Author: Matt Talley

A deal down at the crossroads…

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My boy, like much of his generation, is not a letter writer. While talking to The Ruminator about why he hadn’t sent out a couple ‘Thank You‘ notes, he gave me the – ‘I don’t have any cards and I have bad handwriting’ – story.  I made a deal with him:  I would make him some stationary and cards with zombies on them if he both promised to use them for the aforementioned note of ‘thanks’ and if he would write me one letter a month for two years.  I told him that penmanship, content, punctuation, and spelling didn’t matter.  I just wanted one honest letter a month.   He loves “killing” zombies and so he was in!  I made him shake on it.  To drive the point home, I drew up the little contract below for him to sign, putting Christmas and birthday presents on the line for failure to live up to the deal, and made sure Santa witnessed it as well.

Quality stationary means quality paper.  Like with my own and Stamps-With-Foot’s Stationary – instead of the white recycled paper that we use for most printing, I used 30gram 100% cotton ivory/ecru paper and matching 100% cotton envelops.   I went into Adobe Illustrator and made a green zombie head Victorian silhouette from an image that I pulled of the inter-webs.

I worked on it for 3-4 hours and stayed up late putting it all together.  I had a surprise trip to the UAE come up, so I asked Stamps-With-Foot to send The Ruminator his stationary.  I even included an organizer and special pen for him to compose his prose with.  I called his house the day it all arrived and got an butt-chewing from his mother about how crappy it was to make a 10 year old sign a contract and expect him to write me once a month.  She was not amused and missed the whole spirit and reason it was all done in the first place.  I doubt that I will be getting a letter and no notes will be sent out.  My son will learn that he doesn’t have to keep his word and that not all manners are important…  Exactly the opposite lesson that I was trying to teach him.  We shall see how it all turns out…

Card Catalog, you complete me

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Are you old enough to remember standing in front of a wooden box in your school/neighborhood library, flipping through yellowed note cards, looking for the tittle/author of just the right book?  As I sat in Mrs. Peterson’s 3rd grade classroom, learning the intricacies of the Dewey Decimal System, I would have never imagined that I would one day look back on it all with smiling nostalgia.  Going to the library and thumbing through the old oak card catalog drawers – pulled out and sitting on a table – and finding titles like The Roghfort Gang, My Side of the Mountain, How to Eat Fried Worms – happy memories.

The days to the DDS and the card catalog are almost completely gone. Almost all libraries – large, small, rural, urban – have digitized their catalogs/holdings and have sold off or just thrown out their cabinets (insert look of horror).  I had looked for my own case for the last 3-4 years before finding one at a decent price that fit in our home.  A fine old card catalog should be de rigueur for a bookworm’s home office/living room.  When I found that perfect one early this year, I may have caressed and spoke to it in soft loving tones for the first few days.  I moved it right into my office, re-arranged the drawers, and mounted my book press on the top.  Something was still missing though.  I realized that I needed labels installed in the brass pull/placard to complete the piece. I set up a template in Visio and set the lettering to an interesting script-like font that I found at dafont.  Then I had a little fun with naming the drawers from A to Z.

A few pictures of Laurel and Brodie this summer

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Since Brodie follows my wife constantly and they are near inseparable, every time I snap a picture of Stamps-With-Foot, Brodie is there.  When I leave this life I hope that I am reincarnated as a new frenchie puppy for my wife.  She is fully involved with her fur-baby: he eats lavish hot food, has more toys than he can play with, a warm comfy bed, a yard free of crap, other dogs, unlimited snuggling, and bacon for snacks.  In short, the life all Frenchies dream of – well except for the occasional romp with a toy poodle – there could be more of that for Brodie…

My wife’s badass personal stationary

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I have always felt that you don’t truly possess a house until either miscellaneous charities start sending you mounds of address labels in the hopes of a donation or until you have personal stationary with your home address.  My sweet little wife has never had custom stationary and I figured that it was about time and it would give me the opportunity to spoil her a little.

Having a print shop or a high-end paper store design and print say 100 letter sheets, envelopes and thank you cards will run you about $500.  Buying a hand letterpress, a couple sets of tin/lead font, paper, ink, new rollers, etc. will set you back $1000, easy.  I am way too cheap and too handy to fork out that kind of dough for something I can do myself.

Stamps-With-Foot loves her puppy like the Pope loves Jesus.  I thought that his handsome mug would make the perfect personal seal for her.  I took a picture of him and through the voodoo of Photoshop, I made a black silhouette image – all big ears and narrow butt.  I dropped that image into AutoCAD and did some arranging and formatting.  I added to that her contact information in a semi-french script font that I designed a few years ago for my own letters and cards.

Quality stationary means quality paper.  Instead of the white recycled paper that we use for most printing, I bought a pack of 30gram 100% cotton ivory/ecru paper and matching 100% cotton envelops.  Wood pulp paper yellows and crumbles after only a few years, but cotton paper with last roughly a year per percent of cotton before showing any signs of age: 25% cotton = 25 years, 50% = 50 years and so forth.  After some diligent searching, I found some indelible archival printer ink on the inter-webs for our HP and I loaded each sheet and envelope into the printer by hand.  A note from my bride should be as crisp and clean for our great grand children to read as it was the day she sat down to write it with her glass dip pen and brown bulletproof ink.

She swooned a little bit when I gave it all to her 🙂

An update on the removal of the giant outdoor cat litter box.

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As mentioned before, the previous owners of our home filled what used to be a cascading koi pond with a couple of years worth of used cat litter.  The removal of this “gift” was a project that I was NOT looking forward to, but it had to be done.  While it was officially still winter, I started the spring prep in the yard/garden and the litter box was the first project on my list.

