New Year’s Eve!

“Happy New Year’s Eve!” I said greeting Mr. Wonderful at the breakfast table.

“Hmm,” he said sinking into a chair

“The last day of the year!” I said sliding toasted English crumpets in front of him.

“Hmm.”

“What a beautiful time to reflect on what—”

“Can you save the happy talk ‘til after I’ve had a coffee?”

It was true: I was a morning person, Mr. Wonderful wasn’t.  I was a reflective person, Mr. Wonderful wasn’t.  I embraced vacation, and Mr. Wonderful… didn’t.  So while I loved this time of year with all its celebrations, twinkling lights and champagne imbibing, Mr. Wonderful couldn’t wait for it to be over so he could return to working and sucking down six triple espressos before breakfast. 

His outright dismissal of this final holiday of the year made me think he was missing the forest for the trees.   

“There’s no point to New Year’s Day,” he said grinding more coffee beans.  “It’s just another excuse not to work on some arbitrary date on the calendar.”

Au contraire, mon ami!  Okay, I’ll admit, the time from Halloween to December 31^st is one long string of holidays and fun.  But what’s wrong with that?  We worked hard all year long, so couldn’t we take some time to reflect on what we had done for just one day a year? 

He shrugged.

I attacked his disaffection with another analogy.  If the year were our high school term paper, January introduced our hypothesis of what we wanted to gain and prove in the year.  February, March and April explained Point Number 1—work hard.  May, June and July discussed Point Number 2—work harder.  While August, September, October and November rounded out this three-part theme paper of your life by explaining Point Number 3—combine hard work with the people and things you love, in other words PARTY!  Finally December reminded you of your hypothesis by repeating it—on December 31^st—with the question: Did I achieve my goals for the year?  Yeah or nay?

Mr. Wonderful shrugged.

How could I get this idea through to him about the value of New Year’s Eve? 

It was just after noon so I grabbed a bottle of chilled bubbly from the refrigerator and popped the cork.  I poured it into two champagne flutes.  The liquid bubbled, its foam rose to the rims then swiftly sank to just half a glass. 

“Fill them up more,” Mr. Wonderful said.  “They’re half empty.”

“No,” I shook my head.  “They’re half full.” 

He cocked his head then smiled.  “You’re right.” 

New Year’s Eve was a day to enjoy what we had achieved in our life’s term paper of the year, not what was lacking about it.  It wasn’t something to rush through to get back to work but rather something to savor.  He tapped his flute against mine and we sipped the bubbly and enjoyed our half full glasses. 

Worrying about what we’re going to do next year?  That’s something we can think about… tomorrow!   

So in the meantime, Happy New Year’s Eve!

Sleepless in Seattle—The Trip

If you’re sleepless, go to Seattle.  There’s so much to enjoy in the Emerald City that if you don’t sleep, you can discover it all—as I learned over the holidays.  Here are some highlights of a trip to this City on Elliot Bay!

Going to the Public Market to see the fishmongers handle the live fish so quickly the gilled critters “fly”.

Walking to Pioneer Square, the old heart of the city.  Although with the totem pole, maybe it should be called “Totem Pole Square”, just a suggestion…

Visiting the new Seattle Central Library designed by award-winning Dutch architect, Rem Koolhaas.  I relished being inside this inspiring, light-infused glass space.  Judging by the number of people using the library they felt the same way.  Or else Seattle has a whole lot of homeless people…

Experiencing the Space Needle.  It’s so touristy, cliché and completely silly but going to the Space Needle for lunch was... a major highlight!  Despite the clouds, the 360 degree views of the city, bay, boats and planes were stunning and—bonus!—the food matched the views.

Seeing the King Tut Exhibit at the Pacific Science Center.  This huge, fabulous exhibition included some very fine pieces of Ancient Egyptian art.  The exhibit recreated the Boy Pharaoh’s tomb—complete with Antechamber, Annex, Burial Chamber and Treasury Room—just as it was when British archeologist, Howard Carter, discovered it in 1922, more than 3,000 years after it had been sealed.  Many of the items originally found in these four chambers were on view in simulated rooms, which meant moving through the exhibit I felt like Mr. Carter himself.  To borrow a phrase: it was “bloody” impressive.

