Bits and crumbs

So the speakers are upstairs, as is the new space heater still in its box, of course mine that was not working decided to work the day before this replacement came in.....the table is downstairs and I painted a swath of wall with the sample paint.... it is a chocolate brown... my curtains look very nice with it, I will need to remove them, buy 2 gallons of the paint so when the TV and table for it arrive the walls will be done. (The curtain are a lovely pale blue and ivory damask, the bed set is the same damask in ivory. I have extra items( shams) to recover two chairs and the ottoman and make a slip cover for the tv when it comes. The room will be so pretty, Chocolate, ivory, and blue. Dresser is ivory too. I have the most amazing pictures due in for decor. Owls. I love Owls, I will just need to frame them and hang them.)

That means dragging the ladder upstairs and taking down the drapes....the snow plow just made a pass...it is a blizzard out there. Of course I can't go out tomorrow since it is a holiday and the Post Office is closed and after I made the orders I discovered they used post office and not ups/fedex....so many things will be waiting for me and I need to get there before their 2 hour lunch time between 11 and 1:45 on Tuesday. I am determined to get my bedroom pretty so I have a little sanctuary when I am tired.

I am also baking a cake thingy using a quick bread recipe from an OLD cook book. It will be a revamped carrot spice cake. I have several boxes of mincemeat and it makes a nice addition to a quick bread I am adding a shredded carrot and more spice never can have too much spice. Then cream cheese frosting. These old recipes have less oil and shortening in them. I do not like the greasy taste of the 1970s carrot cake. So I went back. Any one remember Prudence Penny?

Well just an update in the life of me.

Secret Weapon

Punkee got to sleep in fairyland with me last night. I chose him for the mouser in the cat free zone. He is sweet and my baby. I raised him, bottle fed him; he was never a chubby cute kitten but long & lean and his black and white coloring was haphazard. He began life as a feral kitten. I knew his mother and sister but they are another blog. Since the mouse being no fool also chose the cat free zone to occupy, I needed to bring in a cat. The other night I heard and saw the little brown bastard! My little love was the choice, a simple guy with no bad habits. He was a perfect sweetie last night. Once he sniffed around the rooms upstairs he settled into the bed and we slept. With no mouse sounds we all slept well. I will again bring him up tonight. I would rather the mouse go back outside than kill it. So If Punkee can be a deterrent like a nuclear bomb that is a good thing. Mouse goes away to live the life of a mouse and Punkee earns his keep as a cat. I just realized my baby is 10 years old this year! How time flies! Most of my furchildren are 10+ Several are 20 years old this year. I have no regrets for not having people children. So far I have never know one child of those in my cohort to be worth while. And Only one in my family actually speaks to me. I was ready whoever to be a wonderful Auntie, but never had the chance. So my cousin's son is my nephew. So I love my fur children...no regrets.

