
Upon completion of the installation process which took a mere 5 minutes of my precious time, I remembered what I discovered the last time I installed a shower head in this particular bathroom. (I installed my other shower head pretty much as soon as I moved in because the grandparents were still using an unsightly variable spray head that looked like it had just stepped out of 1976, and based on the calcium deposits that made it spray every direction except onto the person standing below it, I found it likely that it had not been properly cared for or cleaned since it was installed all those years ago. But I digress... The lesson I learned upon installing the predecessor of the rain head was that apparently when this house was originally built, Midwesterners were considerably shorter than they are today. I figured this out because the shower arm, (the bit that pokes out of the wall through all the original tile that I don't want to go to the trouble or expense of ripping out and/or replacing,) sticks out through said tile at about 6 feet in height. If it stuck straight out, relying on a shower head to provide an angle, that would be fine by me. I'm shorter... and if I were to have tall overnight guests, they would have to be content to bend down to get their hair wet or pay for a hotel stay... entirely up to them. But the shower arm doesn't just stick straight out. It sticks straight out for about 6 inches, and then it has an unreasonably steep bend so that the end of the pipe comes out around 5'8" which is more problematic. Furthermore, if you add the drop of a couple inches so that a shower head can occupy actual space once attached to the end of the pipe, we end up right around 5'5"-ish, give or take. At 5'5"-ish, we're low enough that EVEN I would have to duck under it to get my hair wet, which is wholly unacceptable. (Especially when you want to get the full effect of showering under a rain head.)
So, I did a little homework. I figured out exactly what I needed to do to remedy this situation. (I even asked a plumber friend of mine about my options!) Upon completion of my research, I determined that a simple solution could be found at my local home improvement store in the form of an adjustable shower arm extender which affords me the opportunity to change up the height and angle of the original fittings.
Unfortunately we had a 2 day break in the action due to inclement weather and shoddy road conditions... Upon determining that the roads were sufficiently passable, I ventured to the same poorly organized home improvement store mentioned in previous posts. I found the part that I needed with relative ease. (Nothing like the tape and toilet seat debacle!) So I purchased the item at a reasonable price and went back home where I promptly installed it.
You would think that would be the end of the story, wouldn't you?
Yeah, you would be wrong.
After completing the installation (roughly a 10 minute process,) I turned the knobs on the extender to adjust the angle of the arm... And though I am not typically possessed of super-human strength, I managed to turn the knob so hard that it just flat out broke off. Knowing that I just bought the damn thing, and that for all I knew it was a freak occurrence due to a flaw in the metal, I returned to the store and exchanged it for a new one. Upon returning home, I installed the second one. I adjusted it, and had no problem. I then showed my mother how I had spent my day, and her inspection yielded a nod of approval. She then wanted to see it work, so she attempted to adjust it. And then SHE twisted a handle off.
Clearly this was a design flaw and poor manufacturing. So I took it back to the store, got my money back, and looked at a different home improvement store only to find the same poorly made brand. At that point, I said to myself, "I'm not operating on the 'third time is a charm method' I am going to look at reviews online and purchase one that is built to do the job right." And that's what I did.
Then I was abducted for three days worth of "we're going to improve your sour jobless mood with some sponsored retail therapy" shopping trips and lunches with momma, so yeah, the shower head was my only project last week.
This week's project: the office and all the horror that that entails! (The office has become a scary catch-all kind of room during my other projects, and was densely populated with odds and ends even before my other projects began.) So this week will be dedicated to clearing out the nonsense, repainting the white walls a far more interesting shade, and then putting the items back into the room in a more amusing and functional fashion.
You know what they say about idle hands!
Thursday, January 06, 2011
Quote of the day:
The Admiral and I were talking about the recent mass-deaths of birds and fish, in Arkansas, Louisiana, Chesapeake Bay, and Sweden:
The Admiral: "I'm not buying the New Year's fireworks theory. I don't care what anybody says... Crows are some smart fucking birds. They didn't all of a sudden get confused by the fireworks of a podunk town! I have never heard of such an event around fourth of July, and there are a hell of a lot more fireworks going on then! ... Basically, I'm not buying into any theory that doesn't involve aliens, time travel, or the real answer of the apocalypse we all now know is apparently coming."
The Admiral: "I'm not buying the New Year's fireworks theory. I don't care what anybody says... Crows are some smart fucking birds. They didn't all of a sudden get confused by the fireworks of a podunk town! I have never heard of such an event around fourth of July, and there are a hell of a lot more fireworks going on then! ... Basically, I'm not buying into any theory that doesn't involve aliens, time travel, or the real answer of the apocalypse we all now know is apparently coming."
Wednesday, January 05, 2011
Adventures in the home improvement stores continue...
So last week paint was on sale... So being the natural penny pincher that I am, I went shopping when the bargains abound.
And anyone who has ever bought a can of paint and intended to use it themselves knows that they shake it up in the store for a reason. The pigments are not an original part of the paint, so they can settle out, and they can settle themselves out faster than you might like. So in an effort to prevent a color-matching disaster, I have been very busy getting that mess up on the walls!
But back to the home improvement store adventures. I learned a couple of things about my local stores.
First off, they are not as intelligently organized as you might think. For example, when I went looking for new toilet seats to put in my newly refinished bathrooms, I went looking near the toilets. Mistake. The toilets are over by the bathtubs, I guess it's the porcelain connection. Not finding my quarry there, I figured ok, maybe closer to plumbing supplies? Nope. Not there either. So I passed by all the aisles of various pipe fittings... Hmm, maybe they are near the shower and faucet fixtures? Nope. So much for that idea. ...Now, I know what I'm after, and I know I am in the right store, and I know that the aforementioned store is a profit seeking entity that earns that profit by having the products one needs in this particular situation readily available to the masses. I don't want to look like an idiot having to ask where they keep their toilet seats, but hell, even if I did, I can't find anyone around to ask... So after a few minutes fruitlessly scanning the aisles, I found them. Where, you ask? Why, a mere 6 aisles away from plumbing and related fixtures, well past the electrical section, right near the water filtration units, of course. (The water filtration section including units intended to be installed under the sink, which, if you ask me would be better marketed if you put them near the sink and faucet fixtures... But what do I know?) So I am scanning the aisle of toilet seats and water filtration units, and I find an appropriate and affordable option. Mind you, I also ran across a significantly not-affordable option too. Did you know that there are toilet seats that are not encrusted with gold and jewels and yet still cost upwards of a thousand dollars? A THOUSAND DOLLARS! FOR A TOILET SEAT! JUST THE SEAT! NOT EVEN A WHOLE TOILET! Now sure, it will also function as a bidet spritzing your naughty bits with perfectly warmed water, but COME ON! OVER A THOUSAND DOLLARS? If I am buying that, I'm certainly not the one going out to the home improvement store and buying it myself or doing a do-it-yourself installation. If I am dropping more than a grand on a toilet seat, I am going to call some professional up, and they can get it themselves at some contractor's depot at half the cost and then mark it up to over a grand... INCLUDING INSTALLATION! (Though who would you call for that? There are electrical components involved for that bidet water to be warmed, so am I looking in the yellow pages for a plumber or an electrician?)
The second thing I learned in the home improvement store is that the products we have come to know and love have apparently been appropriated and renamed. For example, did you know that masking tape is no longer masking tape? It is now all considered "painter's tape." I learned this when I was in the paint department and asked where I would find the tape...
The clerk looked at me quizzically, "What? Like electrical tape?"
My impulse was to reply, "I am in a home improvement store's PAINT department asking for tape, and you instantly think 'electrical tape?' If you're that idiotic, you deserve your lot in life as a home improvement store clerk." Being that we just finished with the holiday season, I quieted my impulse and said, "No. I need masking tape... I'm not looking for the over-priced blue painter's tape though... I just need standard masking tape because I am not dealing with any delicate surfaces."
"Uhh... I don't know, but all of our tape is in that aisle down the way... See where the guy with the hat is?"
"The guy in the hat that is 30 yards away and walking toward us? Yeah, I see the guy in the hat."
"Well, it's down by him."
"He's walking down a main aisle here. Is it down by where he was when you pointed him out, or closer to where he is walking now?"
"Umm, well, sort of where he was before... But on the other side."
Impulse control fading out now, "Ugh... Never mind. You just don't worry your pretty little head and go back to leaning against that display there, I will find it on my own. You're doing a great job though... Who knows how long that display would have managed without you leaning there!"
(Now in my retail days, we were instructed to address product location questions by walking the customer to the location. Not by pointing to an area vaguely near where we're talking about, and certainly not pointing to someone who is in motion and who may or may not be near that location when the customer gets to the right area. Seriously... He deserves his lot in life.)