I dug the bed out and hauled the old liner and kitty-nuggets away.  I had thought about turning the area into a raised root vegetable planter, but the thought of any leftover cat poo getting into my food gave me the shakes.  Stamps-With-Foot has been eyeing my vegetable boxes with intent to “ maybe add some flowers” so I decided to give her some space to plant non-edible flora in the backyard, which by agreement is my gardening domain.

There was already a course of interlocking wall block down, so I rearranged the foot print and after a trip to Home Depot for material, I laid four more courses down to give her a two foot tall planter with about  fourteen square feet of planting space.  (As a note, I have mad masonry hammer skills.)

After finishing the walls and filling the new planter with topsoil and a fresh layer of compost, I soaked the blocks with water and added moss bits from the old wall/garage roof to the seams because my little wife really likes the mossy look of old walls.  I blended some moss up with yogurt that next weekend and spread it on to assist the growth process.  By next summer the planter will look like it has been there for twenty years and the odd floral planting will not “happen” to show up next to my veggies.  The pics below show the original ivy-covered state and how it looked up until late summer.

When a 10 year old helps in the shop.

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My son loves to make, assemble, deconstruct and alter stuff in my shop when he comes out for his summer visits.  This year I put his little butt to work on a project that I knew he would like, that would help me out, and would teach him something: organizing my tool and supply bins.  I know, I know, it sounds really crappy – like I am forcing my kids to fan me while Stamps-With-Foot feeds me grapes on the divan, but it was great, I swear.

My J-O-B was throwing out a couple sets of large metal card catalog bins and after asking permission, I snatched them out of the bin and took both right home.  I immediately filled every drawer with often used crap, but didn’t get around to labeling the fronts.  It has been that way for 2 years and I have to pull out 2 or 3 drawers until I find what I am looking for.  Every time I have to rifle around looking through each cubby, I swear to myself: “THIS weekend I and going to make labels!”  I am glad I waited.  Now The Ruminator (my son’s nickname) can tell the difference between a wood biscuit, a deck screw, a blue wire nut, trim screws, roofing nails and finish nails, just to name a few.  I have organized shop storage and handmade placards that I will always treasure and smile at every time I see them.

Desk Fetish

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As previously noted, I have a certain almost unnatural attraction to desks.  While in Dubai a few weeks ago, I happened into a swanky furniture store.  It is the type of store that rich folk with vast oil deposits peruse. I walked in and marveled at the pieces and the prices for about 30 seconds, when a sales person was ON me.  She was nice and said I could stay, but followed me around the store for ten minutes.  She was fine with me taking pictures, I just wasn’t allowed to touch any of the gorgeous desks or sit in any chairs.  Fair enough…

There was no particle wood to be found.  all solid wood with a smattering of exotic veneers.  The jewel in their crown of desks was a huge cabinet desk that had a price tag of 71477.000 Dirham – that would equal $19455.13!  I was astounded, but I will admit that my heart was full of lust for that finely crafted writing destination.

Thursday has come again

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What I want Thursday – August 11th, 2011:

  1. To get more sleep.  I find myself not going to bed before 1:00 most nights/mornings and I am up at 7ish.  It makes me grumpy.
  2. To find the drive and initiative to work out.  My cookie-handles have now connected with my pot belly and I am not amused, but I haven’t exactly done a great deal to address the situation.
  3. For my kids to have a great, productive, and interesting school year in 2011/2012. 
  4. I want my sister and Mother’s furniture to arrive from Texas so they can start feeling settled in Seattle.
  5. It would be great if my J-O-B cubical would stay spotless.  The 5S monster has come.
  6. I wish I could drink my coffee without sugar.  It would really help me shed the Santa-fat.
  7. Were in the HELL is my iPhone charging cord?!?!?!?!

How did I, of all people, miss this?!?!?!

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Today is National Chocolate Chips Day!  Damn!!  Why didn’t I get some warning on this?!  I should already be well into my Chips Ahoy!-induced sugar coma – Face smeared with melted chips, shirt littered with crumbs, one shoe just gone, right hand clutching a batter encrusted beater, left hand resting on on an empty milk carton, and face etched with a smile…

The Original Tollhouse Cookie Recipe in below – Just like Mom makes!

  • 2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
  • 1 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • 1 cup (2 sticks) butter, softened
  • 3/4 cup granulated sugar
  • 3/4 cup packed brown sugar
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • 2 large eggs
  • 2 cups (12-oz. pkg.) NESTLÉ® TOLL HOUSE® Semi-Sweet Chocolate Morsels

PREHEAT oven to 375° F.

COMBINE flour, baking soda and salt in small bowl. Beat butter, granulated sugar, brown sugar and vanilla extract in large mixer bowl until creamy. Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Gradually beat in flour mixture. Stir in morsels. Drop by rounded tablespoon onto ungreased baking sheets.

BAKE for 9 to 11 minutes or until golden brown. Cool on baking sheets for 2 minutes; remove to wire racks to cool completely.

PAN COOKIE VARIATION: Grease 15 x 10-inch jelly-roll pan. Prepare dough as above. Spread into prepared pan. Bake for 20 to 25 minutes or until golden brown. Cool in pan on wire rack. Makes 4 dozen bars.

SLICE AND BAKE COOKIE VARIATION:
PREPARE dough as above. Divide in half; wrap in waxed paper. Refrigerate for 1 hour or until firm. Shape each half into 15-inch log; wrap in wax paper. Refrigerate for 30 minutes.* Preheat oven to 375° F. Cut into 1/2-inch-thick slices; place on ungreased baking sheets. Bake for 8 to 10 minutes or until golden brown. Cool on baking sheets for 2 minutes; remove to wire racks to cool completely. Makes about 5 dozen cookies.

* May be stored in refrigerator for up to 1 week or in freezer for up to 8 weeks.

FOR HIGH ALTITUDE BAKING (5,200 feet): Increase flour to 2 1/2 cups. Add 2 teaspoons water with flour and reduce both granulated sugar and brown sugar to 2/3 cup each. Bake drop cookies for 8 to 10 minutes and pan cookie for 17 to 19 minutes.

