Attention conservation notice (term stolen from Cosma): What follows is mostly purely Levenson-domicile maundering. The good stuff is at the end; great art by someone I love. Now you know.
I’ve gone silent on our kitchen renovation farrago, for the obvious and very good reason: it’s the eternal return of the same, and thus boring. Everyone who’s lived through (or, FSM-forbid, DIY’d) a major house project knows the one universal truth: it sucks. It’s like parachuting without the thrill: August 1 at 7 a.m. we were riding a perfectly functional airplane had a perfectly functional kitchen. By 8:30 we’d jumped.
And the usual followed: the house is filled with dust; we’ve broken so many glasses in our makeshift sink that we’ve finally given up and gone to plastic; and as the weeks go by the house looks more like a communal grad-student flop than I ever thought I’d inhabit again.
But there’s hope. Yesterday — all in one day! — saw the transition from this:
To this:
Of course, the resulting upsurge in that sweet feeling that suggests, yes, this may someday end, is “hope” only in the sense that Robin Williams describe here. (Round about 1:48 for the reference.) Yeah, the room finally looks more or less like a room again — but now we’re going head on into the fiddly stage, where two or more skilled craftspeople will nudge something or other into some precise configuration that takes hours to work out, for an indefinite and seemingly unending future. Again…tiny violin time.
Never mind. We still cook — this week I managed a lamb stew, even, browning the meat on the gas grill — in the midst of a thunder squall — before finishing everything else on 12o0 watt burner on the hot plate:
Tasted fine.
There’s HOOOOOOOOPE (18 f**king times!)
Meanwhile, of course, life continues to do its thing — and given that, can I draw your attention to something that makes me very happy, and that I think (as I should) shows real power as a work of art.
That would be the new installation show my wife, Katha Seidman, is about to open with two other artists at the Cotuit Center for the Arts — calling all Cape Cod-proximate Balloon Juicers!.
Inspired by and in conversation with Giacometti’s The Palace at 4 a.m. (to be seen at MOMA in New York), the installation opens tonight. Details on the card:
Lots more on the installation (with photos of both the stages of creation and some of the more sculptural elements) can be found at its Facebook page.
I’ve seen it go through all the stages of gestation, from sketches and models to huge bits and pieces, some of which we trialled on our lawn. It’s (in my no-doubt utterly unbiased opinion) a deeply conceived and executed work of art, powerful as spectacle and more so as I’ve lingered with what its elements say in themselves and with and through each other. So, if you happen to be passing anywhere near that way in the next month, check it out.
Last, just for grins, here’s a picture of me, singing cooking in the rain:
And now…open thread.
Steve from Antioch
The other day you wrote that you’d replaced Sullivan’s blog with smarter, more focused and much more disciplined thinkers.
Do you have a list you could share?
Tom Levenson
Yup. But not today — racing to the opening.
Amir Khalid
Is that your usual facial expression?
Omnes Omnibus
The lamb stew looks tasty.
raven
So the top pic is the sub-floor and then you laid what? Did you use 3/4 hardwood?
Richard Shindledecker
Would that be a Weber?
raven
@Richard Shindledecker: I have a gas weber, it is great!
scav
@Omnes Omnibus: Indeed. I’d be equally tempted by both venues if in the area, with a slight edge toward lamb depending on the time of day. Plus construction site? Even more lamb, to my eternal shame. sawdust.
schrodinger's cat
How is the magnificent Tikka?
gelfling545
My daughter has been sending me pictures from this place. She & her SO are enjoying a child-free weekend on Montreal. I expect a lot of folks from here would enjoy this. Also, their hotel has parrots living in the conservatory who like to mingle with the guests. She tells me that the parrots are bi-lingual.
scav
@scav: And I absolutely want a painting with a zipper. plus its context, but especially the zipper. Am hoping that is a table with same: if not will toddle off and consider other glass or wood-based equivalents.
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
The cleaning crew arrived to clean our empty apartment but, sadly, it was not empty. They’re doing their best and will each get a $40 tip for their trouble.
So. Much. Stuff. How the hell did we fit it all in here?!
Omnes Omnibus
Tom, the murder mystery connection your wife writes about on the FB page is quite interesting. It is always fun to see how an artist’s mind works.
Tree With Water
‘Maundering’. Great word I don’t recall ever having read.
Funny you mention your kitchen and Robin Williams. I rebuilt my house a few years ago, and the master carpenter and half the trades people that did the work had earlier built Williams last two mansions (the economy had just tanked, and work was scarce). Williams had kept a lot of people employed for a very long time, may he RIP.
I had the work done before moving in, so it’s light years away from your situation. But my creaky old cottage is today one of the coziest places on the planet, and my kitchen is perfect because it’s new. Isn’t it great to watch a room transformed into something you like? Of course, one thing leads to another. What color paint are you going with for the walls to compliment the new floor?
Corner Stone
Wait a second. You made lamb-anything and didn’t invite me?!
dp
Beautiful floor. Hang in there!
schrodinger's cat
I just finished making the coconut filling for karanjis, still have to make the dough for the for the shells and then bake them. Also, roasted the flattened rice cereal for the chivda.
Ruckus
That’s an interesting FB page. Always nice to see minds at work on a project. May be the part I like about my work the best, seeing people, including myself, take ideas and turn them into something that satisfies that idea or gives the ability to do something otherwise not doable.