Doing yoga in the park with a friend.

I also drank coffee, walked in the rain and… drank more coffee.  If these sights won’t keep you up in Seattle, the caffeine definitely will. 

So go, get yourself to Seattle!  And bring an umbrella!

Happy Christmas!

During this festive time of year the decorations of Christmas red and green and Hannukah blue on this Christmas tree reflect the inclusiveness of our society.  I love that Christmas is big enough for everyone!  On this happy day I'm hoping that you get--and give--the gifts of peace, prosperity and happiness!  

To all a Merry, Happy Christmas!

Big Boy Christmas Tree

With all the possible ways to decorate a Christmas tree, I loved this one at Bob's Big Boy Diner! Big Boy makes a delightfully irreverent angel.

Wishing you a Merry Christmas Eve full of egg nog and anticipation!

Hallway BEFORE and AFTER--photos

The hallway BEFORE the redo.  Complete with its puke tan/brown colored paint on the walls and ceiling.

The hallway AFTER the redo.  Mr.Wonderful removed the electrical outlet to streamline the small space.  The red walls remind me of our challenging redo journey, which is detailed here. Plus they really make my black and white pictures POP!

Since completing the redo I love walking through the hallway.  It even gets me excited for the next project:... The Guesthouse!

Redoing the Hallway

Mr. Wonderful looked at the hallway quietly.

“It’s small,” I said standing behind him.

He touched the walls silently. 

“So painting it will go fast,” I said grabbing a paintbrush.

He knelt to examine the baseboard wordlessly.

“Imagine,” I said, “redoing a room in just one afternoon!”

“Shhh, don’t jinx it!”

Unfortunately I spoke too soon.  The hallway in question was tiny, consisting of more open doorways than solid walls so I had sky-high hopes of redoing it quickly.  I was hoping remodeling it would be described as “short and sweet” or “done in a snap”!  Instead it was “Welcome to Hell”.

When we moved in the entire hallway was painted a shade I could only describe as puke tan/brown—the walls—and ceiling—all of it was puke tan/brown.  It was as if a dog caked in mud, puke and excrement had shaken itself dry in the hallway.  It was a depressing space too reminiscent of gross bodily functions and had to go!  We redid it in a few steps:

Step 1: Remove paint.  When we removed the puke colored paint we discovered a layer of wallpaper.  It’s not unusual to paint over wallpaper, it just means more work for the re-doers.  Which lead to…

Step 2: Remove the wallpaper and find plaster.  Discovering the plaster meant we’d reached the end of scraping off paint!  Yippee!

Step 3: Sand down the plaster to smooth it out.  When—lo and behold—under the plaster we discovered a second layer of wallpaper.  Plastering over wallpaper was highly unusual, undeniably lazy and completely wacko.

Sooo Step 4: Collapse on the sofa and cry ourselves to sleep.

Step 5: Wake up, drink coffee and prepare for another full day of work on this X%&#$ space.

Step 6: Drink more coffee.  Then suck down three triple espressos.

Step 7: Scrape off the plaster—and the paper stuck to it—all the while cursing the people who did this.  In our zeal to remove the plaster+paper combination we also scraped off plastered chunks of wall, thereby turning our solid walls into Swiss cheese. 

Step 8: Cry some more. 

Step 9: Realize this project gets worse with each passing hour.

Step 10: Remember the original puke tan/brown walls as being highly attractive.  “What an ironic comment on human society to have puke colored walls.  Why did we ever remove it?!”

Step 11: When arms ache from scraping, tumble into bed with a bottle of Advil.

Step 12: Go to work after a weekend of “relaxing” in The House.

Step 13: Smile all week as your friends tell you how lucky you are to be a homeowner.

Step 14: Embrace the new weekend and plastering.  Big whoop.  We mixed plaster and covered the walls and ceilings in a fresh coat of plaster that looked as creamy as cake icing—without the calories.

Step 15: Sand down this coat of plaster.  Once dry, apply a second coat of thinner plaster to smooth out the entire surface.

Step 16: PAINT.  Twice.  Walls and ceiling.

Step 17:  Hang picture frames. 

Step 18: Weep with joy at competing this redo!