So I passed the guy in the hat. I kept going. I scanned the aisles and eventually found the right one, and there was plenty of tape. All the standard varieties, electrical tape, (strangely not in the electrical department, but that goes back to organization,) the over-priced blue painter's tape I expected, duct tape in colors I had not previously imagined, plumber's tape, (again, not in plumbing,) packaging tape, paper tape, and masking tape! VICTORY AT LAST! And as I examined the various widths of the masking tape, and the ridiculous pricing for the masking tape, and the packaging of the ridiculously priced masking tape in assorted widths, I kind of understood where the clerk got confused. Apparently now all tape previously known as masking tape is now packaged and sold as painter's tape. I must have just confused him by excluding the blue variety and referring to it by it's old name. Silly me.
I will likely post pictures of the improvements once things are closer to being finished as a whole... Right now everything is just a mess!
And anyone who has ever bought a can of paint and intended to use it themselves knows that they shake it up in the store for a reason. The pigments are not an original part of the paint, so they can settle out, and they can settle themselves out faster than you might like. So in an effort to prevent a color-matching disaster, I have been very busy getting that mess up on the walls!
But back to the home improvement store adventures. I learned a couple of things about my local stores.
First off, they are not as intelligently organized as you might think. For example, when I went looking for new toilet seats to put in my newly refinished bathrooms, I went looking near the toilets. Mistake. The toilets are over by the bathtubs, I guess it's the porcelain connection. Not finding my quarry there, I figured ok, maybe closer to plumbing supplies? Nope. Not there either. So I passed by all the aisles of various pipe fittings... Hmm, maybe they are near the shower and faucet fixtures? Nope. So much for that idea. ...Now, I know what I'm after, and I know I am in the right store, and I know that the aforementioned store is a profit seeking entity that earns that profit by having the products one needs in this particular situation readily available to the masses. I don't want to look like an idiot having to ask where they keep their toilet seats, but hell, even if I did, I can't find anyone around to ask... So after a few minutes fruitlessly scanning the aisles, I found them. Where, you ask? Why, a mere 6 aisles away from plumbing and related fixtures, well past the electrical section, right near the water filtration units, of course. (The water filtration section including units intended to be installed under the sink, which, if you ask me would be better marketed if you put them near the sink and faucet fixtures... But what do I know?) So I am scanning the aisle of toilet seats and water filtration units, and I find an appropriate and affordable option. Mind you, I also ran across a significantly not-affordable option too. Did you know that there are toilet seats that are not encrusted with gold and jewels and yet still cost upwards of a thousand dollars? A THOUSAND DOLLARS! FOR A TOILET SEAT! JUST THE SEAT! NOT EVEN A WHOLE TOILET! Now sure, it will also function as a bidet spritzing your naughty bits with perfectly warmed water, but COME ON! OVER A THOUSAND DOLLARS? If I am buying that, I'm certainly not the one going out to the home improvement store and buying it myself or doing a do-it-yourself installation. If I am dropping more than a grand on a toilet seat, I am going to call some professional up, and they can get it themselves at some contractor's depot at half the cost and then mark it up to over a grand... INCLUDING INSTALLATION! (Though who would you call for that? There are electrical components involved for that bidet water to be warmed, so am I looking in the yellow pages for a plumber or an electrician?)
The second thing I learned in the home improvement store is that the products we have come to know and love have apparently been appropriated and renamed. For example, did you know that masking tape is no longer masking tape? It is now all considered "painter's tape." I learned this when I was in the paint department and asked where I would find the tape...
The clerk looked at me quizzically, "What? Like electrical tape?"
My impulse was to reply, "I am in a home improvement store's PAINT department asking for tape, and you instantly think 'electrical tape?' If you're that idiotic, you deserve your lot in life as a home improvement store clerk." Being that we just finished with the holiday season, I quieted my impulse and said, "No. I need masking tape... I'm not looking for the over-priced blue painter's tape though... I just need standard masking tape because I am not dealing with any delicate surfaces."
"Uhh... I don't know, but all of our tape is in that aisle down the way... See where the guy with the hat is?"
"The guy in the hat that is 30 yards away and walking toward us? Yeah, I see the guy in the hat."
"Well, it's down by him."
"He's walking down a main aisle here. Is it down by where he was when you pointed him out, or closer to where he is walking now?"
"Umm, well, sort of where he was before... But on the other side."
Impulse control fading out now, "Ugh... Never mind. You just don't worry your pretty little head and go back to leaning against that display there, I will find it on my own. You're doing a great job though... Who knows how long that display would have managed without you leaning there!"
(Now in my retail days, we were instructed to address product location questions by walking the customer to the location. Not by pointing to an area vaguely near where we're talking about, and certainly not pointing to someone who is in motion and who may or may not be near that location when the customer gets to the right area. Seriously... He deserves his lot in life.)
So I passed the guy in the hat. I kept going. I scanned the aisles and eventually found the right one, and there was plenty of tape. All the standard varieties, electrical tape, (strangely not in the electrical department, but that goes back to organization,) the over-priced blue painter's tape I expected, duct tape in colors I had not previously imagined, plumber's tape, (again, not in plumbing,) packaging tape, paper tape, and masking tape! VICTORY AT LAST! And as I examined the various widths of the masking tape, and the ridiculous pricing for the masking tape, and the packaging of the ridiculously priced masking tape in assorted widths, I kind of understood where the clerk got confused. Apparently now all tape previously known as masking tape is now packaged and sold as painter's tape. I must have just confused him by excluding the blue variety and referring to it by it's old name. Silly me.
I will likely post pictures of the improvements once things are closer to being finished as a whole... Right now everything is just a mess!
Monday, December 27, 2010
Mission: Accomplished.
So my Christmas wish was to wake up on Christmas morning and find that there was nothing left to do in the bathrooms but stare at what I'd accomplished... And that wish came true. Mind you, I was a VERY busy bee in the last couple of days before Christmas, but that's really nothing out of the ordinary. I am a project-motivated person... I like being busy and I like achieving my goals in time to sit back and relax for a weekend before tackling another new project.
This week has been about the holidays. Obviously. But in the evenings I have taken to shifting around bedroom furniture trying to find something that better suits me than the configuration my grandparents had for 40+ years. It's an ongoing process... moving a few things around, seeing how it functions for a day or so, and then shifting things again as needed.
I would keep going on about all of this but I think I have even bored myself with this post. (If you started reading this only to find yourself picking your face up off of your keyboard, hoping you didn't drool on the keys, and having lost a couple hours with this giant snooze of a post, I apologize.)
This week has been about the holidays. Obviously. But in the evenings I have taken to shifting around bedroom furniture trying to find something that better suits me than the configuration my grandparents had for 40+ years. It's an ongoing process... moving a few things around, seeing how it functions for a day or so, and then shifting things again as needed.
I would keep going on about all of this but I think I have even bored myself with this post. (If you started reading this only to find yourself picking your face up off of your keyboard, hoping you didn't drool on the keys, and having lost a couple hours with this giant snooze of a post, I apologize.)
Tuesday, December 21, 2010
Bathroom follies... (UPDATED.)
Ok, this is not a post about what typically goes on in a bathroom. This is about what is going on in MY bathroom lately... And don't worry, I'm not going to tell some horrific story involving explosive diarrhea.
So I have pretty well finished the downstairs bath. And a few problematic touch-ups on problems created by previous owners aside, it looks awesome. May post pictures soon. The upstairs bath should be done by Christmas if I get my ass in gear... Though I admit that lacquering the light fixtures is taking longer than I had initially planned on... I think it's an issue of humidity making the dry time longer, and as a result we are experiencing undesired texture issues in the finish. The former electrician who originally wired those things was SERIOUS about not having anyone undo his work, though I must say with regard to the mountings, he did a shitty job. (The wiring part I will approve though.) So I've had to re-do the mounting brackets and because that electrician was so protective of his wiring, I spent more time than I should have needed on undoing the wiring. (Re-doing it should be a snap though!)
I will say this; thank god I haven't run into anyone I know lately while out running the odd errand. Because I've been constantly dressed like a schlub, never wearing makeup, and either had wallpaper scrapings stuck in my hair or was covered in some form of paint or plaster pretty much every day for the last few weeks. It's not a look I expect to see strolling on the runways of Milan in the spring.
And with that, I will leave you because I've got to get back to my task if I want this thing done by Christmas!
Oh, and P.S. - Whoever thought it would be a great idea to have swivel brackets on these stationary light fixtures, YOU WERE WRONG! (SO INDESCRIBABLY AND HORRIBLY WRONG.)