So dad, I’ve been thinking…..

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My son, who is deep thinker and a child that possess a vivid imagination came to me the other day and said, “Dad, we need to talk“. He had a stern and serious look on his face and he motioned to the table. I said “Alright buddy”, knowing that this was going to be good since the last time he got that look and we had to sit down, he asked me if I knew about Jesus and proselytized such that Jerry Fallwell would have been proud…  He is forever coming up with the funniest and often profound little quips: like yesterday when he told my wife that he had had the same Teddy Bear for his whole life, a bear that he clutches as he sleeps every night, and that when he got married his wife would have to just deal with him sleeping with Rocky Bear.

So, we sat down, me smirking with anticipation, and he says as he furred his brow and tapped all five fingers on the table for emphasis; “Daddy, I need you to tell me the truth. It is ok, I already know so you can tell me.” I was trying not to laugh when I answered, “Of course son, what do you want to know.”

“Well, me and Hunter (his partner in crime) have been thinking (my son ruminates on things for months sometimes) and we figured it out, I know what you do.”

“Umm what exactly you mean…”

“Dad it is really ok, I know you’re a spy.”

“Bwahaha! I’m a what!? Where in blue blazes did you come up with that one?! Who exactly am I a spy for?”

“You know us, the US, the CIA, like Jason Borne.”

“Son, I am not a spy”

“Look dad, you really need to tell someone, you’ll feel better and it might as well be me.”

Still laughing: “Son, why do you think I am a spy?”

“So, you fly all over the world, speak like 11 languages, have a pretty girl, a fast car with a TURBO, can do karate moves, have cool army guns, and not even mommy knows what you do for a living.”

My boy may be over-thinking and over-estimating my cool quotient, but God love him for it.

“Son, I am not a spy. I fly a lot for work – to fix airplanes & have crappy meetings – and I only speak 2.5 languages (poorly) and a few words of others here and there. You have been to my office – it’s boring.”

“Hunter said that it was a fake office like Mr. Smith’s (my 10 year old has SO not seen Mr. & Mrs. Smith…) and that its just to trick your enemies.”

I am almost peeing myself laughing at this point and it was made worse by the seriousness and earnestness of my child.

“My enemies… Son, I am not a spy.”

“Daddy, its ok. When you are ready you can tell me. I won’t say anything to anyone.”

“Anyone except your friend Hunter…”

He raised an eyebrow at that and looked at me sideways, nodded his head knowingly and went back to playing with werewolf action figures and tormenting the dog with squeaky toys.

Hipsters on a plane

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I was fortunate enough to share a seat row on a flight from Chicago to Seattle with a young female member of the hipster mafia.  She had all the proper accessories: skinny-jeans, a Mac book, plaid, roughed up messenger bag, an ironic tattoo, bed-hair and of course big goofy Steve Urkel glasses that had no lenses in the frames.  There were affirmative grunts to the flight attendant and 4 tiny (under 3oz for the TSA – thank you very much asshole London liquid bombers for making us all know what 3oz looks like…) bottles of hooch in Listerine containers to mix with her tomato juice.  The aroma of sweat, cheap booze, and stale pot smoke lingered faintly in the background – all while the aforementioned macbook placed a cheesy 1970’s horror flick – after which she cracked open “Dont Hassel the Hoff” and read with gusto – Not making any of this up!

There was no sharing of the seat arm.  No ‘excuse me’ for repeatedly bumping into me while arranging the contents of her bag or when reaching across my face and over my book for another clandestined drink mixer.  Nope, I was sitting next to a late 20 something 15 year old.  It was not awesome.

So this is what we have wrought?  All our blog posts about nerd culture, bikes, beer snobbery, bluegrass, how amazing old vinyl is, and laments for the way things were back in the days when Kevin Bacon’s Footloose was cool and before we got real jobs working for the man.  We caused this – you and I with our own smugness.  Our own blathering on and on about bike polo and hot nerdy girls.  Our fault.

This girl and maybe millions like her are the worker bees that will fund the twilight of SSI and try to figure out how to clean up the mess we, our parents, and our grand parents have made of things here on terra firma.  We’re fucked.  How in the bejesus is all that going to happen when The League of Hipster Youth is trying, this very minute, to figure out how to extend their stay in mom’s basement indefinantly so they can use “their” money for music, handmade bikes, Apple products, PBR, and primo hindukush?!  Again, we’re fucked.

What I want Thursday:

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  1. More time with my children. No one ends this life with the thought – ‘Man, I should of spent more time working...’
  2. The Longines 2011 24hr watch. Unveiled at Basel World 2011 and is an update of the Classic Swiss Air pilots watch custom made for the airline in the 1950s. It has a half-hunter case that NEEDS a picture of my wife and kids in it.
  3. A great sport coat that looks as good with jeans as it does with a tie and slacks.
  4. For my birthday to finally arrive so that I do not feel bad about buying an iPad2.  I both need and want a new computer and I figured out that I can do 95% of what I need to do on a daily basis on a pad.  As soon as I can open and edit CAD file reliably, then it will be 100%.  I have started lusting.

Good laws

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Sometimes I get reminded that my job really isn’t that important in the grand scheme of things and that I am a dumb-ass.  Such was the case when I got pulled over for talking on my cell on the way to work.  The police officer asked me why I was talking on said phone and I told him, “because I’m and idiot.”  He nodded in agreement and handed me a ticket for $240.  I am not the least bit butt-hurt about this ticket.  I fully deserved it.  I will not be talking on the phone while driving again and I hope the funds go to schools or the library.