Yes, the smallest room in the house took the largest amount of scraping, elbow grease and struggle.  A process I could best describe as “Small and Fighty”.  With this project we went to hell—and back—and the red walls remind me of our journey.  I look at them with a source of pride.  I’m a survivor!

The redo taught me—the hard way—to avoid talking about the ease with which we could do projects in The House.  Although the bathroom is such a small room, I bet we could redo that by lunchtime!

Shopping for Wine Lovers

Wine Lovers dig getting wine gifts and here are some suggestions for Wine Presents !

Thanks for checking it out at the Central Coast Foodie site and Happy shopping!

The Holidays in Hollywood

Hanukah is wrapping up, Christmas is right around the corner and Hollywood is dressed for the Holidays.  Dressed to the nines, in fact.  Here are some festive images of Hollywood to bring some needed holiday cheer.

 

Happy Holidays.

The French Bakery

“I’d like a loaf of French bread,” I told the bakery clerk.

“We don’t have,” she said in uneven English.

“But your sign says ‘French Bakery’.  What French bakery doesn’t sell French bread?”

She shrugged.  “This one.”

Recently I discovered a French bakery in our neighborhood.  Formidable!  Yet another reason I loved Los Angeles: immigrants from over 150 countries had come to this city of dreams bringing their edible delicacies in tow.  With this local bakery now I could buy a delicious loaf of crusty bread while avoiding French clerks who didn’t care un peu about customer service. 

"Okay,” I said regrouping “how about some light and flaky croissants?”

“We have, but not flaky,” she said tapping the pastry display case at a croissant that was bigger than a bowling ball and twice as heavy.  Listening to her accent I determined she wasn’t French but Armenian.  I punted my plans for a Parisian breakfast.  Better to keep it simple, traditional.

“How about doughnuts?  Do you have those?”

“No,” she said staring at me in silence.  Across the street I heard the church bells chime the hour, then they played Beethoven’s entire Fifth Symphony; once they’d stopped, my ears kept ringing.  But still she didn’t speak or try to sell me anything else.

“You must have doughnuts,” I persisted scanning the display case until I spotted a round pastry coated in powdered sugar.  “Look, that’s a doughnut.” 

“No, it’s bonchi.”

“Bonchi?”

“It's Armenian deep fried, sweet bread filled with cream and covered in sugar,” she said being downright talkative.

“That’s a doughnut!”

“No,” she shook her head “bonchi does not have hole.”

I bought one.  She was right—it didn’t have a hole.  But I was right, too—its taste was pure doughnut.

In L.A. you don’t have to go far to get immigrant attitude or a good doughnut.  But I’m still looking for a crusty loaf of bread.

The Cat's New Spot

"Jackson, I'm home," I said tossing my keys on the table still clutching my plastic wrapped dry cleaning.  There's nothing better than clean clothes free of cat hair; except clean linens free of cat hair.  "Come here kitty cat!"

But the cat didn't come.  

"Jackson?" I said scanning his favorite chair (empty) and food bowl (half-empty).  

I looked under the bed, under the sofa and on top of the refrigerator.  No cat x 3.  

I searched in the washing machine, in the toilets, at the bottom of the pool.  Nothing--thankfully!

I put a handful of kibble in a plastic container and shaking it like a mariachi, danced around the house singing his name, "Jackson, ole!"  Nada.  

Don't panic, I told myself.  Jackson had gone missing before only to be found in the most obvious place.  So.  Don't.  Panic.  

I continued with my routine and swung open the closet to hang up my dry cleaning when I saw black and white fur.  Jackson!  The cat had discovered how to open the closet and had curled up on the clean sheets and blankets.  

"Jackson!  What a relief to find you.  But you've gotten cat hair on all the clean linens."

  

He yawned and rolled over leaving a trail of cat hair in his wake.  He looked so comfortable.

Revision: There's nothing better than clean clothes free of cat hair.  Except... a found cat.

Have a Crepe Day!

Last night I went to bed and it was raining.  This morning I woke up and… it’s still raining!  Which makes five straight, exceedingly long days of rain.  To counteract this feeling a wet gloom, I grabbed eggs, butter, flour and milk and made crepes.  Nothing keeps depressing rain or the zombie apocalypse at bay than hot crepes.  Especially if they’re well dressed.

