National Novel Writing Month (November!!!)

I know, I know...as if I have nothing better to do than write a novel in November. Not even an advance, just the honor of being declared a "winner" if I write 50,000 words by the end of the month! Luckily they don't read the books, just count the words, so spelling can be atrocious and typos may abound.

Hey, if you want to be a character in my book, give me a name you'd like to be and maybe what kind of person you want to be (if you don't want me lifting all your real life qualities and circumstances, that is!). And of course, I may still take a few liberties with your character...hee hee heee.

I'm not sure if I should tell you much about the story. It's not one of those "adult" books, rest assured. (You may wind up in one of those anyway, but I'm not gonna tell you until it's published...hee hee hee.)

It's really a blueprint for what I'd like to do when DH and I are "retired" that is, what kind of work we'd like to do before we are too old and tired to do much of anything.

The working title is Beadboard, Sea Glass and Driftwood and it's the first in the Trilogy Cottages Mystery Series, and the protagonist is Abigail Steele. You, my friends and family, may find her eerily familiar...

There, that's enough to keep you guessing for now....hee hee hee.

Margaret

Noses, gallbladders and ukuleles, oh my!

I've just finished my 10 days of Augmentin, and things are OK. I still get that smell in my nose very now and then, so I'm not convinced it's really gone away. I'll see how I fare this weekend and e-mail the doc on Monday if it comes back. I love being "special" but not in this way! I would much rather have something common and easily diagnosed! The intestinal blues have calmed down, thank goodness.

Russ came out of his gallbladder surgery just fine on Wednesday, and is recovering nicely. Lots of resting, sleeping, TV and testing what kinds of foods are OK right now. The surgeon wasn't convinced there was anything wrong with his gallbladder since it looked so healthy (as he removed it). This may or may not alleviate his symptoms....

We had a great time at the Ukulele Festival last weekend in St. Helena. We got to see/hear/meet the infamous (in uke circles) James Hill and the lovely Victoria Vox. I'll include a couple YouTube videos here. They are not mine and not from that day. But these are wonderful young talents.

Enjoy! (and buy some of their CDs!)

Yucky Drugs...Yucky Smell...

My doctor put me on the antibiotic Augmentin on Tuesday and warned me it could have yucky side-effects. Since I've been on antibiotics before without adverse reaction, I just hoped for the best.

Not so lucky this time. I did what she said to do and have been eating some (vegan) yogurt with live cultures, but my intestines have decided to sing the blues today. I downed another carton of raspberry coconut yogurt this morning and am again, hoping for the best. Maybe it's time to get that fiber Sassy mentioned. (Just hadn't had time since I was at a conference.)

The reason I'm taking an antibiotic is a possible sinus condition. But it really isn't presenting in a typical way. No fever. No pain. No yucky-colored discharge. What I do have is a nasty smell in my nose. It started last Monday and went away on Thursday, the day I started my trip. I was doing nasal rinses with the NeilMed squeezebottle.

This effort seemed to be working, I thought.

But on Monday morning, after being home one night, the nasty smell came back. (This is something only I can smell. I don't smell bad, nor does by breath, according to my brave DH who tested both.)

I had only missed one evening of nasal rinsing, so I started it up again and decided to see my doctor. Bad smell all day Monday, bad smell all day Tuesday. I got in to see her on Tuesday and took the first pill around 1 pm.

After describing my symptoms and the doc looking up my nose and in my ears, she announced, "Well, this one really stumps me."

So not the words I wanted to hear. This is what I wanted to hear...

"Oh, I know what this is. I've seen it several times. Here's what you do (or take) to get rid of it and this is what you do to prevent it."

Nope.

So instead, going on the assumption it's some sort of nastiness/infection in my sinuses, I am put on antibiotics. I am perfectly willing to do this because I too, am stumped.

I've tried to be very Nancy Drew about this and figure out what external thing could be causing this and eliminating things one by one. A new face cream. Sudden allergy to spinach. A scented candle in the bedroom. A new lip gloss. A scented deodorant I'd been using for weeks. I wasn't on any supplements or other drugs. On and on. It had better not be chocolate!

I'll keep you updated, and am happy to take suggestions or hear of other people's experiences. The smell really waned yesterday, but kept came back a little last night.

What does it smell like, you ask? There is nothing on this earth it smells like for me to give it a name. How I wish it smelled like maple syrup or a new puppy. It's not really a horrid smell (like dog poo or garlic breath), but it's definitely not a nice smell. It's a little sickening. And to having anything in your nose this long is just depressing and annoying. And I'm too close to menopause to have any more annoyances.

House update

Well, the flu side-lined us a bit and we didn't all the stuff we planned done! We did get the "toilet room" painted and it looks great. We started on the bathroom painting, but didn't get too far. But hey, it's a start!

I did discover Rustoleum "hammered metal" spray paint and am in love with it!. I'll post pics later of what I have painted. I started with some simple beige plastic outlet covers. This stuff its cool! Ironically, I have decided to buy (or maybe just spray these white now) white covers for the whole bathroom since white looks so nice against the "Atlantic Grey" (which is really a soft teal). But I will spray paint the brass sconces and towel bars in the room with this so it will match the light fixture--whenever we buy it! Slowly trying to change over the room (house) from brass to satin pewter fixtures.

The kitchen faucet will have to wait!

The $50,000 Sink Faucet

We just bought a faucet the other day and plan to install it next week.

We really needed to buy this when we first moved in, since the faucet has been leaking since then. (Almost 5 years ago). I bought a faucet for $119. Nothing too fancy, but not bottom of the barrel. The one I really would like is about $500.

