Adventures In Bits and Bobs
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In no particular order:
Home Decorating (how not to), Part 1:
When I was fairly young (pre-teen, I think), my mother decided that our main bathroom needed wallpaper. She chose a very 70s color scheme (oranges and avocado greens and such) and a very long repeat pattern. This meant that there would be a good bit of wallpaper wasted with each sheet applied, as it took a couple feet to match up the pattern. We were not wealthy, so my mother carefully calculated how much we needed to buy, with no margin for error.
I was largely oblivious to the whole situation until the day of wallpaper application was at hand. On that day, my beloved father, in an act of rank cowardice, fled the house, taking my two young brothers with him. Fine example he was setting for them. Disgraceful. This left me to help my mother. By “help,” I of course meant standing by to “hold that in place” or “carry this” or “hand me that” or whatever.
Back then, wallpaper did not come with glue on the back. You had to cut the piece you needed, and then roll the entire piece through some glue in a tray, which of course left glue on both sides. Very messy. My mother was working carefully and competently, but was clearly still a little stressed out by the whole situation. This meant that I was also stressed out in sympathy. But any sympathy I might have felt ebbed away bit by bit as my mother barked orders and made an increasingly large mess of paper and glue.
She was doing okay, though. Mess aside, the paper was being applied and was sticking in its proper place. Toward the end, we were trying to paper the half wall above the sink and counter area. The vast amount of extra paper (required to match the pattern) was dragging over the counter and not cooperating in its placement. So my mother grabbed some scissors and whacked off the excess at the bottom of the strip she was applying. And not only the excess…about two ragged inches above the counter, leaving an un-papered strip of white paint showing.
There was a moment of silence. It was rather like when a baby screws up its face and opens its mouth, preparing for an epic scream…you know, the moment of silence where the baby is still winding up for release, so to speak. In that moment of silence, I discovered that I have an unfortunate penchant for nervous giggling in moments of extreme stress. This was also news to my mother, who gave me a look which should have struck me dead. I tried to explain that, no, of course I didn’t think this was funny but that I just couldn’t quit laughing.
And my heroic mother pulled herself together and patched the missing section of wallpaper with some of the excess bits from other strips. It was astonishing. I still don’t know how she did it but she matched that complicated pattern and glued it down so effectively that afterward, even knowing where the patch was, I couldn’t see it. My mother is amazing.
Okay, so what did I learn about home decorating from this fiasco event? I learned never to try to put wallpaper on my walls. And I haven’t.
Translations:
A translation of a dispute between a married couple, as told by the husband:
“We discovered we were not in accord on the matter.”
They hold diametrically opposing positions on the matter.
“We had a frank and open exchange of ideas.”
There was a lot of shouting.
“And then we agreed to compromise.”
They agreed to do what the wife wants, because that’s what they always do.
My father, in an attempt to encourage me:
“Persistence always wins.”
Nag until they give you what you want so you’ll shut up about it.
In any conversation:
“With all due respect…”
The speaker is about to say something quite disrespectful.
“No offense, but…”
The speaker is about to say something very offensive.
When a southerner ends a sentence with “Bless his/her heart…”
I know I just said something really mean or rude but you can’t hold it against me because I used the magic phrase.
Border security:
When I was in my teens, my parents drove the family into Canada to meet and visit with some extended family (second cousins or something). This was the first time I’d left the US and crossed a border, so it was all very exciting. As we got up to the head of the line and the border patrol officer came to speak to my father at the driver’s window, they asked a series of questions. “Do you have any fruit?” We had to surrender our snacking apples. “Do you have any weapons?” My mother had persuaded my father to leave the guns at home, so he didn’t lose any of them. But by “weapons,” they also meant things like chemical mace, and we did have a really old little can of that in the glove box of the car.
I doubt they’d have searched our car, but my mother is a pretty honest person and immediately handed the can of mace over. The officer took it, wrote a receipt for us, handed us the receipt, and waved us on our way. My mother read the receipt and started laughing. It said:
“One can of mace, surrendered to the crown.”
She kept the receipt for ages, just to occasionally take it out and laugh about it.