I like the development of a basic idea for creating something that didn’t exist, even if it’s helping someone else’s idea. The adding on of value.
MomSense
Great selfie! Hoping the kitchen is finished soon. I’ve been through that nightmare a couple of times now and it really does suck. The first time I had two toddlers–good times.
Living in the carpenter's house
Hang in there! It’s exhausting but the finished renovation is always so nice that you’ll be looking at other rooms critically in no time.
(I did kitchen renos with my dad 20 years ago in my carpentry apprenticeship.)
Steeplejack
@Mnemosyne (iPhone):
I think we all exist in a state of greater or lesser “clutter blindness” in our everyday lives (phrase taken from one of those dreadful hoarding shows), and when it is disrupted by something like a move, a renovation or a repair the effect can be shocking. I had the same thing happen when I did my recent “spring cleaning”/decluttering.
raven
@Steeplejack: Or a two-year delay in a renovation while waiting for the sewer to be moved!
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
@Steeplejack:
It’s also an ADHD thing — I literally don’t notice things that drive other people crazy. They just never make the trip into the “take action” part of my brain.
We’ve been trying to sort as we go, but we have now accepted that there will be a second sort when we unpack, and we’re okay with that.
Ruckus
@Mnemosyne (iPhone):
I’m still doing the second(OK actually the third) sort after my last two moves. I am getting better. No really, I am. My storage unit with all the crap I have has shrunk in half and a lot of the things left are tools. Progress!
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
@efgoldman:
Not directly, in our case. We got movers for the big stuff (couch, refrigerator, etc.) but most of the cost for us is our time and wear and tear on our cars going back and forth since it’s a cross-town move (we’re moving about 6 miles west of our current location).
scav
@efgoldman: Could also be interpreted as paying for the time to make decisions when less under the gun — we’ve all made very strange decisions under time constraints no doubt. Sort of an insurance policy sort of deal.
Corner Stone
Oh, hey. No one ever saw this coming.
GOP changes tune on cutting Social Security with elections on the line
“Once venerated in both parties as a good-faith proposal, the Bowles-Simpson plan calls for political compromise to rein in the $17.9 trillion national debt, which was dangerously elevated by the recent recession. Republicans would raise taxes, the theory goes, in exchange for Democrats cutting health and retirement spending. Among its proposals: trim Social Security benefits for well-off seniors, raise the retirement age to 69 by 2075 and adopt the new inflation measure, known as the chained Consumer Price Index, or chained CPI.”
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!
opiejeanne
@Mnemosyne (iPhone): There is a book, I Hate to Housekeep, that mentions this problem, saying that if the sock is not removed from the mantle within X number of days it becomes part of the decor and you just do not see it any longer.
Had a friend come over the day after we returned from a month in Europe. She looked at our fairly tidy kitchen and said she wished she could be like us and just invite people over when there were things on the counters. The “things on the counters” were a large and very beautiful Cinderella pumpkin from our garden sitting on the island, a toaster and some small pitchers with often-used utensils in them (spatulas, tongs, pierced spoons, a “spider”, wooden spoons and spirtles). And a pile of mail that we were sorting. Honestly, I do not know what was bugging her about our non-mess but some people can’t stand to have ANYTHING on their counters.
aimai
Hey Tom–renovations do come to an end but cooking is for ever. I can absolutely say that for cooks–like you and your spouse–a renovated kitchen is a joy unlike any other renovation. I mean no matter how much money you put into a bathroom or another room its not thes ame as the place where you create food and family events.
Anne Laurie
@Amir Khalid: He’s much better-looking in person (and/or when he’s not being rained on!) — ask EFGoldman or SiubhanDuinne, if you don’t believe me.
Howard Beale IV
A Cat Cafe has opened in Oakland, CA.
Mike in NC
Except for the kitchens and bathrooms, the rooms in every house in our development came with wall-to-wall off-white carpeting, which is impossible to keep clean. Not to mention having two cats in the house. Everybody hates it and many neighbors are getting hardwood or laminate flooring installed, so we’ll probably do the same next year.
Tree With Water
@efgoldman: I’m in a serious process of losing all the extraneous crap I currently warehouse. And yet, just a couple of days ago I took back a rocking chair I had donated to a charity store. It was Big Red, a very large, comfortable red faux leather thing that was my Archie Bunker chair for years. The store had slapped a “free” sign on Big Red, and I couldn’t bear to see it like that. I’ll be making room for it in my small shed after all.
It’s raining as I type in Sonoma County, California. Blessed be the rain, amen.
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
@Howard Beale IV:
I wonder how many urban legends will spring up about puzzled foreigners wandering into the cat cafés expecting to have cats be part of the menu, not the ambiance.
Betty Cracker
@aimai: Hear, hear! We demolished and renovated our little kitchen when the only remaining working drawer fell apart. The new space exponentially increased counter space and storage. Worth every penny, bruise and abrasion and then some!
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
Also, Out of the Closet refused to take my white four-poster bed frame, so I guess it will be Craigslist after all. Apparently beds are just too much of a hassle to set up and maintain in the store, plus it’s too big to fit into most people’s cars, even disassembled.
divF
@aimai: This.