How to Dress a Crepe:

Step 1 Make crepes.

Step 2 Slather a hot one in jam—like strawberry, apricot, or fig. 

Step 3 Roll up the crepe.

Step 4 Eat the sucker while it’s still hot.

Step 5 Laugh at the zombies in the rain!  

Ha-ha!

Gardening on a Wet Day

I wanted to garden this week but it rained Wednesday.  It rained yesterday.  It rained today. So this is all the gardening I'm going to do:

Long live dry (indoor) rock gardens!

"Those People"

“Your front yard is looking less dead,” our retired neighbor bellowed from his porch.

“Thanks, Harold,” I said closing my car door, the hot engine still clicking from the commute home.

“What’s that green stuff growing up front?”

“Onions.”

Harold looked at me with wide eyes.  “Onions?”

“Yellow, white and—”

Slam!  He disappeared behind his front door.

Clearly Harold did not approve.  Yes, we were “those people” the ones who planted onions (shocking!) in the front yard, in the primo spot right next to the house usually reserved for roses.  In his eyes Mr. Wonderful and I had suddenly transitioned from fixer-uppers to (gasp!) farmers.  And if there’s one thing suburbanites, at any age, dislike it’s farmers.

“You hoo!” our smiley neighbor said pausing before our yard in her sneakers.

“Hi Mary, out for a walk?”

“Did you know you’re the only house in the whole neighborhood with a supermarket produce section in the front yard.”

“I didn’t know—”

“Well you are,” she said with a sniff.  “I’d never plant food in the front yard.  It’s so… ratty,” she said waving her arms with a pleasant smile.

The division of garden planting goes back to caveman days.  Beautiful ornamental flowers were planted in front of the cave and ugly kitchen plants were relegated to the cave’s back rockyard, as far away from sight as was hominid possible.

But times had changed.  For one, people weren’t wearing animal skins anymore and two, everyone was a foodie now and foodies loved… food.  So why not plant edibles in the front garden?  Onions are rather good looking plants… if you close your eyes.

The next day Charles waved from his front garden.  “I see you planted onions—”

Here we go again!  Another annoyed neighbor.  “I can explain,” I said crossing the street to him.  “We love food and why not plant what we love—”

“Look at this,” he said pointing to a spiky purple plant in the middle of his gated front yard. 

“That’s an… artichoke,” I gasped.

“Yeah!  It’s beautiful and delicious!” he said laughing.  “We planted one when we first moved in and now we have half a dozen.  Have you ever eaten home-grown artichokes?”

“No,” I said smiling “But I think I will now.”

The thing about a diverse suburban neighborhood is although lots of people may not understand what you’re doing, maybe one friend will. 

Black Friday Calls

Hello?  Oh, it's Black Friday.
Then what am I still doing in the kitchen?!
It's time to go shopping!

Yippee!

Training a Fighter

“Jackson has become a real tiger,” I announced over a late dinner.

“Uh…huh,” Mr. Wonderful said buttering his bread.

“I’ve been working him for weeks.”

“Hmmm,” he said putting his knife down.

“Jackson can fly like a butterfly and sting like a bee.”

“Our old cat is not Muhammad Ali.”

“How do you know?”

Ever since Jackson had whimped out with the opossum last summer, I had taken it upon myself to help our domestic feline get in touch with his inner tiger.  I was convinced that under Jackson’s fur-and-fat façade lay a natural-born killer… a killer of anything beside his daily dose of kibble.  And all I had to do was awaken it. 

I started with the ribbon and the stick.  This was a very high-tech training device that consisted of tying a red Christmas wrapping ribbon to a thin, old tree branch on one end and to a mouse-shaped, catnip toy on the other.  Every day after work I’d swish the stick around the kitchen floor and Jackson would chase it trying to grab the catnip.  With his clawed paws he was excellent at catching the toy.  Although once he had it in his mouth he couldn’t hold onto it.  I looked closer at Jackson’s pie hole and discovered he had just four teeth: two on top and two on the bottom.  FOUR teeth!  It was a wonder he could even chew kibble.