Speaking of good laws: the City of Seattle now says it is a crime (fine included) to not scoop up after your dog.  I couldn’t be happier.  I hate to find a big steaming pile of dog deuce on my fresh mowed grass (it happens a lot) and I curse both the dropper and their owner.  No, like a real curse, not just dirty words, but I do throw a couple of those in for good measure.  It usually sounds something like: “May your kibble forever taste like the poop you dropped on my lawn, may fleas torment you, and my your dog snack on your warm corpse after you have a painful demise alone at home…” I do what I can for the cause…

Thursday wish list – 6/30/11

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What I Want Thursday was meant to be a weekly post but due to the realities of my J-O-B and growing list of home improvement projects, it has now become a bi-monthly (hopefully…) utterance.   For this Thursday I would like:

  1. For traffic to slow the fvck down on 35th Ave! – A ticket was handed out last week for 62mph in a 35mph zone and 50+ seems to be the norm.
  2. For my kids to write me real snail-mail letters in addition to dialing the phone, typing a single line e-mail, or sending me a text.  I do not want my generation to be the last that prizes personal tangible communication.  I want my children to send Thank You cards, notes of congratulations, and sympathy.  Manners are small gifts we give to other people, often strangers, that mean so very much…
  3. For my kitchen remodel to be finished and done with. I would like a celebratory breakfast of bacon, eggs, fine pressed coffee, OJ, flakey croissants, and lavender honey at the table in the breakfast nook.  I would like a morning free of worry and noise to enjoy my breakfast in our new clean, bright, painted kitchen, while reading the day’s International Herald Tribune.
  4. Some BADASS/useful luggage for my frequent international travel. No more fvcking roller wheels!!  Real bags, that look good with jeans or a suit.   I like this one from Monocle, A similar one from a guy in Portland, and a new laptop messenger from Timbuck2 in all black.
  5. More book shelves. I need 8’ or so of shelf space in the office, 4’ in the kitchen for our cookbooks, and 3-5’ in our master bedroom to accommodate our home library.  Some cool bookend would be snazzy as well.  These or these or these would work nicely.
  6. For iTunes to realize I do not live in Germany anymore and to FINALLY switch my account over to a US one. Every time I buy a song or app, I get charged in Euros and I have to call in, explain the issue for the umpteenth time and they send me a refund for the difference in 10-14 days.

All Trans Air

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My wife, one of her buddies, and I went to the Pride Parade this past Sunday in Seattle’s Capital Hill.  We have some particularly flamboyant friends and as New York State just legalized same-sex marriage, it felt like an auspicious time see a parade and show some support.

Holy good googamooga!  The people watching was AMAZING – participants and crowd alike.  The leather-clad manly-ladies on Harley’s were interesting, the naked bicyclists were not, well except for the one guy who had his junk tucked in the slit of his bike seat – dangling strait down through the gap.  While mildly disturbing, we couldn’t stop depating the outcome if he were to fall off his bike and if said junk would stay attached or not…  There were a couple groups of leather-man, all wrapped in black leather and shinny studs with a guy in the back twirling and cracking twin studded whips.  Scary on so many levels, but the papa-bear with the whips had amazing control.  Some of the floats were very funny, but the best of the parade, for me, had a hysterical airplane theme.  Since the aviation business puts food on our table, will send my kids to college, and I spend an inordinate amount of time working on and flying in aircraft, I have a natural affinity for related topics.  Yep, the float of the day was: ALL TRANS AIR.  The flight attendants were well quaffed, smiling, happy and came equipped with Adam’s apples.

The crowd gathered in Seattle Center was a site to see as well, lots of hot pants.  Tiny purple hot pants.  Tiny purple hot pants on a misshapen 60 year old man…  There were bears and twinks, butches and lipsticks.  Funny t-shirts and no shirts.  The grass in front of the stage area was a sea of pink and rainbow flags.  Some of the ladies from ALL TRANS AIR were on the main stage lip-syncing and I met what must be the biggest, toughest tranny on earth.  There is a picture on her/him below sitting down, with his sparkly red Judy Garland shoes neatly tucked beneath the chair.  While sitting, his/her head was at the same level as Stamp-With-Foot.  This lady was probally 6’5″ and 280lbs+ before the pumps and lace added height and girth.  I text messaged the same picture as below to my mom and added “Thinking of you”

My Kindle e-reader is about to be even more awesome!

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I was reading the Seattle Times on my Kindle saturday morning while having my coffee and croissant and what appears before me: “Owners of the Kindle from Amazon will be able to download e-books from 11,000 U.S. libraries later this year, the company said Wednesday.” This is HUGE.  The one reason that I ever even give the Nook a passing glance is because I could use it at the library.  Living a few houses from my local branch has saved us some cash, but my wife mentioned last week that my e-book shopping is getting spendy.  Problem solved!  Man, I want to hop up from my bench, drop my oar and dance in the bilge, err I mean push away from my keyboard, leave my perfectly 5S’ed cubicle, and see the sun outside.

Neurotic Puppy

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Anytime my wife leaves the house, the dog runs to the window, watches her walk out of the gate, puts on the saddest puppy face you have ever seen, and whimpers like she is never coming home. He then quickly looks over at me like he is trying to say, “Do SOMETHING pink monkey!! She is getting away!” He then sulks for a couple of hours. If Stamps-With-Foot is gone for more than a day, he acclimates and we turn into big buds, he follows me around the house/yard, snuggles at bed time, and hangs out with me if I am reading or watching TV. That dog has it great when it is just him and me: unlimited bacon, I don’t blaming him for the gas smell that was probably me, walks in the park, cream cheese at C&P coffee, no baths, rough housing, ball throwing, ear scratching, his food heated up, and cat chasing to his heart’s content.

All bets are off though when she walks back in the door. He runs up and puts on a ten minute show of how much he loved and missed her like I beat him and made him wear fuzzy booties and have Tea Party with Kung Fu grip GI Joe, Han Solo, and some troll dolls.

This is “The Look” and below is the background music in his head when the gate swings shut and he is not prancing out of it with her connected via a leash… 

 

Sometimes I am too damn handy.