But it kept turning into the $50,000 faucet. No, I don't have extreme tastes in kitchen hardware. It's just that our whole kitchen is a tangled web of items that need replacing.

Neighbors ended up remodeling their whole kitchen the same way--by replacing the faucet that was leaking. They found water damage behind the sink. When they were done, they had new cabinets, new countertops, new flooring, new appliances and new tiling. I don't know the total, but I'm guessing it was way more than the cost of a nice faucet. And she hates the new faucet...

Our kitchen is in the same predicament. I don't know about water damage, but I do know that our sink is also an ugly and barely functioning piece of stainless steel. I might be the only woman on the planet who doesn't like stainless steel--but I've never liked it, especially in a sink. Give me a white porcelain double sink any day. (Maybe about $500 for a decent one?)

Well, if we replace the sink, we have to do something about the tile around it since it's being held on via numerous applications of Gorilla Glue. Probably not in the Sonoma County contractor's handbook, but hey, it works. The whole counter that holds the sink is made of small tile (another very bad idea--small tile means way TOO MUCH GROUT), and the grout is so old (and missing) that the crevasses rival Yosemite Valley in terms of steepness. And deep valleys easily get blocked up with lots of sediment. Yucky.

But if I replace the sink, I would have to really replace the tile. But I hate tiny tile. So that means getting a new countertop. I'm not wild about granite, but solid surface makes sense in a kitchen. Sure, one long countertop, labor included, would be about $2-3,000--no matter what kind of solid surface you get. Maybe. But we have a huge island (that we had re-grouted when we moved in), and the other counter with the stove is in fine condition.

I also hate the island. Way too big for the kitchen, and no overhang for sitting/eating at.

I'm going to fast forward here, this is taking too long.

The island should be removed and a smaller, more functional one put in. $2,000

If we want all the surfaces to match, that means the island, the sink counter and the stove counters. $10,000 easily in materials and labor.

If we remove the island, the flooring has to be dealt with. The current tile is "Taco Bell Ugly" (I'm not kidding, we have seen this tile in Taco Bell and the restroom at Fresh Choice.) and I would prefer wood. But the kitchen floor extends into the hallway and into the front entrance. So, what $10,00 for new floors, if we are lucky? The irony here is that the tile is in perfect condition. This is strong ugly tile!

The cabinets are all scratched, badly painted and banged up from the previous owner. So, maybe $3,000 to paint really well or $8,000 to replace?

Only 3 burners on the 6-burner stovetop work. $1,000 or about $2000?

The fridge leaks, two drawers are broken and they cut into the cabinet above to push the nasty dented floor-model thing into place. (No ice machine or water--except on the floor when it leaks.) Simple two-door fridge with ice and water....$2,000-$3000.

The double in-cabinet ovens look like they are from the 1960's yet this house was built in 1989. They don't cook well, aren't vented and I am surprised they haven't caught the house on fire in the cabinet above them. (That no one can reach...) So. maybe new oven ...$1,000?

OK, so maybe this is all just $30,000...but they say you should double any estimates to get the real final cost!

What we will try really hard to do next week is SIMPLY install the $119 faucet and not go any farther.

How do you think we will do?

We've already decided to paint the cabinets ourselves....and I'm thinking I don't really need ovens for awhile, do I? So I could rip out the ovens....take out the cabinets.....hmmmm...

Our latest addition

Rigatoni Pepperoni Bologna Abalone Macaroni
Guacamole Mr. Mahony.

We call him Toni for short.

Our little Zen Chihuahua.

Outdated?

I can't stand to hear someone say "That's outdated." Or "this kitchen needs to be updated." Especially when the design they are looking at is less than 10 years old!

I love to watch shows on HGTV and see what kinds of houses people are looking at, and how they decorate a space to their own tastes.

But it frustrates me to hear couples walk through a house and comment about this and that and how outdated it is. Often, it's the kitchen or bathroom. And they say it snidely as if the yokels selling the house had no taste and should have remodeled a perfectly good kitchen and spent $100,000 on it just so they wouldn't have to be offended looking at tile counters instead of granite.

My parents never once remodeled a kitchen or a bathroom in the houses they lived in. Granted, they should have once or twice...but mostly, they used the cabinets and counters and sinks and faucets that were already in the house because they all still worked. Plain and simple. There was nothing wrong with them so they kept using them. Plain and simple.

Bad ergonomic design should be changed. Broken tiles or faucets should be replaced. Wall colors that make you want to barf should be painted over. But we shouldn't be throwing out, willy nilly, perfectly good cabinets, hardware, appliances, tiling or counters just because they hint of a previous decade.

I happen to love the colors and tile patterns found in bathrooms from the 40s and 50s. You just don't see them anymore. More than once I've seen a family rip out this incredible piece of history in a bathroom and replace it with something that WILL LOOK OUTDATED in about 2 years. (Can we say above-counter bowl sinks?)

So here's a question...when does outdated become hip retro? I'm thinking it's at least 30 years. Seems like anything 10-20 years just gets labeled outdated. If the design happens to survive a family (that would be my parents), then it suddenly becomes "in" and stylish. My parents had a rounded-top Gibson refrigerator (like the one to the left) well into the 1970's. They brought this fridge WITH THEM from at least 2 previous homes. Possibly 3 or 4, but I was too young to remember that far back. Now you can buy a fridge like this and pay A LOT OF MONEY (like $2500) for the look. Of course, I'm betting they have some modern features like ice-makers and defrosting freezers. Aw, the memories of defrosting 5 solid inches of ice in a freezer compartment that would barely keep ice cream solid!