In 2001, we did major renovations on our house. After spending way too much money on boring maintenance – replacing all the windows, putting down helical piers so that the house wouldn’t slowly turn and shear with the Hayward fault – I decided that this was the perfect opportunity for me at age 49 to have my midlife crisis. Since I had no interest in a divorce (Madame divF has *always* been my trophy wife), and sports cars don’t do anything for me, I tripled the size of the kitchen and equipped it so that I can cater a party for 100 out of it. Many parties and family events later, my only regret is that I did not install a second dishwasher, a defect that I may yet remedy.
Betty Cracker
@Mnemosyne (iPhone): I remember one almost certainly apocryphal story about a foreign exec getting a tour of a gourmet catfood plant, including the lab, etc., and asking the tour guide, “What do you do with the pelts?”
Howard Beale IV
Two more retailers just pulled the plug on ALL NFC payment systems and are now joining the MCX cabal, giving the shiv to both Apple Pay and Google Wallet.
Looks like they’res still a lot of bad blood between the merchants and the interchanges-in reality, that battle never ended.
Corner Stone
@divF:
Good Lord. Why?
Lizzy L
I just turned my 500 sq ft garage into my home, and my small (940 sq ft) 3 bedroom house is now a 2-bedroom rental unit. (The third bedroom has a separate entrance onto the back yard and is my office.) My new house is one big room, except for the bathroom, but I have a bedroom section, a living section, and a kitchen section, no problem. I got rid of 50% of what I own. It was most difficult to divest myself of the books: I ended up keeping about 700 books, which is less than half of what I had but still a lot of books.
The construction on the casita (that’s my ex-garage) took 3 months. I remember the day the floor went down — wow. And I also remember the day the skylights (there are two, and five windows) went in. I love the light.
The rule in the casita is: in order to bring in a new thing (book, article of clothing, dish, etc) and old thing has to go out.
So far, it’s working.
And yeah — it took longer than expected, and cost LOTS more than the original estimate. I am told it always does.
Tree With Water
@divF: Like David Brooks, you now have “vast spaces for entertaining”.. Next step: make some friends.
Cervantes
@Corner Stone:
I think the clue was in the words “midlife crisis.”
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
@Betty Cracker:
I always heard that one as Russians, but that was back in the Soviet days. I wonder which nationality gets assigned that one these days.
Howard Beale IV
@Mnemosyne (iPhone): When you go to certain parts of China and you see drawings (not pictures) of dogs and cats, those aren’t for adoption.
fleeting expletive
In the mid-nineties my then-husband and I bought a 1912 6000 square foot two story house. Red brick, eight fireplaces, 4 1/2 bathroom house that had been subject to an abysmal reno in the 60’s. Very similar in style to the Obamas’ house in Chicago. I took about 18 months off to design and supervise complete restoration, with carpenters and painters and wall paperers, oh my. We at the time had enough money to do it right. I wasn’t trying to make it into a museum restoration, but to honor the style and the era. This place had a parlor and a library and a lovely glassed-in side porch that became my sanctuary, a full attic and basement too. There was gnarly stuff like foundation repair and replacing most of the plumbing and electric wiring (knob and tube).
I had all the floor vents and one of the fireplace cast iron fronts brassed, replaced the kitchen cabinets, stained and finished all the wood floors, ordered custom stained glass kitchen cabinet doors, etc. It was an immense labor of love and of course was expensive. But the project turned out so beautifully that it was twice included in the town’s Christmas Home tour. We were able to stay in our old cramped house while the work was done.
It was personally very satisfying to me to have done that. We lived there for another 7 or so years until divorce messed up my situation. It took me over a year to get the place sold, while living there alone with my daughter. I still have dreams about that old place and ALL the work. Basically every surface and fixture was replaced. My realtor made a CD showing the house in its entirety that I still have. Oh, and I bought the 2nd dishwasher and never regretted it for a minute.
My point is, I guess, that even though it can be a giant pain, memories and results can warm your heart forever afterwards.
Tree With Water
@Mike in NC: Whoever came up with white carpeting had a twisted sense of humor.
raven
@fleeting expletive: We’ve owned our old house for 15 years. My father-in-law was an old school builder from Central Virginia and he would come down with designs and “supervision” and kicked my ass for a couple of years when we renovated. We decided three years ago that we need another bathroom and master suite. My bride worked with a guy that has done major additions and home building for a number of friends to design and build the add. We are closing in on two years of waiting for the city to move the sewer that they had mis-marked and THEN we get to start.
Tom Levenson
@Amir Khalid: Yes.
@raven: red oak, rift sawn.
@Richard Shindledecker: Yeah — an older one, inherited from my brother when he moved west. We’ve got a charcoal dome weber too, but that’s not for everyday cooking — at least not for me.
@schrodinger’s cat: responding with his usual tact, grace and charm to strangers. Pictures to come.
@scav: Paintingswith a zippers are obtainable! @Tree With Water: I have no idea what color the walls will be, except probably white. We’re going to have a lot of strong colors in the fixings, so we won’t want to argue too much with that. But who knows? TBD.
@Corner Stone: ;-)
@Living in the carpenter’s house: No, no, no. A 1000x no. If you even hint at more renovation in this millenium I will send Tikka out to hunt you down and kill you. (PS – thanks for the encouragement.)
@aimai: Thanks. I know. But there is this moment (that comes more than once) when you feel just f**k it — I want this to be done. We’re there.