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I have, for years, prided myself on my ability to make or fix just about anything found in our home or yard. Instead of having to hire a repairman or contractor, I have just done it all myself. That sounds smug, but I don’t mean for it to be – bear with me and you’ll see where this is going…

In the years since I met my wife, I have made: squirrel feeders, two loft beds, cutting tables (sewing), bird houses, 5 cutting boards, bookshelves, 2 hutches, kitchen cabinets, a hall tree, reupholstered chairs, refinished countless pieces of furniture, designed/built drawer organizers, patched walls, made a bat house (?!), hung drywall, sewn dresses, painted countless rooms (one with 5 coats of paint…), unclogged toilets & sinks, said some dirty words, welded a bumper, made a working boomerang for my son, etched glass, rescued old furniture from the burn pile, repaired a ukulele & 2 guitars, built window box planters, installed crown molding and fancy trim, bound books, constructed pellet gun targets, fixed printers/plotters, organized crap, made many of my own hand tools, hung doors, planted a garden, cleaned gutters, reseeded lawns, planted a mini-orchard, baked bread, made 2 yards Ireland-green, hung light fixtures, split firewood, soldered pipes, installed irrigation systems, pulled dents from two fenders, cut down trees, built 2 decks, sharpened countless kitchen knives, BBQed like a spatula wielding God, crafted raised garden boxes, installed 4 wireless home networks, baked turkeys, epoxied stuff back together, framed pictures, made pies, rewired lights & switches, changed automotive oil, installed shocks, brewed beer, hung about a 1000 pictures, replaced an intake manifold gasket, rewired the TV and remote, built-up 8 bikes, re-glazed windows, built PCs, replaced/rekeyed locks, and have been the entire family’s Computer Help Desk – on call 24hrs a day...

While this has saved me a few bucks here and there, it has had a couple of unwanted effects as well. 1: While I CAN fix this stuff, I don’t have the time to work, write, see the kids, snuggle my wife, and walk the dog and still take care of all the crap on my list of stuff to fix or build. 2: My wife knows I can do it all and so she is forever finding new tasks for me AND she breaks shit constantly. Now, the first thing is just one of those parts of married life that one has to just accept. It is like the 9th unwritten wedding vow: Do you, __________, promise to trap mice, carry grocery bags, repair the little things on the coming honey-do list, and put the toilet seat down, so long as you both shall live?

The second issue is more an unconscious development than a malicious attack on our household goods. Some examples:

  1. A cutting board gets left in a sink of water overnight and warps/splits. “It’s OK, you can fix it right?” She says when I find it in the morning and make the grumpy face…
  2. Kid who worked at the grocery store puts HUGE dent in car door with a train of shopping carts. No report is made. “Can you smooth that out?”
  3. First day in our home in Seattle… Me: Don’t use your hair dryer upstairs, the old wiring can’t handle it. Her: OK. After two tripped breakers when she plugged it in anyway the next morning, I found myself at the bottom of the stairs, crumpled in a ball, with a dislocated shoulder after I fell down said stairs trying to turn the breaker back on.
  4. Me: “Where is my bike lock cable?” Her: “Oh, that… I used it the other day and it fell off my bike somewhere and I didn’t notice.”

It is my fault, I have trained her to be this way – it is a learned behavior. If we had to pay cold hard cash for all the little/huge messes/dents/dings/cracks that seem to follow Stamps-With-Foot she would be more careful. I love my wife. She is amazing in so many ways – in most ways, but I swear the very next thing time I have to fix around the house (caused by her own personal tornado), my lovely/girly/sweet wife is going to get covered in sawdust, mud, paint, goo, putty, primer, glue, stain, and gunk – just because.

What I Want Thursday

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This is blatant plagiarism. I slipped into the Wikipedia hole for like three hours this weekend and came out on a girl’s blog that was really sad: hurt, suicide, illness… but I did find a bright spot, one might argue the only one: She had a number of “What I want Thursday” posts. They were funny and sweet and made me think a couple of times – so I am stealing the idea. Is it plagiarism if I admit the theft? Probally.

So, to follow is my inaugural go:

  1. Better Penmanship – My handwritting is terrible , like a seventy-five year old doctor with the shakes writing a prescription terrible.
  2. A fine prosperous garden – As much for my ego as for our table and pocket book
  3. Custom letter-press stationary – Everyone should have their own!
  4. A clean, tidy and simple home – La Maison du Talley is currently flooded with the clutter of half done projects, piles in the basemet destined for Goodwill, and like 20 banana boxes of crap we are storing for other people.
  5. To finally finish the book I am writing about living in Hamburg
  6. A clean shop – Projects, sawdust, bike parts, and garden tools strewn about in a rushed haphazard manner.
  7. For my neighbor’s pine tree to die – I have cleaned my gutters three times in 2011 and they are full AGAIN. I have serious hate for that tree.
  8. Peace in the Middle East – I am throwing that on in because I, like the rest of humanity, really DO want it and because I am feeling like the rest of the list is all about me and flirts with self-absorbed douchebaggery.

Bus ride home with Grammy Lector

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Stamps-With-Foot had an appointment today and I rode the bus home from work. Riding the bus in Seattle is never dull. For part of my ride home I sat next to a grandmotherly looking lady with a blond/gray bun on top of her head, wearing a sweater with cats faces on it, and she was alternately reading: Wine and Cheese : The Essential Reference and The Encyclopedia of Serial Killers. I kinda wanted to ask her why one would be reading such dissimilar books on the ride home, but I kept thinking about how she might want eat my liver with some fava beans and a nice chianti. No, really….

When I got some Stamps-With-Foot was waiting for me with a glass of the wine pictured below. There are days when I do consider that I am in a Twilight Zone episode, looking for the gremlin on the wing.

