LOVE:

Pocket Doors:

I am beyond obsessed with pocket doors. In fact, I think they might well be my favorite thing a person can do to their home. Why have a boring old swinging door when you can have a door that saves space and disappears into your wall? My grandmother’s bathroom had one, but I don’t recall being obsessed with it. The obsession began two years ago, I think, when I was looking at a house I intended to buy. It was later stolen from me with a ridiculous lowball offer that nobody was expecting and the house is now filled with a young couple who I assume are total bitches. The husband doesn’t offend me, it’s just the artsy wife that lives in my should-be home gloating over it. They’re awful. She even had the audacity to nod at me one day. She did not get a response. Bitch! Anyway, inside that house were three or four massive pocket doors. They were intricate and gorgeous and I loved everything about them and they quickly became my favorite part of the house — that and the massive attic space that was going to be my writing studio, and the entryway that reminded me of Victorian London townhouses, and the unique brick design, and the bay windows, and the trim…hold on, I’m crying. It really ruined me emotionally when I didn’t get the house and I think about it every day. In some way, I can see that it was probably for the best that I didn’t buy it — it would have trapped me in Perry for a while and I don’t need that, though it doesn’t seem like I’m getting anywhere else with my life. Enough misery, though, back to pocket doors. They’re amazing and I am determined to install them all throughout my home. I’m to the point where hinged doors offend me. Why doesn’t my front door slide into the wall? Why don’t I do this? About a year ago, I realized I had to seal off my kitchen to keep the room tidy and detract from dust and things floating in, so I went to West End Salvage (before it was trendy with that horrible show) and bought an antique pocket door. I have no idea how to install it and so it still sits in my living room looking nice propped up on the wall. I probably need to have it professionally done so that I can watch while somebody who knows what they’re doing install it, takes notes, and then do it myself. Pocket doors are the epitome of chic.

Sad Songs:

I think I wrote about this before, but it’s true still and is always becoming truer. I love a good sad ballad. The kind that makes your eyes water and chokes you up a bit. Not Adele, she doesn’t do it for me — her songs aren’t theatrical enough, they’re too real. I want my torch songs to sound as if they’ve been ripped right off of a 1950s Broadway show. Like the song, “I’m Always Chasing Rainbows,” it turns me into a blithering pile of goo.

“I’m always chasing rainbows,

Watching clouds drifting by.

My schemes are just like all my dreams

Ending in the sky.

Some fellows look to find the sunshine,

I always look to find the rain.

Some fellows make a winning sometime,

I never even make a gain.”

That song describes me perfectly. Oh and then there’s “It Might As Well Be Spring:”

I’m as restless as a window in a windstorm,

I’m as jumpy as a puppet on a string.

I’d say that I had Spring Fever,

But I know it isn’t spring.

I am starry-eyed and vaguely discontented,

Like a nightingale without a song to sing.

Oh why should I have Spring Fever,

When it isn’t even spring?

I keep wishing I were somewhere else,

Walking down a strange new street.

Hearing words that I have never heard,

from a man I’ve yet to meet.”

Oh and then tragic love songs are also wonderful, like “I’ll Never Stop Loving You.”

I’ll never stop loving you,

No matter what else I may do.

My love for you will live,

Until time itself is through.

I’ll never stop wanting you,

And when forever is through,

My heart, will beat,

The way it does each time we meet.

I could listen to sad songs all the day long. I probably will.

What Would Ryan Lochte Do?:

People may judge me for it, and what do I care of people’s opinions?, but I absolutely adore reality television. It’s a culture that I was raised with and that I’m passionate about. Each day, I wonder how my life might be portrayed if it were filmed for the screen. I think I’d have a great time because reality — even though real is in the name — is as far from reality as I am from Pluto. I don’t like living in the confines of reality. You know this from my writing and my Facebook and my Twitter and all — I like to elevate my perception of life with a sensible dose of irreverence and and exaggeration. If not, life is far too tedious to talk about. I don’t understand why people see reality television as documentary when it’s simply entertainment based on truth. You get what I’m saying, right? I have loved all these shows starting back with my beloved The Simple Life, then Hey Paula! (DO YOU REMEMBER THAT WONDERFUL DISASTER?), My Life on the D-List, Joan & Melissa, The Golden Sisters, Life with La Toya, Here Comes Honey Boo-Boo, and What Would Ryan Lochte Do? What would he do? He doesn’t know and neither do we, but we watch with delight because we get to live vicariously through him. Do I want to be an Olympic swimmer? Not really. Kidding, I do. But just to see Tom Daley on a regular basis.

Again!

 Hooray! What skill! What talent! I need to learn how to do this.

Even Tom’s hypnotized by his own perfection.

Anway, it fascinates me to watch Ryan’s life unfold and hear the idiotic ramblings that gush out of his mouth. It’s wonderful. You’ve got to watch.