@divF: I’m so glad to hear this.
divF
@Corner Stone:
Being (half-) Italian, entertaining is something you do with food. We had gotten into the habit since the late 1970’s of throwing parties twice a year (Yule and Midsummer) and inviting all of our friends. These are 6-8 hour affairs, with multiple waves of food produced. Over time, the size of that group consisting of “all of our friends” has grown so that, even with no-shows, we have over 100 people show up through the course of the event (that number does not double-count the people who show early, then again later). Also, over time everyone has become so busy that these parties are a way of saying at least a couple of times a year “yeah, we’re still here”.
In addition, Madame is the oldest of five, so having a over-capacity kitchen for more modest-sized events (20 or so for Thanksgiving, what with children and random strays) has its points.
Tree With Water
@opiejeanne: I’m a picture straightener myself.
Mike J
Seattle Sounders snatch Supporters’ Shield!
fleeting expletive
We were only the third owners of this house in its 90+ years. We bought it from the widow of a doctor who had practiced there for >50 years. It had a two story detached brick garage in which one half of the bottom story had been the old doc’s labORatory. There were bunsen burners, beakers, several of their three sons’ science projects from 30 years before, and also the good doc had a display case of jars with I believe human embryos up to maybe 6 inches in height. Some of the old place was kreepy. We hosted tons of parties, political appearances (John Edwards!), huge family holidays and reunions. I was a busy little beaver then, and am a hermit now. Also we were very lucky in that our carpenters and painters, etc. were all outstanding craftsmen and I think really appreciated the chance to work on something meaningful.
Tree With Water
@fleeting expletive: When it came to their bonuses, I trust you remembered the fetus jars. Jeezuz.
Corner Stone
@divF: That sounds like hell on earth.
Glad it worked out for you though.
Gene108
I redid my kitchen. Being in a two bedroom 1000 sq ft condo, there’s no rearranging possible.
What drove me nuts was finding a plumber. I told them I was getting granite countertops and would have a sink that sits under the counter.
They all told me they could not do the job because the garbage disposal would not fit.
Finally found one, who came up with the simple solution of going to Home Depot and getting a garbage disposal that would fit. Cost me an extra $80 dollars.
IAMNAP but I do not understand why suggesting a new garbage disposal was so hard to come across.
Corner Stone
@fleeting expletive:
“Some” of it? “SOME”??
WereBear
@Lizzy L: That sounds delightful!
I have a fascination with small spaces, and come the digital revolution my biggest space grabbers, music & books, have shrunk to the size of a hard drive. However, there’s the cats. I’m still stuck on those :)
raven
@Tom Levenson: sweet
fleeting expletive
@Corner Stone: When we originally were considering buying the place it was “decorated” with hunting trophy heads in the parlor and fossils and African souvenirs. The carpenters and I discovered a space above the refrigerator that was under the stairs to the upstairs. It might have been about 4′ x 6′ and with an angled ceiling (stairs). We discussed, and the carpenter said it could be done, a concealed entry to the space from the stairs, like taking five or six stairs and placing them on a liftable door. Hard to describe but it would be a perfect hidey hole in a zombie invasion. we decided not to do that. Oddly, there was a lightbulb receptacle in the space, so perhaps at some point there was another configuration and no refrigerator there at all. They used iceboxes in the early days.
Ruckus
@opiejeanne:
Used to have a boss who demanded that I print out every email and save them along with every piece of snail mail that I got. My cubical had enough room for about a weeks worth of mail. Of course his desk had at most 5 pieces of paper on it, all arranged in one tidy stack, nothing else. My facial expression should have caused him to burst into flames but unfortunately it didn’t. BTW I was a bad employee and didn’t do either of these asinine things. And of course it made no difference to the world in the least.
raven
Howard Beale IV
@Gene108: When I moved into my condo I not only did not have a garbage disposer but I did not have a dishwasher. Those were the first two things I had done after I moved in-worth every penny. Granite countertops? Ehh…not so much. I also replaced the washer/dryer with a frontloader HE model when the state ran a cash-for-costly-to-run appliance deal, where I got a $200 rebate to trade in a top-loader for a front-loader. Had to replace the folding doors, and the dryer doesn’t match the washer in color, but they’re behind to doors anyway. I should have replaced the electric dryer with a gas dryer, but I took the path of least resistance. Also replaced the old coil-top range with a flat-top convection oven I got cheap, and the microwave and refrigerator were replaced before I moved in, so I’m pretty well set.
catclub
From the article:
@Howard Beale IV:
What is so hard about that?
Howard Beale IV
@Ruckus: Yikes-had you actually done those things and your company had been party of a lawsuit, those could have been extremely damaging. That’s one reason why enterprise email systems run agents that diligently purge email that exceed corporate retention guidelines just for that reason.
catclub
@Howard Beale IV:
I recently got a new range with glass top cooktop, but suddenly want an induction cooktop – in principle no burns from touching it.
Ruckus
Once remodeled most of my 1700sq ft house. Taking down walls, moving load bearing walls, etc. Took me four months, 8 hrs a day with some days a bit longer. Every room painted, new flooring through out, quite a bit of dry wall/plaster work in several, bath renovation including moving all the fixtures, all new plumbing/electrical, complete kitchen remodel including an oak island and cabinets.