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A bowl and a mallet

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I few weekends ago I spent some hours hunched infront of the lathe just playing with shapes and chisels.  I came away with a much needed maple carving mallet and a large elm bowl for Stamps-With-Foot.  She was all smiles when I presented it to her and turned it in every direction to see all the detail.  There was some kissing.  The mallet is now in my shop and I have used it for some clean-up chiseling on some trim and the bowl is sitting on our kitchen table filled with fruit and the first roses clipped from our bushes this year.

I find that if I spend a whole day in my shop and come out out with a little something that either makes the wife’s day easier or something that she has requested fixed I can get away with walking into the house covered in wood chips and sawdust.  A hour or so of labor is a fine trade for 8+ hours of shop-time were I am not penilized for not mopping the kitchen floor, washing dishes, or cleaning the toliet.

Spring in Belfast, Northern Ireland

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One of the reasons my J-O-B pays me the medium bucks is because I will travel anywhere in the world with little to zero notice.  I again proved that last week when, with two hours notice, I hopped on a plane from Seattle to Northern Ireland two days before the Memorial Day weekend.  Stamps-With-Foot was none too happy.  I bought her shiny objects while there to quell the violence in her heart.  Man, she really likes shinny stuff because I haven’t heard one more cross word from her about my trip and I am starting to wonder if she relishes when I travel so that she can display annoyance and mock anger to receive sparkly bobbles and guilt-heavy jewelry.

Some rough initial, unedited opinions of Belfast:

  1. Strong northern winds blowing when I arrived brought in the smell of cattle and pastures – the sweet decay of manure and decomposing grass.
  2. Road right-of-way here is on the left side of the road.  This makes me a hazard to curbs, rental cars and living beings.  I also noticed after repeatedly walking against the flow of foot traffic on the street that people here walk on the left of sidewalk and escalators are left-flow as well.  It’s the little things one notices.
  3. There exists a weird pocket version of adolescence rebellion Northern Ireland: lily-white 12-18 year old boys who are overly groomed, cell phone to ear with hip-hop blaring, trying to look tough – Impossible when one is wearing his collar popped and has his feet shod in white leather slip-ons.
  4. I went on a hop-on hop-off city tour that included drives down the Falls Road and Shankill Road areas of town were 40’ high barriers, blast walls, bullet scarred bricks, and where victims’ and martyrs’ murals take up the entire sides of buildings and.  There is not an inch of street in those neighborhoods that doesn’t hold some palpable sad memory for some.  It was spooky and sad and made me say a prayer of thanks for my lower-middle class childhood.  Growing up in Belfast during The Troubles, in a constant state of fear and vengeance would have probably led me to a very angry and short life.
  5. This land is a sea of red hair. Most of it real, some from a bottle, one 20-something lass walked into view with natural ginger roots and pink/red tips. An Asian teen and a black girl with red dos also strolled by my people-watching perch – Were they red-headed just to blend…?
  6. I happened to stop in at a mass at St. Mary’s (walked out of Kelly’s Bar and there was a church, what do you do?) and police had to be called because of drunk/high/ crazy lady (maybe she was all three) interrupted mass and tried to take over the microphone at the pulpit.  – High drama.
  7. Traveling without my wife is lonely and sucky.  The sharing of things and people seen, food eaten, and the smell of the flower and grocery markets is a thing not to be trivialized.
  8. Every third word I here is “fock” or “focking.”  Spoken with gusto by men, women, teens and kids (one lad with spiky hair, maybe ten, at an international food market said today: “Ah fock this ma, I wanta go home”). It seems that the Northern Irish have such a great affinity for this word and use it as much as possible in an apparent attempt to claim it as their own.
  9. I went to Madden’s Bar to drink a pint and listen to the advertised Irish trad music. Walked in for the last 30 minutes of the Champions League final between FC Barcelona and Manchester United. As I sat down, Barcelona scored (final was 3-1 Barcelona) and the crowd cheered.  Apparently, I was in a Nationalist/Republican Pub…  I kept my United love to my focking self and drank my focking Guinness as focking quietly as focking possible. Music was great though.
  10. For some reason biking in Belfast is not wide spread. It can’t be due to a northern Irish aversion to 2 wheels:  I arrived on a Thursday afternoon and the roadways between villages were packed with road bikers all kitted up in multi-colored spandex.  Really, hundreds of them, but in the city it seems like almost no one rides.  I went out walking on a mostly sunny afternoon in the central part of downtown and saw maybe 15 people riding all day.  There was only one fixed speed wonder and only 1 guy on a trials bike (Danny MacAskill fan I would bet) out hopping on to park benches, walls, and planters.  It is not the weather – London and Hamburg are full of bikes. The Belfast streets are broad and flat.  It must be something left over from The Troubles, I don’t know and didn’t get a chance to ask.
  11. As discovered when Stamps-With-Foot and I were in Dublin – Guinness is better in Ireland!








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Bike to work month… big belly… left in the dust by old guy…

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May is bike to work month and I need to ride. As I have neglected my many two wheeled lovelies this spring in my quest to become hugely fat, I decided it was time that I get back in the saddle, shed some pounds, and get into fighting shape. My first outing was somewhat painful and more than a little ego smashing. I drove into work the first sunny morning of the month and cut out 20 minutes early to take advantage of the not-rainy weather. This winter and spring have been cold, wet, crappy, and gray and I am so white that my skin is almost translucent.

I rode my CycloX bike at what I believed was a nice little let’s-get-reacquainted clip. The sun was warm, the sky blue, little wind, I was soaking up vitamin D, and WHOOSH! – an ass on a blue bike darted past me without a word and cleared my bars by a couple inches. Son of a… Poor form, poor form… Times past, I would have chased him down, stuck on his wheel and punished him with a nasty big-ring pace till he fell off, ashamed of his transgression and performance.  However, my cookie handles precluded me for doling out lessons in cycling etiquette right then. Let’s just say that I got passed a bunch.  Once, that lovely afternoon, by a 70+ year old man on a ’80s steel frame, who said “Look out, son!” as he rolled by on my left.  Really, he said that.