Evidently a small number of teeth in an adult cat’s mouth was a sign that it had been separated from its mama too soon as a kitten and never received the appropriate calcium to grow the rest of its chompers.  So Jackson was… an orphan.  And as everyone knows, orphans made the best fighters.  It was his destiny!  Besides who needed teeth when he had claws like ninja daggers?

Through the ribbon and the stick, he had developed quick paws.  I continued his training.  

I told Jackson to be a good fighter, he needed independent exercise.  He abandoned the ribbon and the stick and graduated to real bugs.  When a fly flew inside Jackson followed it throughout the house.  When it flew above his head, out of his reach, Jackson waited below.  Hours later when the fly eventually landed on the floor Jackson pounced, popped the bug in his mouth and chewed it like he was eating taffy. 

He had developed patience and was better than a can of Raid.  I continued his training. 

The cat was committed to becoming a fighter.  He stayed awake longer—now sleeping just 29 hours a day—which gave him time to hone his skills.  In our neighborhood lived several feral cats and one evening a feral feline jumped the fence into our yard and peered inside through the glass French doors.  Jackson lurched toward the unwanted visitor, slammed his head into the glass and tumbled to the floor in a heap, while the unhurt feral cat looked on with amusement.  What our feline lacked in brains he more than made up for in commitment. 

He had developed strength—or at least was too dense to feel pain.  I stroked Jackson in my arms and set him on the wood floor.  He had successfully completed his training.  I deemed him ready to fight.

“Your story is entertaining,” Mr. Wonderful said pushing away his dinner plate.  “But if this cat sees another opossum, I’ll be you $20 bucks he’ll roll over and play dead again.”

“Deal,” I said shaking Mr. Wonderful’s hand as our tiger cat lifted his leg and licked his butt.

 

Then out of the darkness and through the glass I saw an opossum wobbling toward our open house door! 

“It’s back!” Mr. Wonderful yelled.  Jackson leapt to the door and barricaded his body in the open doorway.  His sudden appearance and massive fighting-tiger size shocked the opossum, who turned on a dime and scurried back into the darkness.  Fast.

At the door Jackson sat guarding his home and us.  My heart beat with pride.  He was my prize fighter! 

“He’s no Cassius Clay,” my husband said watching our tiger.  “But you can teach an old cat new tricks.”

Remodeling Connections

"All things are connected," observed the Victorian author E.M. Forester.

Clearly he had remodeled a kitchen.

When my husband and I embarked on our kitchen remodel we decided to do it on the cheap, which was a win-win situation: Mr. Wonderful liked my frugality and after "redoing" our guestroom together, I liked that he still liked me.  DIY home remodels had fractured stronger relationships than ours, so I was thrilled he was game to tackle the hardest room in the house on my bare-bones budget.

Our planned remodel consisted of painting the cabinets, replacing their hardware and installing a backsplash (that was both practical and gorgeous; another win-win!)  And that was where we planned to finish the remodel.  But plans are things you make before your kitchen collapses around you.  What we didn't plan for was Forester's insight: "All things are connected".   Let me tell you, the bookish Brit wasn't kidding.

A kitchen is connected to a stove, so we bought one.  A stove is connected to an overhead hood, so we purchased one.  A hood is connected to a ceiling vent, so we busted through to the roof and made one.  A ceiling hole is connected to repair work, so we insulated and replastered.  Hoods are connected to symmetry, so once our narrow stove was centered under the hood it produced gaps on either side of it... and gaps as wide as the Grand Canyon aren't connected to anything but needed to be, so we made two cabinets to fill them in.  New cabinets are connected to finding things easily or why else would you bother installing the darn things in the first place?  So we built pull-out drawers.  Pull-out drawers are connected to special parts, so we special ordered their specialness despite their extra special arrival delay.  All of this stuff is connected to our money, which was in shorter supply now than when we'd started this %&#@$ DIY project, which was all your cheap, frickin' idea!

The money, the stress of cooking in a lumberyard, the constant scrapping-and-making of plans, this gentle readers, was why relationships broke during DIY projects!

E.M. recognized the ugly truth of remodels but he also gave me the solution.  I walked out to Mr. Wonderful's work bench.  Sawdust covered his dark hair, band-aids were wrapped around three of his fingers.  He set his drill down.