How I got it done I’ll never actually know. Only needed help once, someone had to hold in the new window I had to custom order so I didn’t have to do it again.
Would I do it again? Sure why not. That’s easy to say, all it takes is time and money and I’ve got half that equation.
Steeplejack
@WereBear:
There was a show on HGTV about 10-15 years ago, This Small Space, that had a lot of great shelter porn scaled down to somewhat “normal” reality. Some of it was over the top, of course, but it had a lot of usable ideas.
Howard Beale IV
@catclub: Hey-it’s no skin off my nose right now-even though I’m set up to use either Google Wallet or MIcrosoft Wallet, I have yet to actually use either one. Unlike a mobile service on smartphones where you can take a picture of a check and deposit it into your checking/savings account, its just one of those things that isn’t front and center when I go shopping – and since major retailers, after spending millions to roll out NFC readers, they’re not just blocking iPhones, but ALL NFC devices, well, one has to wonder what the hell they’re thinking here. If it’s becuase Apple beta them to the punch? Well, whose fault is that?
Ruckus
@Steeplejack:
It’s amazing what one can do with a small space when they have to. I find that decisions about what to keep are much easier now that I live in a room of about 110 sq ft. How much effort to expend to get rid of the stuff that still has some value to others is the big question. The stuff that doesn’t? A big free sign, Salvation Army, or a dumpster is the answer.
ETA I should say that I learned to live in a pretty small amount of personal space when in the navy. You had to be able to carry off everything at one time, in one bag. Any more wouldn’t fit in the very small space allowed.
Howard Beale IV
@catclub:
I’m right with you there: I picked up a cheap 110V induction cooktop and it’s amazing how quick it can bring stuff to boil in a frypan. If the local mid-high-end appliance store has another warehouse sale and if I can snag one for $800, I’ll replace mine with it-a 220V induction element would boil water in probably 3 minutes. Of course, all of my other appliances are white, and the induction ranges are stainless steel…
Howard Beale IV
@Ruckus:
Never give anything to the Salvation Army. For as much good as they do, they are as homophobic as they day is long.
Corner Stone
@Steeplejack: My next house/space is going to be between 1300sqft and 1600sqft. I realize that isn’t “small” or tiny, but that’s about the amount of space I think I actually could make best use of. Two master BedRs, both with en suite, a half bath for guests, a nice kitchen (with gas!) and a place to watch sports.
Corner Stone
@Howard Beale IV: Eh, we give to SA a few times a year. The kids who get our clothes and toys/supplies don’t care about any of the rest of it.
Trentrunner
From the NYTimes story just now on what the ISIS beheading victims were subject to in their final days:
Ladies and gentlemen, our role models.
If it’s the last thing I do, I swear by Grabthar’s hammer I will outlive Dick Cheney so that I can take a protracted e-coli-ridden firehose spray of chartreuse diarrheal shit on his newly-dug grave.
LT
Hecka nice work, Tim! And beauty of a stew, too!
Howard Beale IV
@Corner Stone: Well. if you feel ok to support a homophobic organization, then knock yourself out. When the annual United Way pledge drive comes at where I work I list the Salvation Army as a organization to not give funds to.
The taint of one seed fouls the entire harvest. Sure, it may sounds like a baby and the bathwater scenario, but at the same time, you reap what you sew.
opiejeanne
Great photos, Tom.
SiubhanDuinne
Tom, I’ve been poll-watching the last couple of weeks. At training, they told us: “Take a book.” Sound advice — we’re not permitted to have electronic devices (iPads or laptops or phones or, you know, fans), so I grabbed Alan Lightman’s latest, The Accidental Universe, a day or so ago, and it has been a surprisingly good choice. I am going to assume that you know him as an MIT colleague (and maybe a friend?), but didn’t know until reading the above that your wife, like his, is an artist. Given the familial and collegial similarities, I’m wondering if there might be some kind of interesting collaboration in the wings — a book, or perhaps a film or TV series. Seems there might be some interesting synergy there. (Of course, if you and Lightman detest each other, just forget everything I’ve said.)
Speaking of books, my friend John, whom you met last month at the Boston BJ meetup, is reading (or perhaps now has finished reading) Measure for Measure at my recommendation, and reports that he is thoroughly enjoying it.
I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
@gelfling545: Montreal’s an interesting place. We spent a few nights at the L Hotel this summer. It’s basically a modern art gallery with very nice rooms.
Cheers,
Scott.
Corner Stone
@Howard Beale IV: I’m in the dark heart of wingnutville. There simply isn’t a better alternative, for the most part.
We give money to Star of Hope, as well as donations, but SA is right down the road and helps a lot of people in our area.
SA isn’t making any money off us.
opiejeanne
@Tree With Water: I am too, but only when no one is looking if it’s not my house.
When my house is on the market, and this is house #7…. I think that’s right, I go into Lampshade Twitching Mode.
This neighbor wanted to talk to us, needed to talk to someone, anyone; I wonder if she thought I should have made her do it on the porch.