I would like to tell you that I got stronger as the month wore on, but traveling for work, a painful case of costochondritis, and my own laziness conspired against me.  I rode home three more times in May, averaging once a week and did ZERO weekend rides.  I am more than a little ashamed to own as many bikes as I do and not treat them with the respect they deserve.  June and July are going to be different.  I am going to commute an average of twice a week (when I am home instead of in Belfast – long story) and I am going to do one weekend ride a week.  In fact, next weekend I am going to take my lovely bride on a tandam bike ride/pincnic on either the Burke/Gillman or the Cedar River trail

On a brighter note, ridership at my work has increased 33% from last May to this: we have 3 people out of 700 that now ride to work occasionally instead of just two…

Bad Luck or Karma Boomerang?

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When you open up your travel toiletries kit and you find that your toothbrush is broken in half after 20+ hours of flight-time and after arriving at your hotel just as all the local shops close, you have two choices:  Use the nub or go to bed with fuzzy teeth.  I chose the former and as I made a mess of things, I couldn’t help think that I must have set my karma on fire at some point in my recent travels in order to deserve the splotch of toothpaste that somehow landed in my right eye.  Did one of the ferns I took out of the yard have a Secret of NIMH expansion colony under it?  Did I cause a bride-to-be in transit to miss her wedding by taking a specific parking spot?  Was the taxi I took from the airport destined for more worthy/needy passengers?  Did I drink the last beer in the last keg of Guinness at a pub on St. Paddy’s Day and did violence ensue? 

opps…

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I apparently am a blog-tard…  I recently accidently turned off all comments for like a month and had no clue and a couple of days ago I mistakenly published a draft that had incomplete sentences, more misspelled words than usual, no pictures, and a run-on cycling related rant that I digressed into.  I am officially grounding myself from posting for a week.

The most awesomest desk ever!!!!!!!

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The wife and I have desk issues:  Not problems with sharing, it that we own too damn many.  I have a 1950s copy of a 1790s Federal secretary, we use an Art Nouveau drop front secretary as a liquor cabinet, her sewing desk is a ’80’s maple laminate, there is an 7X3′ drafting desk in the basement, I am currently refinishing a solid oak university desk for her office and we pay the bills on a Duncan Phyfe drop-leaf.  We need another desk in the house like John Hinkley, Jr. needs an assault rifle…

For Stamps-With-Foot’s birthday, we went and perused jewelry stores, had lunch and coffee down town, window shopped for a new Persian carpet, and eventually wandering into our favorite antique market…  Damn!  I bought another desk.  In my defense though, this is the most awsomest desk ever!!  No, really.  It is a solid wood 1960 build of a Norwegian/English/Swedish cabinet desk – a modern interpretation of a Moore or Wooten folding wing desk.  It unfolds and slides like a fvcking Optimus Prime Transformer!  The minute I saw it, I felt all funny in my lower abdominal region…

Now, to get my little bride to agree to this purchase, I had to promis to sell the Federalist secretary and a 5-drawer quarter-sawn oak dresser, but it was SOOO worth it.  Additionally when I went back a couple of days later to pick up the desk, I also brought home an additional 2’ section of library card catalog.  The wife was not as pleased with that surprise…

Sorry, the pictures were snapped with my cell at the shop and do not do this beauty any justice at all.

Fresh cut grass makes me tingle in the lower abdominal region…

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After 100+ days of rain, spring is finally here.  I only really know that because my lapin cherry tree and the ornamentals on the block are in full blossom.  Hopefully, all the hard work done in the rain and mud till now is about to start paying off.

Prep has been the theme for the past few months.  I spent some quality time killing yard moss, reseeding in the front and back yards, adding weed and feed, conducting property-wide dandelion genocide, planting 70+ bulbs, and getting the soil in the garden bed ready for the tomatoes, carrots, onions and garlic.  In addition to finishing the raised beds and converting the cat litter-filled pond into a flower planter for my wife, I have cut all the trash trees, vines, and blackberries from my south fence.  My neighbor on that side keeps his home and yard in the Miss Havisham fashion.  I have taken three loads of branches/leaves/vines to the dump and I can now see from one end of our property to the other.  So far this year his pine tree has delivered three 5-gallon buckets worth of pinecones in my front yard and I have had to clean my gutters three times.  I have a sneaking suspicion that the particular pine tree in question is not long for this world…  There is a holly tree of some relation that is not looking all that well either...

I finally got a great espalier apple tree in the ground, two columnar apples to flank it, and an additional cherry (a glacier) up front.  There is now a fig for Laurel, a dwarf Helena apricot from Dave&Sarah, a Satsuma, and an Improved Meyer lemon – all in containers so we can hot-house them this winter.  For the side yard, there are two huckleberries in bloom – ready to plant.  The last rose bush (a J&P Radiant Perfume) has been planted on the back fence and irrigation lines have been run to the roses, garden boxes, raspberries, and fruit trees.

The Apricot and citrus trees will stay in containers so that I can

move them into a hot-house when the temperature drop in the fall.

The multiple weird cold snaps this year have been decidedly unhealthy for my strawberry pots, but the kitchen herbs planted last spring are doing well.  The orange-mint has taken over a rectangular container and the rosemary is starting to bloom tiny baby-blue flowers.  The two sunshine blueberries in pots are covered in small white blossoms and the grass in front and back is thick, healthy, and Ireland green – I can’t wait to string up the hammock and snooze gently swinging above my lawn.  Although I still have dandelion farms on either side there have been very few that have dared to peak up in the grand lawn of Le Maison Du Talley this year.  Their appearance has been followed with swift and forceful retribution.  Speaking of the weed farms adjacent to me: It seems that someone sprayed them in the middle of the night with Scott’s liquid death.  Now all the yellow-orange flowers that they were cultivating seem to be shriveling up. I think it was the gnomes. -I have a couple of English garden gnomes that are leftist lawn militants.  The local dogs give our place a wide berth – narry a singe poop on the parking strip this year and there is a racoon living over at Miss Havisham’s and they are preparing to hunt safari-style…

The second of three loads of branches taken to the dump in the last month.  My neighbor loves me so much that he shares his trees and yard waste with me…

I am slowly being replaced.