So I have pretty well finished the downstairs bath. And a few problematic touch-ups on problems created by previous owners aside, it looks awesome. May post pictures soon. The upstairs bath should be done by Christmas if I get my ass in gear... Though I admit that lacquering the light fixtures is taking longer than I had initially planned on... I think it's an issue of humidity making the dry time longer, and as a result we are experiencing undesired texture issues in the finish. The former electrician who originally wired those things was SERIOUS about not having anyone undo his work, though I must say with regard to the mountings, he did a shitty job. (The wiring part I will approve though.) So I've had to re-do the mounting brackets and because that electrician was so protective of his wiring, I spent more time than I should have needed on undoing the wiring. (Re-doing it should be a snap though!)
I will say this; thank god I haven't run into anyone I know lately while out running the odd errand. Because I've been constantly dressed like a schlub, never wearing makeup, and either had wallpaper scrapings stuck in my hair or was covered in some form of paint or plaster pretty much every day for the last few weeks. It's not a look I expect to see strolling on the runways of Milan in the spring.
And with that, I will leave you because I've got to get back to my task if I want this thing done by Christmas!
Oh, and P.S. - Whoever thought it would be a great idea to have swivel brackets on these stationary light fixtures, YOU WERE WRONG! (SO INDESCRIBABLY AND HORRIBLY WRONG.)
Thursday, December 16, 2010
We're working on it...
Template changes are clearly underway. I'm not sure if I am sticking with this theme, but I rather like it SO FAR. (It is a work in progress)
I have lost the links in my sidebar, but I think I will be putting updated links in there at some point in the near future.
In the process, I also lost my comments because I used a comment gadget other than the standard blogger comments. So please feel free to re-comment as you like.
More changes to come, ...I think.
I have lost the links in my sidebar, but I think I will be putting updated links in there at some point in the near future.
In the process, I also lost my comments because I used a comment gadget other than the standard blogger comments. So please feel free to re-comment as you like.
More changes to come, ...I think.
Tuesday, December 07, 2010
Here's what we're going to do...
I understand that I have a rather limited audience these days. I've gone through too many starts and fits to expect otherwise, and frankly blogging is becoming passe, so I'm not attracting new readers through word of mouth, and linkage the way I used to. An episode of my current favorite TV show, "House," (the only show that I block off time for,) recently did an episode about a blogger/patient, and the writers made some salient points about the concept of blogging. I won't bore you with all the details, but until I can find someone else who wants to publish my writing for a mass audience, this is my outlet.
That said, I'm remodeling my home, so I'm remodeling my blog as well. There will be a template change, as the current model is a little outdated for my current lifestyle, (I'm no longer the drinker and party girl I once was) and so, like a predictable girl after a bad breakup, we're getting a new look. I am going to take some time to find exactly what I want, so the change might not be immediate, but it is impending, and it will be rather sweeping.
All of that said, and knowing I have a limited audience, I am turning the reigns over to the readership for a bit.
You tell me what you want to know, and I will try to spin it as only I know how. The subject matter around here has been pretty boundless for a long time, and I don't see that changing... So if you've got a question, and you want my opinion, let me know and I will try to accommodate you. If it is personal or lengthy and you don't want it all out there in the comments, feel free to send an email to thebartenderspeaks@gmail.com and I will sort out the details and then post a reply. If it is something simple and you just want an expansion from my point of view, leave it in the comments and I will find it there too. If it is something I don't feel comfortable answering for whatever reason, I simply won't answer it. (But there isn't much I'm not willing to take on here, so have at it.)
Don't get me wrong here, I'm still going to inject my own topics and interests, and daily misadventures on a regular basis, but in an effort to be more accommodating to the few readers I have left, I'm essentially opening the floor for a little Q & A time.
Ok, so now it's your turn!
That said, I'm remodeling my home, so I'm remodeling my blog as well. There will be a template change, as the current model is a little outdated for my current lifestyle, (I'm no longer the drinker and party girl I once was) and so, like a predictable girl after a bad breakup, we're getting a new look. I am going to take some time to find exactly what I want, so the change might not be immediate, but it is impending, and it will be rather sweeping.
All of that said, and knowing I have a limited audience, I am turning the reigns over to the readership for a bit.
You tell me what you want to know, and I will try to spin it as only I know how. The subject matter around here has been pretty boundless for a long time, and I don't see that changing... So if you've got a question, and you want my opinion, let me know and I will try to accommodate you. If it is personal or lengthy and you don't want it all out there in the comments, feel free to send an email to thebartenderspeaks@gmail.com and I will sort out the details and then post a reply. If it is something simple and you just want an expansion from my point of view, leave it in the comments and I will find it there too. If it is something I don't feel comfortable answering for whatever reason, I simply won't answer it. (But there isn't much I'm not willing to take on here, so have at it.)
Don't get me wrong here, I'm still going to inject my own topics and interests, and daily misadventures on a regular basis, but in an effort to be more accommodating to the few readers I have left, I'm essentially opening the floor for a little Q & A time.
Ok, so now it's your turn!
Monday, December 06, 2010
I should write them a thank you note!
After that tirade about the peeling of the wallpaper (2 posts down) and the painted wallpaper, (which, in my opinion, should be considered a treasonous act of hostility against all future possible owners of a property, and should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of laws yet to be written,) I did a little homework.
I went to the websites of the assorted home improvement stores. I googled effective removal methods. I even searched for reviews of the products I found. The mixed reviews of the "Paper Tiger" seemed to indicate, (often in broken english -- which led me to believe that the users who wrote some of these reviews didn't possess the literacy level necessary to comprehend the directions for proper use,) that this was the tool I needed.
So I dropped by ye olde home depot. I looked through the aisle alongside the zip-strip and fancy $30.00 scrapers. (For thirty bucks, that shit better have an ivory handle and do half of the scraping by itself while you're on the couch clutching your third martini!) And there, on a peg not 6 inches from the floor of the aisle, (well out of range of the headliner products that the store REALLY wants you to buy and thus puts them on shelves at eye-level). It was seven dollars and forty nine cents. And as far as this home improvement project goes, it was easily the best seven and a half dollars spent so far!
I returned home with my new-found toy and restored hope, and idly gave it a quick twirl in a small area on the wall. My mother, drawn in by the curious noises produced in said twirl, came to observe.
For those of you not familiar with this product, it's a small dome-shaped tool that fits easily in the palm of the user. Under the dome are two small wheels with teeth set at an angle that tear tiny perforations into the surface of the offending wallpaper... and if used correctly, not deeply enough to damage the wall surface below. Admittedly, it makes a horrid screeching noise as you twirl it over the wall, because the edges of the dome are dragging on the wall surface, but that is a small price to pay when faced with the prospect of slowly and painfully scratching through and lifting away painted wallpaper one square inch at a time. (After all, with the benefit of an ipod turned up to eleven, you're not going to notice the screeching nearly as much.)
My mother was amused by patterns left by my screeching new toy. She readily encouraged a brief foray into using it to graffiti by scratching out our names onto the wall before we got serious about using the thing to its full and honest capacity.
After a few minutes, distractions deterred me from continuing. Dinner was ready, and there was something on TV that I think I was actually vaguely interested in watching. And then I came down with a cold and felt like garbage, so the last thing I wanted to do was go to town screeching this thing over the wall... So our names remained on the wall for a couple of days. But since I was feeling better and needed a sense of purpose in my day, I got to work this afternoon, while also doing three loads of laundry, and cooking dinner, (after three days of being miserable and non-productive, I was jumping back in with both feet) I got to work showing that painted wallpaper who was boss.
After doing about 60 square feet in total, and then squirting it all with a windex bottle full of water rather than any fancy over-priced stripping product, I took my trusty old $2.00 scraper and wouldn't you know, that nonsense came off like butter! And so a large portion of the wall just needs a good rinse and wipe to get minimal glue residue off, and it'll be ready for paint! (I don't think it's necessary to tell you that at this point in the game, taping out the tile and window will be no problem and the painting portion will be tantamount to receiving a puppy as a Christmas present... Pure, unadulterated joy. (I would've compared it to getting a pony, but let's be real here... None of us has ever gotten a pony for Christmas. And if you tell me you did, I'm going to call you a liar and demand documentation from your parents and video proof that it happened on Christmas... A puppy on the other hand is far more plausible and likely.)
Anyway, it might seem like a simple thing to you, but these days I deal in little victories.
I think I'm going to get to working on that thank you note for the maker of that fine product... And a letter to my parents asking why I never got a pony on Christmas morning.