Corner Stone
@Howard Beale IV: I never learned to sew, more’s the pity.
debbie
@Betty Cracker:
There was a “Hill Street Blues” episode about an Indian restaurant serving the tastiest stew any of the cops had ever had. There was also a growing number of citizens reporting lost cats. It was a mystery until one of the cops, dining at the restaurant, heard persistent mewing, peeked into the kitchen, and saw a large pile of empty collars. Lots of retching and horror, and then closing down the restaurant.
opiejeanne
@Corner Stone: This house had a very awkward kitchen and the dining room was 10X13. Now the dining room is 13 X 18 and all of the awkwardness of the old kitchen is gone. We added 8 feet across the back of our house last year, to enlarge both the kitchen and the dining room. Now we have a space that is not cramped when we have a big party and everyone shows up and brings their friend/cousin/ in-laws who were visiting. At Christmas and Thanksgiving there are almost always people who have no family nearby but know one or two of our guests and we welcome them because we have been strangers in a new neighborhood and it can be tough the first year when you know very few people and the rest of your family is hundreds or even thousands of miles away. These friends and family always ask first and there is always enough food. We think it’s fun and since everyone always wants to crowd into the kitchen to talk to us while we’re messing around with the food, there is now room for them. And they always show up with food and/or wine, so there is that. It started four years ago at Thanksgiving when we knew only two or three people here but our daughter had friends with no family so I told her to invite her friends. We crammed 22 people into that 10X13 dining room, which was difficult; some people, once seated, were trapped.
Our previous house had a kitchen that was about 7 feet wide. Maybe 7’3″. It was U-shaped, and we reorganized it so it made sense, but I still had to pick up a big knife at crucial moments and threaten people so that I could finish what I was doing. There just wasn’t room.
Howard Beale IV
@Corner Stone: I just bough a sewing machine so I can fix my clothes. Woot had a sale on a Sunbeam sewing machine that uses old school mechanical stitch guidance vs. microprocessor guidance.
And since I inherited my father’s idiopathic familial tremors, I need all the mechanical assistance I can get, short of booze, Mysoline, Inderal, or Topamax.
Juju
@opiejeanne: I can’t stand having much on my counters, but sometimes I do anyway, but I would never comment on anyone’s counter clutter if they were kind enough to invite me over. What a maroon.
opiejeanne
@Gene108: Undermount sinks are all the rage in some areas. I think those plumbers were lazy or something, but they were not the plumbers you were seeking.
JPL
@debbie: I loved Hill Street Blues and I’m so glad that I blocked that particular show from my memory.
WereBear
@debbie: The bizarre-ity there is that people don’t eat carnivores.
Herbivores, even omnivores — sure. But obligate carnivores, like cats, are considered terrible eating, much like squirrel. (Who have a strong tannin taste from all the acorns.)
debbie
@JPL:
Pretty warped, I agree.
raven
oops
Howard Beale IV
@Corner Stone:
You have my sympathies. At least I have alternatives up in my neck of the woods; although my state is still plagued with Crazy-eyed Bachmann.
opiejeanne
@Juju: She’s … yeah, sometimes a maroon. Believes way too much “woo” and is science-illiterate, thinks that because a holistic animal “doctor” lives in a yurt it lends credence to their treatment of her doggies with herbs.
However, she’s a lovely, warm person and she’s a rabid Democrat so I can’t fault her too much.
JPL
@WereBear: Tell that to former governor, preacher, republican candidate for pres. Huckabee. He liked squirrels.
Of course, his son was found guilty of animal abuse.
opiejeanne
@debbie: I remember that episode, but I didn’t remember that it was an Indian restaurant.
Corner Stone
@WereBear:
Sure. Too lean with really stringy meat.
Not sure neighborhood cats qualify as carnivores who have to hunt for their sustenance. But in any event, I’ve always enjoyed Mongolian Beef from the local Chinese place.
gelfling545
@Corner Stone: @Corner Stone: while yes, the Salvation Army does consider homosexuality a sin I have never heard of them asking anyone’s sexual orientation before extending help or refusing assistance to anyone on that basis (in my area, anyway). For a couple of years recently I was somewhat knowledgeable about what local aid organizations were doing because of a project I was working on & never saw any evidence that they were letting their doctrine get in the way of helping.
opiejeanne
@fleeting expletive: We owned a house in the 80s, an Arts & Crafts bungalow built ca. 1910. The garage had almost certainly been something else orignially, a carriage house and/or barn, but it had a ceiling, which means it had an attic.
My husband went up into the attic through the little maid’s room at the side, and discovered a cupboard next to her closet complete with shelves. There was no other way into this space that we could see, and never had been. He could tell that there have been jars or possibly bottles on the shelves, but it would be a terrible place to store booze during Prohibition when there was a perfectly good cellar complete with a fire-safe room with a steel door under the house.
I still dream about that house. We were just about done with it and it really was our dream house, when my DH was laid off (a week before Christmas) and we had to sell and move 400 miles away for a job.
opiejeanne
@raven: I always wondered about that.
raven
@efgoldielocks
: Overload.
debbie
@opiejeanne:
Apparently, according to Wikipedia, the name of the episode was “Bangladash Slowly.”
SiubhanDuinne
@debbie:
opiejeanne
@debbie: Snerk! That’s terrible.
Steeplejack
@Ruckus:
Very true. My last place in Atlanta, I rented a room in some friends’ house and had access to the common areas. I had very few belongings after an involuntary downsizing (illness, medical bills, depression, career crash). Probably could have put everything in one bag, like you did in the Navy. Except for the (desktop) computer. Nowadays, with a small, speedy laptop, I’d save even that space.