Home Decorating (how not to), Part 2:
When I was in my teens, my mother got a notion in her head that she wanted to clad the front of our house (which had standard siding on it) in bricks. She imagined a sort of wainscoting arrangement, where only about two feet at the bottom would be brick, with the house siding rising above it.
So my dad cleared out the siding in the proposed area, leaving a flat surface for my mother to practice her artistry. And my mother bought enough brick tiles (made like tiles, flat but with rippled surface on the backside for the mortar to grip) and mortar for the project. Using kitchen implements to manage the mortar, she started building her brick cladding, but almost immediately discovered that the bricks (other than the first layer) did not want to stay put on the vertical surface, even with the encouragement of mortar. I’m not sure if she was using the wrong kind of mortar or her application technique was flawed or what, but bricks started sliding all over the place and occasionally just falling off.
It was at this point that my brothers and I were made aware of the project, as my mother hollered (in a voice that could be heard in Scotland) for us to present ourselves immediately and render assistance. The “assistance” took the form of us holding the bricks in place with our hands, shoulders, knees, and (eventually) feet. I was hoping that my mother would stop placing bricks while we kids were playing twister, trying to hold them on the wall, but no…she kept placing them and barking at us each time a brick slipped and we weren’t quick enough to hold it.
It was quite ridiculous…but it worked. And the front of the house really did look quite a lot nicer with the addition of a couple feet of bricks. Well, brick tiles.
What did I learn from this? Never—and I mean never—mess around with tiles, mortar, or bricks, on any surface, horizontal or vertical or anything in between. And I haven’t.
Hiccup remedies:
Yes, I know one that actually works about 90% of the time. It’s that old one, where you drink water upside down. Now, before you poo-poo this valuable information, I wish to point out that it’s only the swallowing part that you have to do while upside down. The part where you try to drink out of a glass of water upside down and end up pouring water up your nose is, as far as I can tell, only for the amusement of the witnesses. But the act of carefully swallowing a mouthful of water while you’re bent completely over (so, gravity works against you instead of with you) does something soothing to the diaphragm and usually stops the hiccups. It may take a couple swallows, but it’s worth a try.
Beautiful nails:
For many years now, I’ve gotten a pedicure once a month. This means that I don’t have to cut my own toenails (which I hate doing) and also that I’ll have a pretty color of polish to admire. But I’ve never bothered with polish on my fingernails because I use my hands in such a way that a manicure never lasts more than a day at most.
But recently, I discovered the company Color Street. The idea is that a base coat, a color coat, and a top coat are all layered together and dried (cured) about 95% of the way. Then they are cut into little nail-shaped strips, and packaged up for the consumer. When you get the little strips out of the packaging, you remove the protective layers, and lay a strip over your nail. The strip has just enough stickiness left to adhere to a very clean nail, and you smooth it down and then take off the excess. You need to then not use your hands for 15-30 minutes because the polish still needs to finish curing, like any nail polish would.
After that, I add a clear top coat (I like OPI) and let it cure for another 15-30 minutes. Then I’m good to go! And these polish strips are lasting beautifully for 7-10 days. I admit, I do add another layer of top coat after about 5 days, just to help the polish endure a little longer. But the final effect is quite beautiful and I’m finding that my nails aren’t breaking or splitting because the layers of polish add strength and keep everything intact. It didn’t occur to me until recently that I should be taking pictures of these lovely nail treatments, so I only have a couple.
There are many YouTube videos on applying and customizing and removing the Color Street nail strips. I like this one for the application and this one on how to effectively remove the polish. I liked her hints so much that I actually bought a soft rubber cuticle pusher, nail clips, and the polish remover that she recommended. I’m happy to report that they all work beautifully. And I’m still using my DeLore nail oil every day, which is doing wonders for my nails.
One note about Color Street: it’s a multi-level marketing setup, which means that if you buy from them, at the checkout point, you’ll be asked to pick a “stylist,” which will be the person who gets the commission on your purchase. If you don’t have one, the company will let you pick anyone you want and can recommend one in your area. But if you do buy from the company, let me encourage you to give your business to my stylist, Heather Musser.