I went to the websites of the assorted home improvement stores. I googled effective removal methods. I even searched for reviews of the products I found. The mixed reviews of the "Paper Tiger" seemed to indicate, (often in broken english -- which led me to believe that the users who wrote some of these reviews didn't possess the literacy level necessary to comprehend the directions for proper use,) that this was the tool I needed.
So I dropped by ye olde home depot. I looked through the aisle alongside the zip-strip and fancy $30.00 scrapers. (For thirty bucks, that shit better have an ivory handle and do half of the scraping by itself while you're on the couch clutching your third martini!) And there, on a peg not 6 inches from the floor of the aisle, (well out of range of the headliner products that the store REALLY wants you to buy and thus puts them on shelves at eye-level). It was seven dollars and forty nine cents. And as far as this home improvement project goes, it was easily the best seven and a half dollars spent so far!
I returned home with my new-found toy and restored hope, and idly gave it a quick twirl in a small area on the wall. My mother, drawn in by the curious noises produced in said twirl, came to observe.
For those of you not familiar with this product, it's a small dome-shaped tool that fits easily in the palm of the user. Under the dome are two small wheels with teeth set at an angle that tear tiny perforations into the surface of the offending wallpaper... and if used correctly, not deeply enough to damage the wall surface below. Admittedly, it makes a horrid screeching noise as you twirl it over the wall, because the edges of the dome are dragging on the wall surface, but that is a small price to pay when faced with the prospect of slowly and painfully scratching through and lifting away painted wallpaper one square inch at a time. (After all, with the benefit of an ipod turned up to eleven, you're not going to notice the screeching nearly as much.)
My mother was amused by patterns left by my screeching new toy. She readily encouraged a brief foray into using it to graffiti by scratching out our names onto the wall before we got serious about using the thing to its full and honest capacity.
After a few minutes, distractions deterred me from continuing. Dinner was ready, and there was something on TV that I think I was actually vaguely interested in watching. And then I came down with a cold and felt like garbage, so the last thing I wanted to do was go to town screeching this thing over the wall... So our names remained on the wall for a couple of days. But since I was feeling better and needed a sense of purpose in my day, I got to work this afternoon, while also doing three loads of laundry, and cooking dinner, (after three days of being miserable and non-productive, I was jumping back in with both feet) I got to work showing that painted wallpaper who was boss.
After doing about 60 square feet in total, and then squirting it all with a windex bottle full of water rather than any fancy over-priced stripping product, I took my trusty old $2.00 scraper and wouldn't you know, that nonsense came off like butter! And so a large portion of the wall just needs a good rinse and wipe to get minimal glue residue off, and it'll be ready for paint! (I don't think it's necessary to tell you that at this point in the game, taping out the tile and window will be no problem and the painting portion will be tantamount to receiving a puppy as a Christmas present... Pure, unadulterated joy. (I would've compared it to getting a pony, but let's be real here... None of us has ever gotten a pony for Christmas. And if you tell me you did, I'm going to call you a liar and demand documentation from your parents and video proof that it happened on Christmas... A puppy on the other hand is far more plausible and likely.)
Anyway, it might seem like a simple thing to you, but these days I deal in little victories.
I think I'm going to get to working on that thank you note for the maker of that fine product... And a letter to my parents asking why I never got a pony on Christmas morning.
Thursday, December 02, 2010
We're talking about the wrong things...
(This post is entirely editorial in perspective and content.)
I have felt for a long time that we are talking about all the wrong things.
People focus on the other people. We focus on the banal concepts that give allow for conversation rather than discourse. We talk about the weather. We talk about sports. We talk about the boss' daughter's overpriced wedding. We talk about the Kardashians and other obscenely unimportant gossip of the day.
The ibid and common quote goes: "Great people talk about ideas. Average people talk about things. Small people talk about other people." And in my experience we have all become small people.
I admit that I have become as guilty as most anyone, being a regular observer of dlisted.com as one of my daily web visits. But I also ascribe to a higher aspiration. I also visit cnn.com, politifact.com, and thedailybeast.com as a point of daily ritual and intent on seeking relevant news and information for my daily input. (The latter of which is HIGHLY UNDER-RATED, and in my opinion should be high on most people's list of informative sites, as it seems to encompass most any political and social view in features and editorial pieces.)
The fact is that we as a people have become far too complacent in ourselves. We scrutinize the latest update on the impending royal wedding in England (Something that we are not invited to, and doesn't even impact the U.S. economy, aside from raising airfares to Europe for spring 2011,) and the latest update on espn.com about the most current sports scandal, (which will serve no purpose other than to be further divisive to drive up ticket prices for our chosen favorite teams). Does it impact our daily lives? NO. Does it influence how I am going to make ends meet on an annual basis? NO. Does it do anything other than inflate or deflate my opinion of myself and or my opinion of the celebrity or sports affiliations I tend to root for? NO. Meanwhile, we're not teaching people about ACTUAL civics, or math, or important concepts of language... Why just this week, I LITERALLY (YES, LITERALLY) had to take twenty-five minutes out of my unemployed day and explain to someone in their late 30s (who makes $40 an hour) how cause and effect relationships work... I'm not kidding. This person is nearly 40, and I had to spend nearly half an hour explaining what cause and effect was, and how it operates in language theory and reality. Yet, I am the unemployed idiot, and they take home upwards of 80 grand a year. (Do the math.)
Like I said right out of the gate... We're talking about the wrong things.
Politics. The economy. Money. Job satisfaction. Quality of life... If we delve into these topics on more than a surface-level basis, they are considered TABOO! We don't want to upset anyone. We don't want to rock the boat. We don't want anyone at the office to talk about their pay grade or benefits package for fear that someone else is catching a raw deal. We might imply that we are open about these things, but we're not. This politically correct atmosphere we've established as a cultural norm is something that is running us into the ground and damaging people's lives along the way.
We're not talking about the person who is assisting the dentist cleaning my teeth... she might only have a high school diploma and some limited in office training. I don't begrudge her the job she does, but I do take issue with the fact that she makes more for turning on a machine to sterilize the instruments going into my mouth and taking notes on a chart than someone with a college degree in social work who spends their days going into poop houses and supervising visits between child molesters and the kids they abused.
Think about it.
It should enrage you. I'm not just talking about dental assistants. I'm also talking about Hollywood starlets, celebutantes, agents, marketing directors, cash-flow analysts, unionized auto workers, finance magnates, celebrity chefs, Las Vegas pit bosses, and a thousand other jobs... I could very easily spend my time memorizing a script and decide I am better off improvising a few lines, or looking at a chart and saying, "Yeah, that's likely to be profitable" or saying, "I'm calling my agent and getting a cover on US Weekly about a crazy pregnancy rumor!" I could easily screw in five bolts per car on ten cars an hour. (Hell for $80 an hour, you can step it up to 12 cars an hour and I'm pretty sure I still wouldn't complain too loudly!) I could spend years in a kitchen studying the exact conditions necessary to yield a perfectly cooked steak and how to pair it with pan seared scallops and a potato puree that would make your mouth water. I could stand and watch people deal cards and decide when a player is getting too hot and costing my boss too much money that we need to switch out the dealer and the cards... And I could get paid obscene amounts of money for any of it. But I don't. And do you know why?
I didn't think it was worth tangible value. And there are others out there too!
They don't get paid obscene amounts of money for what they do because teachers and policemen, and firemen, and public defenders, and social workers went to school and decided that people were their currency. (Hell, there are greens keepers that make more in a week than a public school teacher makes in a month!)
I don't mean that they trade in people... That's slavery... Highly illegal and generally frowned upon pretty much no matter who you talk to.
I mean that we consistently culturally value the wrong things. We value the wrong things because we are focused on and continue talking about all the wrong things.
Don't get me wrong... I know that those movie stars are making $20 million a movie for their efforts at entertaining the masses while teachers and social workers are touching just a few lives at a time... But how hard are those Hollywood actors working for it? I mean how many hours a day do they have to put in to figure out that a specific line isn't working, or that their character is going to be more believable to a mass audience if they weighed 140 lbs rather than 95,(or vise versa depending on the role). That's not rocket science. You know who should be making that money? ROCKET SCIENTISTS! (Or engineers who figure out how to make a zero emissions car, or people responsible for educating the next generation to enter the work force, or UN peacekeepers...etc.)
Basically I think we need to be far more concerned with where this country is headed than the weekend box office returns, or the next new gaming system? Do you know how many hectares are in an acre? Do you know how many sides a dodecahedron has? Do you know what bodily systems are most impacted by hypoproteinemia? HELL, DO YOU UNDERSTAND CAUSE AND EFFECT? For example; The cause is, "We are culturally concerned with ALL THE WRONG THINGS!" What is the effect? -- To be determined.