The Remodel Dream

How am I doing? I am dressed nicely, make-up, jewelry, matching outfit in all two layers. Cats are cleaned, fed, & coffee is on. Parts of the floor are clean and my mind is racing about with the remodel of the kitchen......this kitchen is hard to work in and the sink is a huge looking double sink which is not as big as it looks when a pot of modest size needs to be filled or washed. I have disliked double sinks for about 40 years....ever since the square inch flat space reached a whole 7X7 inches around the drain. This sink is deceptive & at the window, which has a great view except the sun is in my eyes from about 9am to sunset. I have a real problem with sun shining in my eyes like that. I can not reach the window to wash it either so it is a mess since the cats like to sit on the wide sill and soak up the sun. It has a shade but it is rolled up and needs a ladder to reach and I like the warm sun streaming in here. This is Maine and the sun is not that evil Texas sun but a nice, warm, and friendly sun.
I have a dream for this room. I have it on paper too. I am checking all the parts to see how much it will cost and since I am not into that high end professional stove for $6000 I think I can work wonders in this space for a lot less than a stove.
First I keep the flooring. I have cats. The Kitchen Door is the entry way to the house everyone comes in this door. There is a grand porch leading to an old double window entry door. The space is huge but there are 8 (eight) doors and windows.
The previous remodel was done by an idiot. The counters slant just enough so everything rolls off or tips over if its center of gravity is high. The cabinets are stock from the discount place particle board Oak look. I really do not like Oak. That dislike has kept me from buying a lot of nice antique furniture. A good thing. I could paint the cupboards but they are still not useful.
There is not that much space inside really. There are slide out shelves in them which at first is very nice but they are on a different measurement system than anything sold here in the States so cans or boxes or bowls or plastic storage containers do not fit and space is wasted. Bottles and such cannot be stored upright on the slid out. Below the slide out shelves it is also too short for the bottled and anything tall like a cheese grater to fit and things still tip over since those shelves also tilt with the counter's list.
Of course I can not reach the top shelves nor to the back of the lower shelves. The easy shelves I can reach for cooking are not near the stove.
I have been designing kitchens since since Home Economics in high school. I can draw the floor plan of every kitchen I have been in since Pacifica. I have a box of kitchen clipping since the 1960s. Most are committed to my memory. I have drawn and measure every kitchen I have lived in since I started cooking. What features I liked and what did not work for me.
I do know this...... I want a kitchen that does not look like a kitchen......Even my more gourmet cooking adventures have been noted on what I used/needed to the everyday adventures. I use 2 cook top burners. I mostly use the toaster oven and the big oven to bake bread..... and cookies if I had my cookie cutters. I made the most and best cookies in the kitchen with the east counter top. I used the kitchen table, it was the right height to roll out the gingerbread. I use the food processor when I can get it out and on the counter near a plug. I use the coffee pot and electric tea kettle. I hand wash the dishes so I need space for them to drain until I dry and put them up and I need shelves that fit my standard plates, bowls, and glasses.
This room is 14X14. I want to remodel it under $4000. Of course I need to save up the $4K first. But I know what I want and will use. And granite counters, viking ranges and huge refrigerators are not what I need or want...to be continued....

Lovely Day

My driveway is a rutted mass of quicksand. I need to smooth it out and will eventually, While shopping I was chatting with an old man at thee checkout line,and when I left the store I saw him sprawled on the ground, his groceries all over, his coffee cup at least upright, The wind is so strong that it caught the door of his very big trick and knocked him to the ground. I helped him up put his stuff back in the bags and put them in his truck. I put his coffee in the cup holder( the lid was tight and only shook out from the drinking hole.) I stood with him, my arm around him to keep him steady while we chatted. I wanted to see if he was OK to drive and calm him before he left. I then walked him to the drivers side and helped him in. He did not live far. I could not drive into my parking area and had to park in the back slog through the quicksand and through the house and make two trips up the back way ramp. Even the lawn is quicksandish. However the sun is out now. I plan to smooth the sand ruts as soon as I do not sink in 2 feet.

Thank-you Obamacare People

To shame and stigmatize the overweight is in the news! This is news? Not to anyone who is a fatty. We have been shamed and stigmatized and humiliated all our lives and if we started as chubby children it has colored our whole outlook on life and I , at least, have always felt like an outsider, an alien from planet fat and very unwelcome...even in my own family. My aunt Vera always called me “my fat niece”( or my fat fat niece), my uncles were no better. My own sister was as cruel as they could get. So now the government wants to institutionalize the shame and stigma so there is nowhere to go for respite except death.

http://my.earthlink.net/article/hea?guid=20130126/ca5b0839-39e1-4a53-b561-7f0ffbb5cf15

We have been shamed and stigmatized since we first showed our faces and bodies in public. Being overweight is such a crime against humanity that we are shunned and humiliated in public and in media. I have been all my 60 years.

So the Obamacare people are concerned about the high cost of our health due to over weight and want to penalize us.