When I came to NoVA I lived in a small studio apartment (400 square feet?) for six years. Started with a very few basic pieces of furniture and kitchen stuff and began to gradually accumulate a little more. I moved to my current (one-bedroom) apartment of just under 600 square feet two years ago, and it feels very spacious: it’s laid out well and gets a lot of natural light (east and west), and I have been semi-smart in organizing it and being ruthless about what I do accumulate. A huge help has been the Nook. I still buy classic and “keeper” books, but the Nook has saved me tons of space on books that I don’t need forever but probably wouldn’t get around to getting rid of—crime fiction, pop psychology, layman’s science, current affairs, etc.
fleeting expletive
@opiejeanne: I don’t think the garage was a carriage house because the other side had a garage door integrated into the brick. OTOH, inside the main house the old doc had built an addition onto the back, a master suite with two bathrooms separated by a sliding door, at about maybe 1500 square feet. Also, also–he had installed a vault, windowless, with foot thick concrete walls and an actual steel bank vault door. No one had had the combination for years. It was said that he had bales of hay set up in the back (the room was maybe 18’x35′) because he liked to go into the vault and shoot off some kind of guns. I don’t know, buckshot? Something that wouldn’t penetrate the concrete. My ex used the vault as an office for a time and it was as well a place to store excess/broken furniture.
The attic was a veritable honeycomb of little closets and rooms perfect for the various teenagers and friends to sneak off and smoke weed. I love the old house, so much mystery. My ex bought and had someone deliver and set up a 1926 pool table in the library. The pool table came out of a Chicago pool hall. Teens and olds alike had a lot of fun with that.
Steeplejack
@Corner Stone:
I think what you describe is my ideal sweet spot, too. My penultimate place in Atlanta was a two-bedroom townhouse that felt perfect: downstairs one huge living/dining room, a small but efficient kitchen and a half bath (and a double-wide closet for washer and dryer); upstairs two master bedrooms, each with its own bathroom en suite, and a big landing that had enough room for overflow bookcases. As I get into my golden years, I envision something like that all that on one floor. Although I am suspicious of the “old automatically means no stairs” thing. I think it’s more like “old and sedentary means no stairs.” But you never know when you might get hit with involuntary sedentariness through illness or accident. But I digress.
ETA: For a few years in the late ’90s I rented a small house in Decatur that had three bedrooms, but in retrospect I realize I basically used the third bedroom as a storage room. (I used the second bedroom as my office—I was doing a lot of contract programming and working from home.)
Corner Stone
@Steeplejack: I will never own a two story unless someone pays me to take the property.
Corner Stone
I work from home a lot (on a relative basis), but I have never needed a “home office” space. I can (and do) mark up documents on a lap pad and if I need to read something longer than 4 or 5 pages I print it all out and work through it sitting in a recliner.
God, I am getting so fucking old. But I still have better than 20/20 vision! So take that, oldsters!
Corner Stone
“Oh! This would be perfect for entertaining!”
/every couple under 26 on HGTV who should be up against the wall first when the revolution comes
Howard Beale IV
@Corner Stone: I work from home on a pretty much full-time basis, so my one room is an orofice, I have a 27″ WXQGA (2650 x 1440) monitor on an A/B switch that both my work laptop and my main desktop support in full resolution. Unfortunately, I have to rely in some pretty serious progressive bifocals. (-6/-5.5) with astigmatism thrown in for good measure.
Steeplejack
@Corner Stone:
I pretty much hate almost everybody on those home shows. Usually not the hosts, but the demanding and unrealistic “clients,” particularly the ones on House Hunters International. They want the picturesque, exotic charm of wherever it is they’re looking, but they are shocked—shocked!—to find that the amenities might not be completely up to par with current U.S. subdivision show-home standards and that there isn’t a megamart five minutes away.
Second place goes to Love It or List It, where the people are simultaneously enraged that (a) the “list it” guy can’t find them twice the house in their current neighborhood for a 10 percent bump in price and (b) the “love it” woman can’t completely redo their crappy house for $40,000.
Corner Stone
@Steeplejack:
Paris is like Exhibit A for that.
Oh, no closets? Hmmm. Maybe we can expand this over here? No? Hmmm. Well we only have $1300USD a month to spend. So why can’t you find us a three bedroom, first floor space with a parking space and in the heart of the city?
As for the rest, I’ve long concluded the Property Brothers, etc, have the same person writing their script for every episode. Those guys have the absolute worst assholes for clients and yet each time they always end the show saying, “You guys truly deserve this home.”
No. No, they don’t. From shots of the episode they truly deserve to be dropped into the catacombs with the hungry fucking lions.
opiejeanne
@fleeting expletive: Ours was not as big as yours. It was 3800 sq ft, the largest house we’ve ever owned, and big enough that you didn’t have to be around your siblings (or your kids) if they were driving you nuts. The service porch had room for a washer and dryer, and the previous owner left behind a huge fridge that fit through a hole in the wall between the kitchen and service porch, as well as a small commercial upright freezer. The PTA loved that freezer when we put on the carnival at my kids’ elementary school.
And just beyond the laundry and the freezer was an adobe cooler. That was our pantry and it was wonderful.
The fire safe room in the cellar became our wine cellar.