I have felt for a long time that we are talking about all the wrong things.
People focus on the other people. We focus on the banal concepts that give allow for conversation rather than discourse. We talk about the weather. We talk about sports. We talk about the boss' daughter's overpriced wedding. We talk about the Kardashians and other obscenely unimportant gossip of the day.
The ibid and common quote goes: "Great people talk about ideas. Average people talk about things. Small people talk about other people." And in my experience we have all become small people.
I admit that I have become as guilty as most anyone, being a regular observer of dlisted.com as one of my daily web visits. But I also ascribe to a higher aspiration. I also visit cnn.com, politifact.com, and thedailybeast.com as a point of daily ritual and intent on seeking relevant news and information for my daily input. (The latter of which is HIGHLY UNDER-RATED, and in my opinion should be high on most people's list of informative sites, as it seems to encompass most any political and social view in features and editorial pieces.)
The fact is that we as a people have become far too complacent in ourselves. We scrutinize the latest update on the impending royal wedding in England (Something that we are not invited to, and doesn't even impact the U.S. economy, aside from raising airfares to Europe for spring 2011,) and the latest update on espn.com about the most current sports scandal, (which will serve no purpose other than to be further divisive to drive up ticket prices for our chosen favorite teams). Does it impact our daily lives? NO. Does it influence how I am going to make ends meet on an annual basis? NO. Does it do anything other than inflate or deflate my opinion of myself and or my opinion of the celebrity or sports affiliations I tend to root for? NO. Meanwhile, we're not teaching people about ACTUAL civics, or math, or important concepts of language... Why just this week, I LITERALLY (YES, LITERALLY) had to take twenty-five minutes out of my unemployed day and explain to someone in their late 30s (who makes $40 an hour) how cause and effect relationships work... I'm not kidding. This person is nearly 40, and I had to spend nearly half an hour explaining what cause and effect was, and how it operates in language theory and reality. Yet, I am the unemployed idiot, and they take home upwards of 80 grand a year. (Do the math.)
Like I said right out of the gate... We're talking about the wrong things.
Politics. The economy. Money. Job satisfaction. Quality of life... If we delve into these topics on more than a surface-level basis, they are considered TABOO! We don't want to upset anyone. We don't want to rock the boat. We don't want anyone at the office to talk about their pay grade or benefits package for fear that someone else is catching a raw deal. We might imply that we are open about these things, but we're not. This politically correct atmosphere we've established as a cultural norm is something that is running us into the ground and damaging people's lives along the way.
We're not talking about the person who is assisting the dentist cleaning my teeth... she might only have a high school diploma and some limited in office training. I don't begrudge her the job she does, but I do take issue with the fact that she makes more for turning on a machine to sterilize the instruments going into my mouth and taking notes on a chart than someone with a college degree in social work who spends their days going into poop houses and supervising visits between child molesters and the kids they abused.
Think about it.
It should enrage you. I'm not just talking about dental assistants. I'm also talking about Hollywood starlets, celebutantes, agents, marketing directors, cash-flow analysts, unionized auto workers, finance magnates, celebrity chefs, Las Vegas pit bosses, and a thousand other jobs... I could very easily spend my time memorizing a script and decide I am better off improvising a few lines, or looking at a chart and saying, "Yeah, that's likely to be profitable" or saying, "I'm calling my agent and getting a cover on US Weekly about a crazy pregnancy rumor!" I could easily screw in five bolts per car on ten cars an hour. (Hell for $80 an hour, you can step it up to 12 cars an hour and I'm pretty sure I still wouldn't complain too loudly!) I could spend years in a kitchen studying the exact conditions necessary to yield a perfectly cooked steak and how to pair it with pan seared scallops and a potato puree that would make your mouth water. I could stand and watch people deal cards and decide when a player is getting too hot and costing my boss too much money that we need to switch out the dealer and the cards... And I could get paid obscene amounts of money for any of it. But I don't. And do you know why?
I didn't think it was worth tangible value. And there are others out there too!
They don't get paid obscene amounts of money for what they do because teachers and policemen, and firemen, and public defenders, and social workers went to school and decided that people were their currency. (Hell, there are greens keepers that make more in a week than a public school teacher makes in a month!)
I don't mean that they trade in people... That's slavery... Highly illegal and generally frowned upon pretty much no matter who you talk to.
I mean that we consistently culturally value the wrong things. We value the wrong things because we are focused on and continue talking about all the wrong things.
Don't get me wrong... I know that those movie stars are making $20 million a movie for their efforts at entertaining the masses while teachers and social workers are touching just a few lives at a time... But how hard are those Hollywood actors working for it? I mean how many hours a day do they have to put in to figure out that a specific line isn't working, or that their character is going to be more believable to a mass audience if they weighed 140 lbs rather than 95,(or vise versa depending on the role). That's not rocket science. You know who should be making that money? ROCKET SCIENTISTS! (Or engineers who figure out how to make a zero emissions car, or people responsible for educating the next generation to enter the work force, or UN peacekeepers...etc.)
Basically I think we need to be far more concerned with where this country is headed than the weekend box office returns, or the next new gaming system? Do you know how many hectares are in an acre? Do you know how many sides a dodecahedron has? Do you know what bodily systems are most impacted by hypoproteinemia? HELL, DO YOU UNDERSTAND CAUSE AND EFFECT? For example; The cause is, "We are culturally concerned with ALL THE WRONG THINGS!" What is the effect? -- To be determined.
Monday, November 22, 2010
Dear previous home owners...
(And this is actually an open letter only directed to the folks who previously owned MY home. And I am entirely skipping the grandparents' ownership, although there is not sufficient evidence to indicate whether or not they had a hand in this too... But the parts where I get verbally abusive are not directed at my grandparents, they were good folks. That said, let's just launch into it.)
You ASSHATS!! Your cockshinery and blatant laziness is going to cost me way more time, sweat, and money than would have otherwise been necessary!
First off... I'm pretty sure that you were drunk when you went to pick out your wallpaper. How else would you be able to explain the eagle, lantern, powder horn, laurel branch, rooster, and schoolhouse pattern you seem to have originally picked? There is no excuse for that mess. NONE. And don't you dare give me, "Oh, it was just lovely at the time!" Because I am calling shenanigans on your asses! You were drunk, or you were going for some kind of "folksy-americana-traditional" or you were deliberately trying to make some kind of satirical statement with your wallpaper selection. And let me just say that if it was the latter, then you are even bigger idiots than I gave you credit for, as there are and were better ways to make satirical statements than with your selection of wallpaper in your suburban Indiana kitchen.
Secondly, it appears that in between the first and second rounds of wallpaper you decided it would be a great idea to put plaster over the wallpaper. How in god's creation you managed to get that to work is a mystery in the physics of plaster and wallpaper, but you did it. And after you did it, you appeared to leave that plaster naked and apply a new layer of hideous wallpaper over it. Turquoise floral and diamond patterned paper? REALLY? This is marginally better than your first choice, but I am pretty sure you were still a little buzzed when making that selection too.
The selections were bad enough, but then you apparently elected to paint over that mess... And somewhere along the line, someone decided that wasn't going to do, so you started to scrape at some of it. But in a consistent run of amateur moves, you scraped haphazardly, and DEEPLY gouging out not only the paint, plaster, and bad wallpaper you put up, but also the plaster walls! This leaves all future attempts at any finish other than wallpaper pretty much out of the question unless we are willing to dump god knows how many paychecks into getting this problem solved properly.
And then there is the half-bath... Good God! The bottom-most layer appears to be a shade of paint that resembles "Tiffany blue" which would be fine in small doses, but doesn't seem to pair all that well with the seafoam green tiles you have in there. You painted over that with white, which was arguably a better choice and I would have been fine with. But then you wallpapered over that with a pattern of ferns and grasses, and palm fronds... Again, I don't know how those greens ever went with the seafoam tile, but hey, what do I know? Apparently, you agreed with me at some point and painted white over that mess... And while white would've been fine, YOU PAINTED THE WALLPAPER AGAIN! Come on! Do you really hate all of humanity THAT MUCH? The white paint was then covered with a floral pattern of wallpaper... Not the worst choice, but hell, if I want to see flowers, you know where I think I should go? (Hint: It's not the bathroom!)
Basically, you can see I am very busy undoing the handiwork of the past. And when I was asked if I would rather just put up wallpaper to cover all of this, my response was, "No. I don't hate anyone that much... Kim Jong Il or Osama Bin Laden could buy this house tomorrow and I still wouldn't have the audacity to wallpaper over this shit!"