Have we not been penalized enough during our lifetime? Clothes are hard to find, The fit of each garment is an impossible combination of not fitting me. Chairs, seats, school desks check out aisles, side walks, streets, the seas are all too small for me
For me, my whole life was has been spent being made ashamed at what I am. And no mattered what I tried, what I lost it was never enough. And I was never successful so I was further stigmatized as a complete failure.

So the government wants to shame and stigmatize me into becoming slender. Thank-you for your concern for the money spent on my care. I am not (nor have been ) ill of any of the fat related illnesses. I have had the flu and colds, measles, chicken pox, mumps, & pneumonia. I went to the doctor for the pneumonia and was lectured for the entire time for being too fat. I had pneumonia because I was fat. Ever time I was sick I avoided doctors because the lecture have always been the same. So the medical cost for me are nil.

However my mental health is poor. I am depressed and suicidal many times and you know why? Because I dread each day I need to see people, go out in public, have to deal with others since all my life I have been and I am instantly judged as lazy, stupid, and ugly. Many people even point that out to me…. complete strangers too.

And no public money has ever been spent on me. And dear people if I ever happen to develop any of the money draining illnesses I will simple kill myself rather than have to deal with the rude cold and frankly nasty medical people I have had to endure all my life. Suicide is better than living a life always being shamed, humiliated, and stigmatized. Don’t worry I will decrease my surplus part of the population.

Shootings

As a society we have accepted the killing of innocents with our wars currently going on, We accept the violence in our movies, games, and daily thoughts as our euphemism show. What we all forget is some people can not separate the reality from the fantasy. Those few people who see death as a good thing, a game, or other unknown wreck havoc on our collective psyche as well as ruin the lives of those immediately involved. We are too big a population to see those who are odd and dangerous since we accept the individual oddity as a good thing. Few of us can tell the difference between the odd and the dangerous person.
If guns were not accessible I believe few of these tragedies would not occur. It is too late to gather all the weapons from those who wish to do harm. We do not know who will desire to kill on any given day. We do not know who will actually kill on any given day.
As a society we need to do what? What can we do so keep people from going over the edge of commonsense? What can we do to know who is at risk to do such destruction? How do we stop a person from his own desires to kill when we are a nation bent on killing others overseas, or even in out movies and games. Are they not related in the mind of those who have a weak grasp on reality and do they really have a weak grasp? Are We, society, the ones who are double minded about who deserves to die and who does not, so we can comfortably watch the killing of those over seas and say it is the right thing to do while condemning those who massacre out children in our schools/home/streets just because they are ours and not the "others".

Irony Part One: Coffee Crises

I drink coffee. The the coffee maker takes #4 cone filters. Months ago I had to buy #2 in a 200 pack size since there were no #4, and 200 was the only size when I was in the store and it is an 80 mile round trip so I was not going to go back anytime soon. I have used up the #2 cones. I did have some basket filters left and put them away for emergency; However, while unpacking some boxes for my aunt I saw she had one of these mesh reusable #4 cones. Ah ha! says I, when I run out I will go and get that from the storage room, since storage space is at a premium in the kitchen.

A month later I have the dear wonderful contractor (I mean that sincerely.) come to do work. I noticed that morning that #2 was my last filter. So I will go get the mesh one later on today.

By later on that day the whole of the available area in the storage room was being used to store the items for the other projects still to be done in a few days (He roofs and the dry days are needed for outside work and he has 3 more roofs to do while the weather keeps.) I can not get to the are where the mesh filter is at this time. No bit problem says I. I need to go to the store and I will just buy a pack of #4 cones at the local grocery store which I have discovered as a wonder little gem. #4, #2, in fact all cones filters were sold out.....only baskets. Well I have some basket shapes here in the kitchen....in a safe and reasonable place.

I return home and Can't remember where that reasonable place is. I need to look in earnest or there will be no coffee this morning, Or I can rinse out the filter again since I did it yesterday morning.

This is Irony in spades. This is only part one of the series.