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I have mentioned previously that my relationship with my wife is a Polaroid of happy modern love, with a side order of belligerent puppy.  Her dog REALLY wants to be alpha-male in our house !  He wants prime the snuggling position when TV watching.  If I get up off the couch or chair, he is immediately in my spot.  Brodie tries his dead-level best to sleep between the wife and me – sneaking into the blocking position in the middle of the night.  I ofter wake up to jowles and puppy breath sharing the pillow with me.  If we have to leave him in the car for a minute while we run in somewhere, he waits for us in the driver’s seat.  My bathrobe is now his bathrobe, etc…

So night before last, I got up to pee and got caught up for like 30 minutes writing a work e-mail on my iPhone.  I came back to bed and I found that not only does Brodie share a love for firm pillows, my side of the bed, high thread-count cotton sheets, and cute girls, he apparently also has a deep affection for presidential biographies…

That dog has some sort of diabolical plan formulating between those big ears…  I feel that he is trying to slowly replace me – you know, like some morning he will dig a deep hole out back, help me into it, and trot back into the house to have his morning coffee, read the news, and get ready for a hard days work, all  without Stamps-With-Foot ever knowing the difference…

My kitchen knife-rack is cooler than yours!

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We were given some really nice kitchen knives for our wedding – REALLY NICE.  I take pride in the fact that we never have dull kitchen cutlery and when my chef father-in-law comes for visits, he always remarks on the usability of our chef’s and prep knives.  Those were just Target specials that were leftovers and cast-offs from my parents and friends.  I was fine with them banging around in drawers and odd knife blocks.  Well, the new Globals, were above a shabby knife drawer and required a case that befitted there quality and beauty.

As part of the kitchen remodel, I am adding little touches that make cooking in our kitchen as easy and pleasurable as possible.  I decided to add a custom wall-mounted knife holder that would both protect the generous gift and make them immediately ready to use. 

Knives need a good hard wood to protect them (hardwood retain less mosture) and the harder the wood, the longer it will last through the years of little nicks and jabs as knives are withdrawn and put away.  I had some reclaimed maple flooring sections that came out of a local school gym that were just the right width and were bone-dry.  I went out to the table saw and cut 10 kerfs from ½” to 2 ½”.  I then glued and clamped two pieces together and let them sit for a day.  After the glue was fully cured, I cut off the original flooring grooves, drilled mounting holes, sanded it with 220 grit, and mounted it in the kitchen.  Dowels were installed over the screws in the mounting holes to make the installation seamless.  I taped off the wall and the contact strip where the knives would enter/exit and painted the rack and painted the rest a gloss white to match the eventual color of the cabinets.  One added benefit is that our Globals show very nicely in their new rack!  I am working on replacing the 9” crap chef’s knife with a Global sashimi blade and a 9″ bread knife.  Both the whe wife and father-in-law approve.

Evil on the inside

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My dear friend Rosy is currently feeling the sting of retribution.  It is his own fault and really more the result karma then anything I might have done.  I HATE snakes and he thought it would be giggly funny to send me an e-mail with an embedded surprise snake video – it may have made me fling my iPhone and pee myself…  Unhappy does not cover my reaction.  Even before his giggling subsided, I began “Project Retaliation.”

Rosy has a beautiful and loving wife, supportive parents, friendly neighbors, and ultra religious in-laws.  I decided to deliver payback through these good people.  The thing about my core group of friends – The Arthritic, Big Belly,  Hillbilly Climbing Assn., is that we are occasionally mean to each other…  There have been forced birthday paddlings, blow-up sheep in restaurants, public ridicule, chain-mails, doctored pictures, co-conspirators, and certain gross misdemeanors committed in the name of good fun, love, and friendly vengeance.  This is shaping up to be one of the latter occurrences.

First, I went online and signed him up on the  Liberation Party website as wanting information and I gave them $10 in his name.  I used his wife’s email address for further contact – she has strong Republican sympathies and the rest of her family are Super-Tea Partiers.  Apparently, Rosy also gave the Tea-Party $10 and clicked every “send me updates and info” button that he could while making that donation…  My friend is now an official Lady GaGa Fan Club member and his picture and details are on one of the Justin Bieber freak/fan sites – they will be sending him periodic (hopefully daily) updates for all things Bieber.  I requested some dirty, dirty, adult toy catalogs for him and sent them to his parent’s address.  Then, a 1-year subscription to OUT! magazines was sent to Rosy via Amazon, but I used his conservative next door neighbor’s address.  Rosy will get a Bear of the Month-mail from now until the end of time and there were also literature requests for everything from hair-loss treatment to laser back hair removal to penile enlargement device specifications.  It really is the small things in life that make us happy.

A couple weeks later I got the text message below from his mom:

One might be tempted to think that I over reacted.  One would be wrong.  Rosy once contemplated releasing a live adult bison into my apartment because I teased him about his mom being hot and me having prior physical relations with her (I didn’t) – he actually looked at the logistics of getting the thing trailered in, really.  Rosy doesn’t have a stop or pause button – you have to decimate him to make it stop.  He fired the first shot in this little war and I had to retaliate with immediate and decisive force or there would have been more snake videos and pictures.  He will attempt some sort of well thought out retribution and I will then have to use the nuclear option: his turbo-religious in-laws.  Stay tuned…