"I'm making steak for dinner," I said.
"Great I'm starving..." he said giving me the first smile of the day.  "Crap, then I have to hook up the stove again."
"Nope.  We're grilling out."
"Yes" he said high-fiving me.

It's connections, people.  With all the kitchen, stuff, crap in a remodel don't forget to connect to the people.  Because... all things are connected.

How Do I Love Thee, Backsplash?

(With apologies to Elizabeth Barrett-Browning)

Oh, Backsplash, how do I love thee?  Let me count the ways!

I love thy depth, breadth, and porcelain height

That lets me keep food stains out of sight

With a quick wipe from a moistened dishcloth.

I love the clean look you give to every day’s

Kitchen moments, by sun or candlelight.

I love thee freely, since I bought thee.

I love thee purely, since I have only thee.

I love thee with the passion I felt before

For my favorite blue jeans or my childhood toys; Like Paddington and Pooh Bear.

None of which was clean but you get what I’m saying.

I love thee with the sweet love I lost

After I learned the truth about Santa.

I love thee with the breath, smiles, tears of all my life. 

Thank you for making everything better.  Will you be my wife?

Kitchen BEFORE, AFTER and DURING the Backsplash

BEFORE: Here's a close up view of our Kitchen sink the day we moved in.  The "backsplash" tile is so "1970s bathroom shower stall".  

AFTER: Here's a close up view of our finished Kitchen backsplash.  My husband also deleted the light switch by the sink, which we never used.  

  

DURING: Here's a close up view of the Kitchen backsplash after it had been hung and before it had been grouted.  The tile was affixed to the wall with glue which had squeezed through the tiles so before applying the grout to the backsplash, I had to go over each tile with a toothpick and scrape out the excess glue.  It was like flossing a T. Rex.

In Summary...

BEFORE: Here’s the Kitchen on the day we bought The House, complete with the streaked “Kountry Kitchen” paint job, itty bitty cabinet handles and the lone strip of bathroom (!) tile.

AFTER: Voila!  Here's our Kitchen after we’d painted the cabinets, installed new hardware, bought an oven and oh yeah, hung the porcelain tile backsplash.  Thank you Mr. Wonderful! The kitchen suddenly has a polished, finished, and—to borrow a phrase—a very “now” look to it. I love my Kitchen! I guess this means I have start cooking in it…

Kitchen Remodel: Backsplash Installation

“I got the tiles for the kitchen backsplash,” I told Mr. Wonderful.

“Good,” he said while shaving in the bathroom.

“I got the grout for the tiles.”

“Good.”

“I called the handyman to install it.”

“No way!” he said nicking his chin.

Since buying The House my husband had turned into a Do-It-Yourself maniac.  It started small with him installing handles on the closet doors the week we moved in and grew with each DIY success until now he wanted to single-handedly expand the kitchen to feed 80, add a helicopter landing pad and build a second Griffith Observatory on our roof.  All while working a full time job.  It was crazy.  He was crazy.  He was driving me crazy.

Now he spent hours at hardware stores buying materials.  He spent days on the internet researching DIY projects.  He spent weeks avoiding local handymen. 

One of our neighbors, James, was a certified electrician.  When we first trimmed our palm trees, James thanked us by handing out his business card,

“If you need any electrical repairs, call me,” he said with a wave. 

Instead of seeing this as the friendly gesture it was, Mr. Wonderful viewed it as a challenge to his masculine virility.  I saw his chin jut out in defiance and could hear his brain screaming: Fix our electrical system?  Over my dead body!

So I said goodbye to a weekend with Mr. Wonderful.  And for the next 60 hours I worked, I went to dinner with my girlfriends, I watched every movie at Laemmle’s Polish Film Festival just to avoid being in his hair while he toiled on the remodel.  While I gallivanted around Los Angeles, he prepped the walls, applied the glue and slapped the tile suckers to it. 

Then he rested for two weeks.  After which I, again, became a weekend widow while he spent another weekend applying the grout.  This time I worked overtime at the office, I invited myself to dinner with my girlfriends and their boyfriends, I caught Laemmle’s entire Icelandic Film Fest.  I’d never seen so much ice on film.  During (another) harsh ice film scene I got a text message from Mr. Wonderful.

“Come home."