A steamer and scraper are the items I will keep close at hand for now... I am very glad that only a few rooms of this place were wallpapered. And I am pretty sure that the full bath has only the one layer... Though I haven't sufficiently peeked under the edges to verify that fact.
I knew going into this that there was work to be done, but undoing the shoddy work that lay hidden underneath all of this for so long is far more than I had initially counted on. It's going to be a LONG LONG road to redemption on this one, I'm afraid.
You ASSHATS!! Your cockshinery and blatant laziness is going to cost me way more time, sweat, and money than would have otherwise been necessary!
First off... I'm pretty sure that you were drunk when you went to pick out your wallpaper. How else would you be able to explain the eagle, lantern, powder horn, laurel branch, rooster, and schoolhouse pattern you seem to have originally picked? There is no excuse for that mess. NONE. And don't you dare give me, "Oh, it was just lovely at the time!" Because I am calling shenanigans on your asses! You were drunk, or you were going for some kind of "folksy-americana-traditional" or you were deliberately trying to make some kind of satirical statement with your wallpaper selection. And let me just say that if it was the latter, then you are even bigger idiots than I gave you credit for, as there are and were better ways to make satirical statements than with your selection of wallpaper in your suburban Indiana kitchen.
Secondly, it appears that in between the first and second rounds of wallpaper you decided it would be a great idea to put plaster over the wallpaper. How in god's creation you managed to get that to work is a mystery in the physics of plaster and wallpaper, but you did it. And after you did it, you appeared to leave that plaster naked and apply a new layer of hideous wallpaper over it. Turquoise floral and diamond patterned paper? REALLY? This is marginally better than your first choice, but I am pretty sure you were still a little buzzed when making that selection too.
The selections were bad enough, but then you apparently elected to paint over that mess... And somewhere along the line, someone decided that wasn't going to do, so you started to scrape at some of it. But in a consistent run of amateur moves, you scraped haphazardly, and DEEPLY gouging out not only the paint, plaster, and bad wallpaper you put up, but also the plaster walls! This leaves all future attempts at any finish other than wallpaper pretty much out of the question unless we are willing to dump god knows how many paychecks into getting this problem solved properly.
And then there is the half-bath... Good God! The bottom-most layer appears to be a shade of paint that resembles "Tiffany blue" which would be fine in small doses, but doesn't seem to pair all that well with the seafoam green tiles you have in there. You painted over that with white, which was arguably a better choice and I would have been fine with. But then you wallpapered over that with a pattern of ferns and grasses, and palm fronds... Again, I don't know how those greens ever went with the seafoam tile, but hey, what do I know? Apparently, you agreed with me at some point and painted white over that mess... And while white would've been fine, YOU PAINTED THE WALLPAPER AGAIN! Come on! Do you really hate all of humanity THAT MUCH? The white paint was then covered with a floral pattern of wallpaper... Not the worst choice, but hell, if I want to see flowers, you know where I think I should go? (Hint: It's not the bathroom!)
Basically, you can see I am very busy undoing the handiwork of the past. And when I was asked if I would rather just put up wallpaper to cover all of this, my response was, "No. I don't hate anyone that much... Kim Jong Il or Osama Bin Laden could buy this house tomorrow and I still wouldn't have the audacity to wallpaper over this shit!"
A steamer and scraper are the items I will keep close at hand for now... I am very glad that only a few rooms of this place were wallpapered. And I am pretty sure that the full bath has only the one layer... Though I haven't sufficiently peeked under the edges to verify that fact.
I knew going into this that there was work to be done, but undoing the shoddy work that lay hidden underneath all of this for so long is far more than I had initially counted on. It's going to be a LONG LONG road to redemption on this one, I'm afraid.
Tuesday, November 16, 2010
Per your request...
I do read the comments here, and the lone comment on the last post requested that I tell you about some of the more amusing gems that have been recovered in the "big dig." Happy to oblige.
First off, let me reiterate that my grandparents were not hoarders. They did save all their letters, a large assortment of junk mail and out-dated large-print editions of Reader's Digest and otherwise, mostly things that had some general use, and loads of stuff where the use was not readily apparent to me, but still, generally speaking, this was relatively useful stuff. You're not going to find me featured on an episode of "hoarders" needing professional help with this particular clean up effort... My nomadic lifestyle has really honed my sensibilities to a fine art of spartan utilitarianism. (I do admit to being girly enough that I do love decorator items, and unique ones at that, so, I am not totally utilitarian in lifestyle, but I know going into my projects exactly what will and won't be useful.) If an item has been bested by a new technology, and that technology can be found elsewhere in the residence, for the most part, the original item goes. The exception to this is predominantly in the tool department. Yes, I admit that we currently have an overabundance of hammers and screwdrivers, but in that regard, I also adhere to the "you never have the one you need when you need it" philosophy. So the tools have remained. This also means we've got a SERIOUSLY old school lawn mower. And by "SERIOUSLY OLD SCHOOL" I mean it's one step up from a goat. It's the old rotary push mower that requires no electricity or gas,running solely on the kinetic energy provided by the person pushing, and is merely a series of rotating blades which are totally open for hands and feet to get caught in. Fortunately, I have no small children, so this open-blade variety, in addition to being very environmentally friendly, and noise pollution free, is totally acceptable to me as a kept item.
In the more amusing, and often somewhat disturbing categories of finds, I also discovered multiple home enema kits, way more glycerin-suppository laxatives than anyone other than a severe bulimic or Hollywood starlet could ever hope to need in a lifetime, and other outdated home remedies for assorted maladies that can be treated by methods with a simple trip for currently approved treatments sold at a Walgreens or CVS rather than shoving something in your back door. Those items were rather rapidly tossed, because I have no intention of using them, perhaps largely because,(call me a prude,) I think of my back door as an exclusive "EXIT ONLY."
I also found a few boxes of at-home perms that, judging by the packaging were not sold anytime after 1978, and were never used in those intervening years... Those also found their way to the dump, along with a rainbow-colored assortment of ugly hair clips, scrunchies, and cloth headbands that no rational person with a choice and capacity to exercise free will would ever sport in public.
Having taken over the master bedroom, it was also my unfortunate duty to sort through... well... master bedroom type things. Having found a tube of KY jelly very early on in the process, I knew I was very likely to encounter at least a few shudder-and-or-nightmare-inducing items. The black crotchless panties were found and discarded shortly thereafter. Admittedly, there was one piece of lingerie that made me chuckle in addition to the obligatory shudder. A pair of white bikini underwear with a lion stitched just above the crotch that was also lovingly stitched with the letters "GRRRRRR!" (Again, chuckle, shudder, trash.)
There was also a... I guess we can call it marital aid, in the form of a handbook, apparently one given to my grandparents by some member of the clergy either shortly before or shortly after they wed. It specifically noted on the first page not to let this book fall into the hands of children, or the "perverted of mind." Falling into both of these categories based solely on the timing of my birth and the social acceptability of certain things relevant at the time this little manual was published, I turned this over to my mother who found it endlessly entertaining and whom I often found in riotous fits of laughter as she proceeded to read the ensuing passages. I assume it was funny by today's standards of what is acceptable in the bedroom, (married or not,) and let it be.
Another helpful guidebook recovered from the dig was a very out-dated manual on "how to help the problem drinker" which was, rather amusingly stored in the liquor cabinet. I read the first couple of pages and laughed uncontrollably at references to drinkers in general as "sad sacks" and the recovering alcoholics as a (and this is a DIRECT QUOTE,) "group of folks sitting around singing 'how dry I am' while holding each other back from gulping down whiskey, and preaching to others about the evils of the 'DEMON RUM.'"
That one was always going to be a tough one to top, and still ranks in the top three finds, but then while clearing out the bathroom cabinets, I ran across an unopened box containing 10 individual packets, marked "LE FUNELLE!" The packets were then further marked, "For when you're out on the town and cannot sit down!" Yes, that's right, it was a funnel for the ladies to use in bathrooms they deemed unsanitary, so they could pee while standing. I laughed heartily at that, and proceeded to wrap it and give it as a gift to my best friend. I think the odds are good that I will get it back for Christmas, and that she will get it back for her birthday in the spring. It's just one of those gifts.
I also ran across a couple of decks of vintage playing cards with naked ladies on them, and seeing as I don't have a pen pal on death row who would get ready use out of those, I simply passed them along to the more appreciative men in the family, who proceeded to jokingly fight about who would get the deck featuring the blonde, and who got the brunette. (They then decided to mix the decks by suit so they both got some of each.)
That's a random sampling of the more worthwhile finds so far. I will let you all know if anything more interesting turns up!
