I got to work this morning to discover that the power was out, and probably had been since the storms on Saturday. At least the weekend wasn't hot. But we didn't get power again until after 1:00. Actually, it came back on about thirty seconds after I finished eating cold soup for lunch because the microwave was on the power circuit that was down.
Nothing much to blog here. I was super busy this weekend and did absolutely no sewing. Not a stitch.
Nothing much to blog here. I was super busy this weekend and did absolutely no sewing. Not a stitch.
Friday: Ran a few small errands and then helped a friend of my mother's clean out her garage. She lives less than a mile away so I walked to her house. However, she gave me a table, which we brought home in her car. When I opened the garage door, I was hit with a cloud of solvent fumes. I hadn't smelled anything Thursday evening when I came home from work--believe me, I would not have missed this--so I knew whatever it was had happened during the preceding twenty or so hours. I let the garage air out for awhile and then rolled my car out (I was afraid to start it. Sparks and all). The smell seemed to be coming from the side of the garage on which my car, and not my mother's car, is parked. My first thought was that, since there is a construction site next to my office, maybe something had been spilled and I'd driven through it, but once the car was out in the open, the smell didn't seem to be clinging to it.
I proceeded to tear the garage apart. I knew I wouldn't sleep that night for fear that whatever it was would either leak into the house or would become ignited, so there was no point in being conservative about how much of a mess I made looking for the source. The up side is that I found all kinds of things that, while not the source of the smell, were aged beyond use and could be thrown away, too.
My second thought was that my father's old camp stove had started to leak, even though the smell didn't really smell like fuel. The stove turned out to be fine, but the smell was strongest in its near vicinity. A little more looking and I discovered that, sure enough, a can of lacquer thinner on the shelf above the camp stove had sprung a leak. The bad news was that I had to email my dad and tell him I'd thrown away all of his rope because the thinner had soaked into it. The good news was that, since it had soaked into all that rope, it had not leaked over onto the shelf below or, worse, into the wallboard behind the shelf. Also good news was that it was (obviously, since it leaked) a very old can and there wasn't much thinner left in it, so the mess wasn't as bad as it could have been. It sure stunk to high Heaven, though.
Mom's friend and I went to Denny's, and then I spent the rest of the evening sticking my head into the garage every ten minutes to make sure the smell wasn't coming back. But it didn't.
Mispickel and I slept like babies that night. Here's proof:
Why are cats so adorable? They are adorable perfected.
And the table? The table has the makings of awesome. It's dirty right now because it was in the garage, but it's solid and it's (also) adorable:
Yeah, I know--the color. Hellooooo, 1987! The story is that her husband, who was a professional cabinetmaker, found the legs and frame in a field, minus the top. They were still usable so he brought it home and made a new top for it. Seriously, the top is probably better than the legs--the wood is super dense and the edges are all routed and the hinges work like buttah. Like buttah! She liked the raw wood on the legs so he left that, but he liked blue, so it's Eighties country blue with pink flower thingies stenciled around the edge.
The first thing she asked me was, "What color are you going to paint it?" Everything in her house is yellow, orange, red, and hot pink. She never liked blue. I'd like to paint the legs but I won't do that for awhile, for her sake. The blue has to go, though. The plan is to research some Art Deco stencils and come up with something more like the designs on this hoosier, in less-saccharine colors:
Black, red, and Nile green on white or cream, maybe? Black, green, and maize? We'll see.
Mine doesn't have a drawer, but this table is very similar. This one has a 1940's wheat pattern.
These are the kind of chairs it should have.
Saturday: Played music with some friends at a small craft fair. I don't do this enough--the guitar almost killed my fingers. I can still hack it on dulcimer, though. Purchased an enormous pile of Newbery books for the Live Oak Friends Meeting Little Free Library for $4 from the Montgomery County Library book sale, though.
Sunday: Went to Galveston. Got there early so I hung out at the City Cemetery for awhile, taking pictures of interesting gravestones.
Major William H. Stewart, Hood's Brigade, Confederate Army:
Even death cannot deliver them from the jokes:
Little Hawley Kirschner, asleep forever on top of his own marker:
There are others, but I can't upload them until I charge my better camera; these are just the ones from my phone.
Last night was the latest installment of "Mr. Selfridge" on PBS. I'm not really that into it but it's something to watch while I either sew or play with Mispickel. The costumes are nice; the writing . . . not so much. Oh, well.
On the other hand, KUHT postponed "Eastenders" for an hour to slip in an episode of "The Bletchley Circle", and I think I could get into that. Mystery set in 1952 London? Yes, please. If it's done well, it could almost be a continuation of my beloved "Foyle's War", following Sam Stuart's heels.
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