Omnes Omnibus
@Steeplejack: @Corner Stone: It’s the freak out over ‘fridge size that grates on me. You’re living in Europe; got the the local market every couple days. There isn’t a Costco or Sam’s Club around there anyway.
opiejeanne
@Corner Stone: You were too generous with the budget for Paris and you forgot the view of the Eiffel Tower.
I hate the people who appear on that show but I sometimes watch it to see bits of cities I probably won’t ever get to visit.
The whiny buyers on the regular HouseHunters, though, those people are the worst especially the first time buyers. “Oh, this is the WORST kitchen I’ve ever seeeeeen! There’s no stainless steel or granite, I can’t cook in here!!!” Property Brothers shows you what a truly bad kitchen looks like, and recently the clients have gotten better about not being assholes. Maybe the writers decided to find nicer clients for them.
opiejeanne
@Omnes Omnibus: Part of the charm is going to the bakery and the market every day or two.
opiejeanne
@efgoldman: That will be nice, even though it scares the pee-waddin’ out of me. Maybe I’ll stop tripping over stuff because of these danged bifocals. I wore contacts for more than 30 years and then one day I couldn’t any more. It’s like suddenly being two feet shorter and having a blurred vision of everything below your waist, unless you tip your head down to watch every step.
Omnes Omnibus
@opiejeanne: I agree.
Corner Stone
@opiejeanne:
Exactly! That’s why I bother with it sometimes, also. I skip past the crazy American centric expectations and just try and imagine myself in those locales.
It’s insane. I have 2300sqft for myself and a 10 yr old. That’s just fucking stupid.
And I’m still pissed my walk in closet isn’t big enough!
Ruckus
@Omnes Omnibus:
I have a mini fridge in my room and that works fine for everything. If I need something the store is about a mile away. Not a bad walk, I hear it’s good for you.
@Steeplejack:
Most of my life I’ve lived in houses with stairs. But the ones I’ve liked best didn’t have any. Took me a long time to understand or even notice why. But then I had to walk up a set and tried to do as I did as a teen, 2 at a time. OK that’s no happening any more.
My ideal would be about 400-500 sq ft max. I don’t need any more so it just becomes some place to keep stuff and clean. Lived for three yrs in a 400 sq ft quadplex and it was more than enough for me. Kitchen/eating area, front room, bedroom, bath. It did have a small garage though, which was nice.
Ruckus
You want to know about people who live in small spaces, about 30 yrs ago I knew a retired couple who lived in an 18 ft travel trailer 6-7 months of the year, during the week. On the weekends they lived on board their 27ft sailboat. The other 5-6 months of the year(winter, such as it is in CA) they lived in an 9ft slide in camper in AZ. Two very happy people.
I also know a couple who lived in a 35 ft motorhome 9 months of the year, traveling around the country working events. It was nice and plush inside but still it was pretty small.
Steeplejack
@Ruckus:
That would be nice. I miss not having a place to do some light carpentry and woodworking.
opiejeanne
@Corner Stone: we have been lucky enough to visit Paris twice and rented an apartment for 10 days both times. It’s cheaper than a hotel AND you can cook for yourself if you feel like it. My DH adored walking down to the bakery every morning for a baguette or a pastry and there was a point the second time when we just wanted to cook something ourselves. Homesick a bit, but also I was having trouble finding things I could eat on the diet for Diabetes II: too many of the wrong carbs and too many fried things and lots of pasta for some reason, not enough vegetables and meat.
So we rode the metro to a market street touted by every cooking show that visits Paris and bought a chicken, marveled at the odd little plums ( and bought some), picked up some green veggies, and shallots, and creme fraiche, and a few other things, and made Tarragon Chicken and broccoli. It was divine. So were some of the things we ate in restaurants, but while this was a bit fattening it was a better balanced meal than what we were finding around us.
opiejeanne
@Ruckus: I had a boss who was sleeping on a smallish racing sailboat in Alameda after he messed up his marriage pretty good. It was too small, so he found a bigger boat that he could live aboard and sailed it from LA to Alameda, which meant coming around Point Concepcion.
During a nasty storm.
We were on pins and needles for two days, worried that he might not make it. His two partners (my other bosses) had told him to wait until it died down but he was stubborn and sailed anyway. I don’t know why he didn’t end up wrecked on the rocks and from the stories he told us later, he didn’t know why either.
Ruckus
@opiejeanne:
I’ve crossed the Atlantic several times, both in summer and winter. And been above the Arctic Circle in winter. But that was a medium sized boat that was damn seaworthy. Owned a 30 ft sailboat for a few years and had a number of friends with them so I’ve been around the water a lot. It is different being the owner and person that makes the decisions on a small ocean going boat and someone who works on one ten times bigger. Sometimes you just make decisions that you are lucky to live through, we’ve all probably done this. I sure have a number of times maybe I’m a risk taker, like your boss. My main hobby in life was very risky and I know many who take higher risks with a smaller percentage of success in that sport.
Cervantes
@I’mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet:
Used to be a bank.
Cervantes
@Corner Stone:
When you can sew what you rip … it’s a good thing.
Omnes Omnibus
@Cervantes: What you did there has been seen.
I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
@Cervantes: I did not know that. Now that I reminisce a little, I can picture it. Thanks.
Cheers,
Scott.
Corner Stone
@Omnes Omnibus:
Paul in KY
Tom, you look a little like Stephen Colbert.