I returned to the house with coffee, sushi and ice cream.  I entered the kitchen and beheld a finished backsplash and a dirty spouse.

"It’s beautiful,” I gasped.  He ran his grout-encrusted hands through his hair.  He was beautiful.  There was nothing but masculine, virile perfection about him and his work. 

So I decided: If he really wanted to be a DIY maniac… I’d let him.

Kitchen Redo: Kitchen Tile

“The kitchen remodel isn’t finished,” Mr. Wonderful said after dinner. 

“I know,” I said.

“We need a backsplash.” 

“I know.”

What backsplash do you want?”

“I… I don’t know!”

Months before, we had painted, sanded and rehardwared our kitchen.  We’d made the space attractively workable but every time I washed a dish in the sink or cooked on the stove—oil, water or waffles splashed on the walls.  It was a daily reminder that we needed to install a backsplash or eat vertically.  Darn gravity.

So I dove into exploring backsplashes.  I looked at stores, I poured over friends’ Pinterest photos, I barged into strangers’ homes to see what they’d done.  I saw backsplashes in tile, ceramic, porcelain, Paris subway, automobile stainless steel and NASA’s titanium/aluminum combo.  The options were dizzying and oddly, transportation related.  These backsplashes were going places.

After doing more research than they did to develop the Hydrogen Bomb, I decided I wanted my backsplash to be: 1) Practical to keep food from sticking to it; 2) Beautiful to look at; and 3) Wouldn’t cost more than our mortgage.  Clearly I had pursued the wrong career.  If I’d really wanted to make a fortune, I would have gone into selling kitchen backsplashes.  Not selling homes or kitchens just The.  Backsplashes.  

Who would have thought a surface to collect dirt and grease could be so expensive?  Not the Parisian subway designers—évidement—who had installed Paris subway tile on 200 kilometers of underground walls, floors and ceilings.  Imagine how valuable those tunnels were!  If Europe really wanted to solve its debt crisis it should dislodge just half those metro tiles and sell them to idiot Americans who were crazy about Paris.  I’d be the first in line!  Mais oui!

As much as I loved Paris and its Métro, I couldn’t install those tiles in my kitchen for two stark reasons: they were white and I was a slob.

Nope, I needed to hide the dirt with a patterned backsplash, which by the way describes 99% of all tile.  I discovered this fact while shopping in a pocket of Los Angeles called the “Broadway of Backsplashes” except instead of having tony New York theaters located one next to another, this pocket of the San Fernando Valley had one backsplash store located next to another.  And another.  After visiting half a dozen of these stores, all their tiles blended together into a brain smoothie of images and impossible tile combinations like “terracotta-white-marble-glass-bubblegum”.  Looking down the street I saw three dozen more stores just like them—

So I fled to Ikea because for once, Ikea had fewer options in tile than anywhere else.  In fact the kitchen tile I liked at Ikea wasn’t even for sale at Ikea but some local Home Plus store http://www.bauformatusa.com/.  I didn’t care, I loved it!  The tiles were wide porcelain panels covered in streaky lines and I had to have them!  I raced to Home Plus and grabbed a salesclerk, the one with the smiling dark eyes. 

“I want this tile,” I said.

“Would you—” he said. 

“I don’t want to look at another tile.  It’s taken me months to find this one.”

“But would you like—”

“This is what I want, so don’t try to talk me out of it!”

“Would you like a cup of coffee?” he said pointing to the espresso machine on the countertop. 

Although caffeine seemed like the last thing I needed, he made us both a double shot and handed me a coffee cup and saucer so small they belonged in a queen’s dollhouse.  While we sipped the java he brought out another tile sample, which had a similar pattern to ours but was cut in thin rectangles.  I gasped.  It was clean, simple and would give our kitchen a retro feel and I… I loved it even more!  Incredible!  This salesman knew me better than I knew myself.  And when I told him so, his dark eyes smiled even more. 

“Some people think I’m pushy but I just want to help,” he said with grinning eyes.  And help he did.  I bought the tile he suggested, loaded it in my car and thanked him profusely. 

Now I knew why backsplash sellers made the big bucks: they prevented me from making design mistakes, which kept me from re-installing the backsplash twice.  Not having to go through this backsplash drama again?  That’s worth any price.