Nakiri Knife:

There is magic in the way a truly sharp knife can glide through the object it’s dividing. Your knives are probably dull and can hardly cut a lemon in two. Go sharpen your knives, reader, you’ll thank me. The other day, whilst wandering around Williams-Sonoma, waiting for the sales associate who likes to flirt with me to offer me a coffee (he did), I saw a green nakiri knife. I had to have it. It’s mine. I adore it. It cuts things as if they aren’t even there. I was chopping up lemons yesterday for what I declared Lemonpalooza and they lemons fell into quarters at the sight of my knife. That’s a hyperbole, I think. I made lemon cake and lemon tarts and lemon curd. The only thing I didn’t make was lemon macarons, and that saddens me. I love a good lemon macaron. I really need to get my oven reinstalled! Ugh, domesticity is so complex. Anyway, nakiri knives are a Japanese design that look a lot like cleavers, but are used exclusively for vegetables. #amazeballs Did anybody ever figure out what amazeballs means? Are somebody’s balls super amazing? If so, how could somebody’s testicles apply to everything good and great in the world? I oftentimes struggle with modern English. It makes no sense. Whatevs. #yolo. Buy a nakiri knife, peasant, julienne things, eat vegetables, live for ages.

Paranormal Witness:

I have a weakness for paranormal shows. I love ghosts and everything to do with them. I love ghost hunting with friends and reading about ghosts and researching ghosts and seeing ghosts and watching ghost shows and dreaming of being besties with a ghost who would play the piano for me. True desire, that. I believe in ghosts and think they’re wonderful. Now, paranormal shows, on the other hand, they aren’t so much research based as they are idiots running around screaming their asses off. For people who proclaim themselves to be experts in the field of supernatural studies, they’re a bunch of sissies. I’d never run away from a ghost! What a foolish thing to do. They’re there to study a phenomenon and determine its origins and plausibility, not shriek profanities and wear poorly-fitted shirts with bad font choices emblazoned across them. They’re also generally out of shape. It’s pathetic. So, I can’t stand watching those shows much anymore. They drive me out of my mind. I love the shows that tell stories, though. Last year, I stumbled upon Paranormal Witness and fell in love immediately. It reminded me of the show that I used to adore called A Haunting. I just read that there was a season I never watched. How thrilling! These shows don’t have night vision cameras and cowardly uglies, no, they have real actors recreating “true” stories. It’s delightful for so many reasons. Manly because it’s campy like no other and I adore that. The acting can be so unbelievably bad. But that’s fun. My favorite episodes are the ones where the real “victims” narrate their story. They are almost always hideous, but the actors playing them are like models. All the men have abs and are always awoken in the middle of the night to creep slowly through their house in a pair of lounge pants as the moonlight filters through the wavy glass to lovingly fall upon their muscles. The ladies never have a hair out of place — even after being raped/fondled/molested/touched by evil ghosts — and their clothes are always perfect and they’re always thin. It’s ridiculous and I’m absolutely mad about it! (Mad in the British fashion.) Tune in, reader, laugh with me! And when you aren’t laughing, it’s actually pretty good. It’s well-edited and narrated for the most part and the stories really pull you in. Good stuff.

HATE:

Salad Spinners:

Salad spinners are dumb. I don’t think I’m using them wrong. It would be difficult to go wrong with a salad spinner. You just toss your washed greens in and spin. What else could you do? I thinned the salad garden yesterday and had a big bowl of greens to eat, so I washed them and got out the salad spinner that I forgot I had and spun and spun and spun, but the greens were still quite wet. I don’t get it. Nothing changed. Do you have to wash one leaf at a time? That’s pointless. The spinner is huge and only works properly when there’s a small handful of leaves. It annoys me. I’m annoyed thinking back on it. I’m having a nice salad for dinner, so that makes me feel a bit better, but I’m still pissed about the salad spinner — I think it’s going into my donation pile.

Microwaves Without Room For Popcorn:

There is no reason for microwaves to be built or to exist if they can’t fit a standard sized bag of popcorn. They’re completely pointless if they aren’t going to spin about and then proceed burn my gourmet kernels. This pisses me off on a regular basis. Why must I babysit my popcorn, opening the door two or three times to readjust the bag so that it rotates freely? This is not the convenience I was hoping for. I’m told that people use microwaves for more than popcorn and reheating soup, but this alarms me. Some people get all their meals out of microwaves. Can you imagine?! What a sad life that must be. It’s as if they don’t all have professional ranges in their home. Anyway, microwave manufacturers, make them bigger. I ain’t got time for burnt corn.

Self-Diagnosed Cyclothymia:

[Perfectly written, this!]