First off, let me reiterate that my grandparents were not hoarders. They did save all their letters, a large assortment of junk mail and out-dated large-print editions of Reader's Digest and otherwise, mostly things that had some general use, and loads of stuff where the use was not readily apparent to me, but still, generally speaking, this was relatively useful stuff. You're not going to find me featured on an episode of "hoarders" needing professional help with this particular clean up effort... My nomadic lifestyle has really honed my sensibilities to a fine art of spartan utilitarianism. (I do admit to being girly enough that I do love decorator items, and unique ones at that, so, I am not totally utilitarian in lifestyle, but I know going into my projects exactly what will and won't be useful.) If an item has been bested by a new technology, and that technology can be found elsewhere in the residence, for the most part, the original item goes. The exception to this is predominantly in the tool department. Yes, I admit that we currently have an overabundance of hammers and screwdrivers, but in that regard, I also adhere to the "you never have the one you need when you need it" philosophy. So the tools have remained. This also means we've got a SERIOUSLY old school lawn mower. And by "SERIOUSLY OLD SCHOOL" I mean it's one step up from a goat. It's the old rotary push mower that requires no electricity or gas,running solely on the kinetic energy provided by the person pushing, and is merely a series of rotating blades which are totally open for hands and feet to get caught in. Fortunately, I have no small children, so this open-blade variety, in addition to being very environmentally friendly, and noise pollution free, is totally acceptable to me as a kept item.
In the more amusing, and often somewhat disturbing categories of finds, I also discovered multiple home enema kits, way more glycerin-suppository laxatives than anyone other than a severe bulimic or Hollywood starlet could ever hope to need in a lifetime, and other outdated home remedies for assorted maladies that can be treated by methods with a simple trip for currently approved treatments sold at a Walgreens or CVS rather than shoving something in your back door. Those items were rather rapidly tossed, because I have no intention of using them, perhaps largely because,(call me a prude,) I think of my back door as an exclusive "EXIT ONLY."
I also found a few boxes of at-home perms that, judging by the packaging were not sold anytime after 1978, and were never used in those intervening years... Those also found their way to the dump, along with a rainbow-colored assortment of ugly hair clips, scrunchies, and cloth headbands that no rational person with a choice and capacity to exercise free will would ever sport in public.
Having taken over the master bedroom, it was also my unfortunate duty to sort through... well... master bedroom type things. Having found a tube of KY jelly very early on in the process, I knew I was very likely to encounter at least a few shudder-and-or-nightmare-inducing items. The black crotchless panties were found and discarded shortly thereafter. Admittedly, there was one piece of lingerie that made me chuckle in addition to the obligatory shudder. A pair of white bikini underwear with a lion stitched just above the crotch that was also lovingly stitched with the letters "GRRRRRR!" (Again, chuckle, shudder, trash.)
There was also a... I guess we can call it marital aid, in the form of a handbook, apparently one given to my grandparents by some member of the clergy either shortly before or shortly after they wed. It specifically noted on the first page not to let this book fall into the hands of children, or the "perverted of mind." Falling into both of these categories based solely on the timing of my birth and the social acceptability of certain things relevant at the time this little manual was published, I turned this over to my mother who found it endlessly entertaining and whom I often found in riotous fits of laughter as she proceeded to read the ensuing passages. I assume it was funny by today's standards of what is acceptable in the bedroom, (married or not,) and let it be.
Another helpful guidebook recovered from the dig was a very out-dated manual on "how to help the problem drinker" which was, rather amusingly stored in the liquor cabinet. I read the first couple of pages and laughed uncontrollably at references to drinkers in general as "sad sacks" and the recovering alcoholics as a (and this is a DIRECT QUOTE,) "group of folks sitting around singing 'how dry I am' while holding each other back from gulping down whiskey, and preaching to others about the evils of the 'DEMON RUM.'"
That one was always going to be a tough one to top, and still ranks in the top three finds, but then while clearing out the bathroom cabinets, I ran across an unopened box containing 10 individual packets, marked "LE FUNELLE!" The packets were then further marked, "For when you're out on the town and cannot sit down!" Yes, that's right, it was a funnel for the ladies to use in bathrooms they deemed unsanitary, so they could pee while standing. I laughed heartily at that, and proceeded to wrap it and give it as a gift to my best friend. I think the odds are good that I will get it back for Christmas, and that she will get it back for her birthday in the spring. It's just one of those gifts.
I also ran across a couple of decks of vintage playing cards with naked ladies on them, and seeing as I don't have a pen pal on death row who would get ready use out of those, I simply passed them along to the more appreciative men in the family, who proceeded to jokingly fight about who would get the deck featuring the blonde, and who got the brunette. (They then decided to mix the decks by suit so they both got some of each.)
That's a random sampling of the more worthwhile finds so far. I will let you all know if anything more interesting turns up!
Saturday, November 06, 2010
Cut to Tom Petty singing "Refugee"
Ok, so in the last post we covered the fact that I am a person who seeks geographical solutions to life's problems.
I'm not comfortable with calling it "running away from my problems" because I am not so much running to or from anywhere, but rather, rolling up the homestead, packing it in the ol' wagon, and rolling back to the roots more often than not. Basically, with minimal effort involved, my problems would have no trouble finding me.
That said, I admit that I have spent a healthy chunk of cash on u-hauls, pizza, and cases of beer to compensate helpful friends in the last few years... Much more than I would like. And yes, I have thought quite a bit about how my nomadic lifestyle has kept me from pursuing certain things, and probably a few relationships. But it has also provided me with interesting opportunities, random jobs, and some really great friendships that I would have lacked otherwise.
Living like a refugee has some definite pros and cons.
This most recent move has not only landed me back in my hometown, but in the house where my grandparents lived. This particular situation, too, has pros and cons. For example: Living in hometown - Con for night life, pro for cost of living. The house is paid off - DEFINITE PRO. The grandparents lived here for more than 50 years and didn't throw much away in all that time - MOSTLY CON, with the occasional random found object becoming just amusing enough to be register as a pro.
Yes, I could go on with that list for a while, but I have a feeling I am already starting to bore all two of you whom I have retained as readers, so I will stop.
The point of this is, when I talk to the friends I have amassed elsewhere, and they ask how the new place is, or if I have found work yet, or the other run of the mill questions you get from people who don't see you everyday, I do have things to tell them despite living like a shut-in at present.
The new place is lovely, despite being full of all kinds of crap. No I haven't found work yet, though I admit to busying myself with other endeavors instead of REALLY hunting for that next job. Essentially, I look at the job ads for a little while and then I busy myself with what I refer to as the big dig. I have spent weeks digging through every drawer, cabinet, closet, nook, and cranny of this place, shuffling through mountains of papers, photos, odd little knickknacks, boxes upon boxes of utter nonsense, and pretty much anything else you can imagine amassing in more than 50 years while living in the same house.
I should probably explain something. No, my grandparents were not hoarders. They were, however, children in the depression era. This led them to save things that were vaguely useful just in case they might be needed later. Also, they saved newspaper clippings from 1974, (and every other year,) not because they were particularly interesting, but because at the end of a full page article covering some local event in great depth and detail, my grandmother's name appeared for some banal reason one paragraph from the bottom. This would be fine if there were just one or two of those, but we are talking about tons of loose little newsprint clippings that aren't mounted for preservation because they have some great significance, but rather stuffed in an envelope, and dropped in a drawer because my grandfather ranked fourth that week in a local golf outing in 1958. Apparently this was worth remembering... Just not important enough to actually do anything with any of it.
To boot, in a world before email and that ever-so-convenient delete button, my grandparents were tireless correspondents. They retained their pen-pals from all over the place for decades. Unfortunately, they also retained every letter from every person who ever wrote them anything. I suppose as pros or cons go, this one could go either way, because some of it is vaguely amusing, but for the most part it is just heaps of crap that must be sorted one piece at a time... But now I know that my aunt had tennis elbow in the spring of '74, and that my great aunt had some money troubles back in '53, and I also know that all too frequently many of these letters contained pictures. Mind you none of these pictures qualify to compete with Annie Liebowitz, or Ansel Adams... We're just talking about the run of the mill shots of the back of my cousin's head, or my mother falling asleep at the dining room table, or some random house in Dayton, Ohio, or snow on some residential street somewhere in Vermont. (Riveting, I know.)
Don't get me wrong. Some of it is great. I do have the advantage of being lucky enough to live in a house that is paid off, so I can take the time to sort through all of this, and some of it does admittedly shine a light into the more darkened corners of my family history, but at the same time, I don't really care about the vast majority of it, and yet ALL of it still has to be painstakingly examined and sorted, one piece at a time.