Next step: Installing the Backsplash!

Home for the Weekend

Nothing says "comfortable" more than the perfect pillow; except cat hair on the furniture.

This timeless pillow is made from a retired U.S. flag.  It's welcoming and has great structure.  For me it encapsulates what "home for the weekend" should be.  Plus it's recycled.  A win-win!

Enjoy the weekend and Columbus Day holiday!

What the Rodeo Taught Me

“Welcome home,” I said embracing Mr. Wonderful at the airport.

He rubbed his neck.  “Remind me never to take a trans-Atlantic flight that starts on the Pacific.”

“The House missed you,” I said.

He nodded.

“The neighbors missed you.”

He nodded.

“Jackson missed you.”

“All that cat misses is a brain.”

He called it.  After witnessing Jackson’s recent run-in with a wild opossum where the cat rolled over and played dead, Mr. Wonderful took to calling him the “Dumbest Kitty Ever”.   Looking at the cold hard facts, if the opossum had attacked Jackson, the cat would now be dead.  So our cat’s existence on the planet continued despite his lack of a brain and his complete physical unfitness.  Forget Darwin’s Survival of the Fittest theory, it didn’t apply to dim, pampered felines whose only street cred was they were named after “Jack” Bauer. 

This pushed me to act.  Perhaps I could help Jackson become less of a pillow and more of a cat?  Perhaps I could reawaken an inner tiger hidden deep, deep down inside him?  Perhaps I could give him the skills to fight off a fierce opossum attack?  

Nah.

But I had to try. I thought about the Reno Rodeo I’d just been too.  All the events were activities that cowboys, cows and horses really did on a working ranch.  Perhaps I needed to simulate real life cat activities to awaken Jackson’s latent tiger?

Currently Jackson’s day consisted of sleeping, eating and playing with his catnip toy, then… sleeping some more.  We’d bought the mouse-shaped catnip toy for him after he arrived in our home.  It had a Velcro pocket where you could remove the old catnip and restuff it with a fresh supply.  Once a day Jackson would hug it between his front paws and slowly lick it like an ice cream cone.  After which he’d crash into a drug-induced stupor right on the kitchen floor. 

Then it hit me.  Catnip was a drug!  It was preventing our cat from functioning at his highest intelligence or any intelligence.  The worst part: I was his supplier!  How could he get in touch with his inner tiger if he was as high as a kite?  I confiscated the catnip mouse toy and stashed it in the closet. 

Another game we played with Jackson was “catch the pocket pen laser”.  Friends had given us this toy to get our sad, lazy cat moving.  Initially he liked chasing the red light across the floor and around the furniture but after two minutes when he couldn’t catch the red dot in his paws he slumped off to his food bowl and ate.  The laser hadn’t help him become fit, it made him fatter.

So I went out to the garden, found a stick and tied a ribbon to the end of it.  Then I tied the ribbon to the empty catnip mouse toy.  Back inside I twirled this contraption around our cat, who ignored it with boredom.  His message was clear: Hey lady, I'm not bothering with this mouse toy if it isn’t full of drugs.

I continued wiggling the stick, ribbon and mouse toy on the floor for 30 minutes and just when I felt my wrist would fall off from spinning this clunky homemade contraption, the cat turned his head and pounced.  He clutched the mouse toy in his paws and bit the toy even though the toy was devoid of catnip.  He has animal instincts!  He's a tiger!  He's alive!

Back at the house, I showed Mr. Wonderful Jackson’s progress with the mouse toy tied to the ribbon and the stick.  While Mr. Wonderful ate dinner, rehydrated from the flight and kicked back on the sofa I spun the ribbon and stick toy until the cat collapsed into a panting, happy heap on the floor.     

“See,” I said admiring our feline.  “He has some cat instincts.  We just had to simulate his natural environment to bring them out.”

“Chasing a mouse toy doesn’t mean he can fight a opossum.”

“It’s a beginning.”

“It’s the start of a beginning.”

“It’s better than nothing.”  Mr. Wonderful nodded.  The cat walked to the sofa and rested his paw on Mr. Wonderful’s foot. 

“I told you the cat missed you,” I said.

“Did anybody else miss me?”

“I missed you.”

“Prove it,” he said pulling me close.