For years, I have strongly believed in the so-called Man Period. I suffer it and therefore know it to be true. My research hasn’t really given me any information since it doesn’t technically exist. That doesn’t mean it’s not real, though. Curious about what it could be and how I could save myself the misery, though, I did more and more research and finally think I’ve solved my issue. I believe, and I’m no psychotherapist, but I believe that I have a rather mild case of Cyclothymia. This is a variant of bipolar disorder where the sufferer goes from being quite normal to suddenly quite depressed or the complete opposite and finds themselves to be irrationally euphoric. This is me to a t. What does that mean? Euphemisms confuse the hell out of me. There it goes again — what is the hell in me? Only clear language from now onwards, I think. Anyway, the day school got out I was in a great mood — a normal mood — but then suddenly I was more severely depressed than I ever have been before in my entire life. It went on for hours as I bemoaned all the wasted moments of my life and felt utterly and totally pointless. It was very dramatic. I can’t imagine being depressed constantly, those few hours were too much for me to handle. I also have times where I have nothing but energy, flitting from one thing to the next, being very accomplished, feeling very confident, nothing could possibly go wrong at those times. Both are exhausting. Thankfully, I don’t suffer this very often, the depression aspect maybe twice per month, the euphoric maybe once a week, usually less. The rest of the time I am completely fine, maybe a bit too lazy, but fine. I’m generally quite cheerful and alright, but I realize that I should keep track of these feelings in case I ever go full out bipolar. Sweet Isis, I hope that never happens.

Generic Ovens:

I have been spoiled over the past year by my professional range. It’s a thing of beauty. It took me ages to figure out exactly how to work it, but now that I have, it makes the best macarons and cakes and whatever I put in there comes out beautifully — except for croissants. I can’t figure them bitches out to save my life. Screw croissants! My oven was hooked up in my other house where I did all of my baking in a gorgeous spacious kitchen that I labored over for months. I wallpapered the ceiling, for Krishna’s sake. Do you know how hard it is to wallpaper a ceiling? You can’t handle that knowledge. It’s hellish. But, that house had to be sold and so my oven was moved over to the main house and is sitting…always sitting, waiting for me to finish a section of the kitchen so that it can be installed. I took revenge on the kitchen earlier and removed everything that had offended me over the passed two decades (it didn’t change once in all that time):  the popcorn ceiling, the fan, the wood trim, the carpet, the china cabinet, the table, the curtains. All of that’s gone now. The ceiling is smooth, the fan is now a row of very bright lights, the trim has been touched up and painted, the floor is now covered in a black and white checkerboard pattern that makes the angels weep, the china cabinet was donated or trashed (I don’t care to remember) and replaced with a multitude of quiet (yes furniture can be quiet) and understated cupboards, the table was thrown out in favor of an island and there are no curtains because I hate curtains for the most part. It’s gorgeous, gorgeous, gorgeous! Oh, and I replaced the hideous wallpaper with beadboard, painted the pink paint Sharkey Grey, and painted all the trim black. It’s amazing. People should really pay to come and visit. All that’s left to do is fix up the area around the oven and oh…do something with the old cupboards. Maybe I’ll paint them? Maybe I’ll just whine until somebody buys me the ones I want from IKEA. That seems more likely. Anyway, back to the oven, since my beloved oven is not connected, I’m forced to use the one that’s older than me and I HATE IT. Things don’t come out of it nicely. I want it to go into one of those crushers they have at junkyards and watch it get flattened. I’d love that.

Lady Gaga’s Disappearance:

What happened to my Gaga? Where did she go? We were all singing along and then she got fat, broke her hip, and vanished. It’s bothered me so much lately. I guess she’s rocking a bikini poolside somewhere in Mexico, and I’m glad for that, but come back, Gaga. Bring us more music. Where is Artpop, her upcoming album? I have my theories. We all have theories, but I think mine’s accurate. I know that when I do something day in and day out, I get bored of it so that when I have the opportunity to take a little break, I loathe going back to my old routine. This is probably what happened to Our Lady. She was having a good time singing and singing and singing the same songs and listening to the same rapturous audiences and was thinking, “This is alright, but is my life ever going to change. I’m stuck.” Then she began to eat her feelings and got fat. Well maybe not fat, but plump. She falls down and says, “Hell, this sucks, but I’ve got to perform for my fans!” So she does, but that hip hurts so she’s all, “I’d better go see a doctor. Somebody call Louis Vuitton and get a wheelchair made stat.” The prognosis is worse than she expected and she is forced to take a leave of absence. This is horrid for her, since her work was her life. But, as she recuperated, she realized that she’s incredibly wealthy and has the world ahead of her and it’s nice not to go places all the time and work all the time. It’s nice to sit by a pool in Mexico and drink three…okay…seven margaritas. It’s wondrous to be lazy and now she’s all, “Meh…but I don’t feel like dancing.” She puts the album off and then off again, then pouts at the thought of it, then forces herself to do a little, but finds this to be far too stressful and announces to her entourage, “Screw this, we’re all going to Paris for the weekend to revel in work avoidance.” So they go to Paris and hang out at a hotel for awhile, probably bumping into Bey and Blue and chatting about maybe doing a duet in the future again because they’re both  beloved icons, but don’t put any pressure on each other to get started. Lady Gaga doesn’t even bother putting in her hair bows anymore and takes too much pleasure in reveling in her own interests, but soon the record company will come calling and our Gaga will come back. That’s just my theory. COME BACK, GAGA!