You're probably saying to yourself, "Just chuck it all and start fresh!" And as far as I am concerned that would be the ideal. And perhaps this is my nomadic-refugee lifestyle piping up, but seeing as I lived without all of this other stuff all these years, having it all thrust upon me now seems silly. And if it were up to me, I would most likely give the majority of it a general once-over and chuck most of it... But you see, there is a fly in the ointment. My family knows I am here. They know what I am doing here. Some have readily embraced it and encouraged me to do anything in my power to make this house my own. Which would mean purging many of the the remnants of the past. But there are others... OH YES... OTHERS.
The others are the rather nutty (not in a good way) members of the family. The ones who essentially think that this house ought to stand as is, and essentially be a shrine to the former residents. They seem to believe that nothing should be touched or moved, or (GASP!) thrown out because at some point my grandparents thought it was important to keep.
I'm sorry, but I don't look at a user's manual for a toaster purchased in 1964 and think to myself, "This is truly a precious heirloom! It must be preserved and handed down to future generations!" (That seems to be the thinking of the "OTHERS.") Meanwhile my thinking is, "Jesus, what the hell is this doing here? It is clearly in with other manuals and instructions... Including the manual for the 1976 model toaster that replaced the old '64... (12 years is a pretty good run for a toaster if I do say so myself) And the envelope all of this is in is clearly only a few years old, so someone had to look at all of this... WHY DID WE SAVE IT? Why do we still have assembly instructions for a weed whacker? It's two screws on the handle and then you move the little lever and pop on the wire spool at the bottom... Did we save that in case one of the screws fell out and a mentally handicapped person was recruited to do the repair job? I don't think we need the assembly instructions anymore... WAIT, THERE ARE THREE SEPARATE WEED WHACKER MANUALS... WE ONLY HAVE ONE WEED WHACKER, AND IT ISN'T ANY ONE OF THESE!" Clearly my thinking, while much more long-winded, is also much more logical and rational. Upon completion of examining all the manuals contained in the manual envelopes, my next thought was, "Why was this all stored in the dining room in the cabinet with the nice table linens, and why is there also a cache of incandescent light bulbs and three rotary phones in here too?"
There isn't any real rhyme or reason to any of this, or how any of it was stored. Heap on 8 grandkids and 5 great grandkids all sending every little art project imaginable, and obituary clippings and funeral cards for anyone who you ever breathed on and you're starting to see how things add up.
You can see how I have occupied my time lately.
In the words of Shakespeare, "Once more into the breach, dear friends, once more..."
I'm not comfortable with calling it "running away from my problems" because I am not so much running to or from anywhere, but rather, rolling up the homestead, packing it in the ol' wagon, and rolling back to the roots more often than not. Basically, with minimal effort involved, my problems would have no trouble finding me.
That said, I admit that I have spent a healthy chunk of cash on u-hauls, pizza, and cases of beer to compensate helpful friends in the last few years... Much more than I would like. And yes, I have thought quite a bit about how my nomadic lifestyle has kept me from pursuing certain things, and probably a few relationships. But it has also provided me with interesting opportunities, random jobs, and some really great friendships that I would have lacked otherwise.
Living like a refugee has some definite pros and cons.
This most recent move has not only landed me back in my hometown, but in the house where my grandparents lived. This particular situation, too, has pros and cons. For example: Living in hometown - Con for night life, pro for cost of living. The house is paid off - DEFINITE PRO. The grandparents lived here for more than 50 years and didn't throw much away in all that time - MOSTLY CON, with the occasional random found object becoming just amusing enough to be register as a pro.
Yes, I could go on with that list for a while, but I have a feeling I am already starting to bore all two of you whom I have retained as readers, so I will stop.
The point of this is, when I talk to the friends I have amassed elsewhere, and they ask how the new place is, or if I have found work yet, or the other run of the mill questions you get from people who don't see you everyday, I do have things to tell them despite living like a shut-in at present.
The new place is lovely, despite being full of all kinds of crap. No I haven't found work yet, though I admit to busying myself with other endeavors instead of REALLY hunting for that next job. Essentially, I look at the job ads for a little while and then I busy myself with what I refer to as the big dig. I have spent weeks digging through every drawer, cabinet, closet, nook, and cranny of this place, shuffling through mountains of papers, photos, odd little knickknacks, boxes upon boxes of utter nonsense, and pretty much anything else you can imagine amassing in more than 50 years while living in the same house.
I should probably explain something. No, my grandparents were not hoarders. They were, however, children in the depression era. This led them to save things that were vaguely useful just in case they might be needed later. Also, they saved newspaper clippings from 1974, (and every other year,) not because they were particularly interesting, but because at the end of a full page article covering some local event in great depth and detail, my grandmother's name appeared for some banal reason one paragraph from the bottom. This would be fine if there were just one or two of those, but we are talking about tons of loose little newsprint clippings that aren't mounted for preservation because they have some great significance, but rather stuffed in an envelope, and dropped in a drawer because my grandfather ranked fourth that week in a local golf outing in 1958. Apparently this was worth remembering... Just not important enough to actually do anything with any of it.
To boot, in a world before email and that ever-so-convenient delete button, my grandparents were tireless correspondents. They retained their pen-pals from all over the place for decades. Unfortunately, they also retained every letter from every person who ever wrote them anything. I suppose as pros or cons go, this one could go either way, because some of it is vaguely amusing, but for the most part it is just heaps of crap that must be sorted one piece at a time... But now I know that my aunt had tennis elbow in the spring of '74, and that my great aunt had some money troubles back in '53, and I also know that all too frequently many of these letters contained pictures. Mind you none of these pictures qualify to compete with Annie Liebowitz, or Ansel Adams... We're just talking about the run of the mill shots of the back of my cousin's head, or my mother falling asleep at the dining room table, or some random house in Dayton, Ohio, or snow on some residential street somewhere in Vermont. (Riveting, I know.)
Don't get me wrong. Some of it is great. I do have the advantage of being lucky enough to live in a house that is paid off, so I can take the time to sort through all of this, and some of it does admittedly shine a light into the more darkened corners of my family history, but at the same time, I don't really care about the vast majority of it, and yet ALL of it still has to be painstakingly examined and sorted, one piece at a time.
You're probably saying to yourself, "Just chuck it all and start fresh!" And as far as I am concerned that would be the ideal. And perhaps this is my nomadic-refugee lifestyle piping up, but seeing as I lived without all of this other stuff all these years, having it all thrust upon me now seems silly. And if it were up to me, I would most likely give the majority of it a general once-over and chuck most of it... But you see, there is a fly in the ointment. My family knows I am here. They know what I am doing here. Some have readily embraced it and encouraged me to do anything in my power to make this house my own. Which would mean purging many of the the remnants of the past. But there are others... OH YES... OTHERS.
The others are the rather nutty (not in a good way) members of the family. The ones who essentially think that this house ought to stand as is, and essentially be a shrine to the former residents. They seem to believe that nothing should be touched or moved, or (GASP!) thrown out because at some point my grandparents thought it was important to keep.
I'm sorry, but I don't look at a user's manual for a toaster purchased in 1964 and think to myself, "This is truly a precious heirloom! It must be preserved and handed down to future generations!" (That seems to be the thinking of the "OTHERS.") Meanwhile my thinking is, "Jesus, what the hell is this doing here? It is clearly in with other manuals and instructions... Including the manual for the 1976 model toaster that replaced the old '64... (12 years is a pretty good run for a toaster if I do say so myself) And the envelope all of this is in is clearly only a few years old, so someone had to look at all of this... WHY DID WE SAVE IT? Why do we still have assembly instructions for a weed whacker? It's two screws on the handle and then you move the little lever and pop on the wire spool at the bottom... Did we save that in case one of the screws fell out and a mentally handicapped person was recruited to do the repair job? I don't think we need the assembly instructions anymore... WAIT, THERE ARE THREE SEPARATE WEED WHACKER MANUALS... WE ONLY HAVE ONE WEED WHACKER, AND IT ISN'T ANY ONE OF THESE!" Clearly my thinking, while much more long-winded, is also much more logical and rational. Upon completion of examining all the manuals contained in the manual envelopes, my next thought was, "Why was this all stored in the dining room in the cabinet with the nice table linens, and why is there also a cache of incandescent light bulbs and three rotary phones in here too?"
There isn't any real rhyme or reason to any of this, or how any of it was stored. Heap on 8 grandkids and 5 great grandkids all sending every little art project imaginable, and obituary clippings and funeral cards for anyone who you ever breathed on and you're starting to see how things add up.
You can see how I have occupied my time lately.
In the words of Shakespeare, "Once more into the breach, dear friends, once more..."
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)