What Recession? More Redecorating...

Hola darlings! I was out and about shopping today. The streets were loaded with traffic and the two places I went to - Menard's (a locally-owned home improvement center) and Kohls (mid-price department store) - were packed with shoppers. You would not know there is a severe recession going on in the country by the number of people who were in those two stores. The checkout lines were busy. Perhaps there is a psychological component to my shopping sprees and urge to redo the house over the last few months, aside from the fact that the house will be 19 years old this August and other than the powder room downstairs which I repainted in 2003, very few things have changed since 1990. You know, spending in the face of all the bad things going on around me, pretending that everything is just fine, doing the classic shop and feel better (most women will understand this feeling). I don't know, and frankly, I don't know if it's important that I do know. I'm not spending a fortune (a good thing) and with such good bargains available these days, why not get what I want? To finally get this house looking just the way I've always wanted it to look, but was too cheap (or too busy with other things) to do before? Hell, I'm going for it. Maybe that means I'll have crown mouldings put up in every room!!! I was looking for area rugs for the New York (guest) bedroom and my room and a new light fixture for the upstairs bath. Yes, I have decided to redo the upstairs bathroom so that it is somewhat more color-coordinated with the New York room and my room and soon to be revamped pink bedroom. I found a perfect cream/black toile shower curtain on sale online, and had a certain style of light fixture in mind. I found one I liked today on sale at Menards, the price was right! I took the opportunity to pick up a drywall patch kit to patch the hole in my ceiling downstairs left by the plumber, and some painting supplies in preparation for when dondelion paints the pink room during his May visit. I looked at rugs at Menards but found nothing I liked (or even did not like) in my price range. Next it was on to Kohls, where I found one rug for the New York room on sale for 50% off, a cushion for my desk chair downstairs discounted 40%, and some new towels for the anticipated bath revamp at 50% off. I already have the perfect paint and my lovely black still life will finally have a new home - above the large towel rack. Now I must locate and retain a reasonably priced electrician to take down the old fixture and install the new one. Tomorrow after our investment club meeting I will take down the wallpaper border in the bath and give the walls a good scrub. I would like to install a new floor covering in the bath - I am leaning toward trying the job myself with peel and stick vinyl tile. In 1986 when I bought my first house I successfully laid a black and white vinyl tile floor in the kitchen, after studying the method in my Readers Digest manual of home improvements and repairs :) So, I am no stranger on the method to calculate the layout so all squares end up evenly spaced around the perimeter. The bathroom presents more challenges. First, there are no "hidden" corners so if I make a mistake in my layout calculations, it will be there for all to see; secondly, I need to take up the existing cheap vinyl flooring because it has shrunk away from the walls in two areas and a bubble has formed in one spot underneath the linen cabinet. I have nightmares of endless glue and months of scraping and sanding to try and get a smooth surface - not to mention working around and under the toilet! Yikes! But today while I was showing my sister around the improvements upstairs and explaining the changes I wanted to make in the bath, I tested a corner of the vinyl that has shrunk away from the wall by the vanity and lo and behold, it lifted up quite easily. I was able to pull it up a couple of feet and looked at the subfloor beneath. It appears as though whatever daubs of glue were once anchoring the floor have long-since dried up - at least in front of the vanity. However, there is no assurance it would be that easily removed from the remainder of the room. I would also have to buy or borrow the proper tools to remove the quarter-round trim (I do not want to break it if at all possible) around the perimeter of the room and figure out how to remove the metal divider between the carpet in the hall and the vinyl in the bath. Maybe it's a really easy thing, but it looks intimating to moi! And the toilet remains a problem. I sure ain't gonna attempt to shut off the water, unscrew and unseat the toilet myself just to lay vinyl tile around it. Plus I'd have to stuff the hole with rags so no sewer gas would escape (gag). This is not something I'm willing to undertake after the plumber went to such pains to shim the toilet so it is steady and firm and replaced the worn-out wax ring that had caused the leak in the downstairs ceiling which I now have to patch (that should be an adventure)... So... I think I need a nap. By the way, that photo above of the beautiful bedroom is from a blog, Bargain Hunting with Laurie (a woman after my own heart). It's HER bedroom, and it's gorgeous. And it's the color scheme I'm using in my bath. My walls will be a very similar color, just a wee bit lighter because there are no windows in my bath and I don't want it to be overwhelmingly darkish, also more tan/taupe and less mustard - but the color saturation is spot on. I have a dark cherry vanity with white (just a hint of cream) laminate top and dark cherry linen cabinet with similarly stained woodwork, comparable to Laurie's dark-stained furnishings. The cream and black toile shower curtain (en route from the merchant) and the black towels I purchased today will add just the right touch of sophistication. My current area rugs in the bath will remain - they are very neutral tan/taupe and in good shape. The vaguely French style of the new light fixture, which has a "waxed bronze" finish and three alabaster bell-shaped shades, will be the perfect compliment to the color scheme. Even without a new floor or "waxed bronze" finished towel holders (my shiny brass ones purchased 19 years ago when the house was built are still in near perfect condition and I just cannot justify the expense of replacing them), the room will be transformed. The floor I would eventually like to install in place of the sad, cheap cream and grey tile-pattern sheet vinyl I currently have will be a black and gold/tan marble look vinyl. Ahhhh, perfection. Future wish list includes replacing the large sheet mirror with a smaller framed mirror centered above the sink, light sconces added on either side, and possibly stencilling a suitable design around the ceiling perimeter, if I can fix upon the right color and design! New bath rugs and towel rods.

Friday Night Miscellany

Hola Darlings!

Whew - what a week. The election is FINALLY over with, Thank Goddess! we're free of those horrid lying, sleezy political advertisements (both sides, but especially on the Republican side, unfortunately) for the next 2 years, I hope!

Speaking of sad, check this out. The Governor's Feelings Are Hurt. Boo Hoo. Lady, it hurts my feelings that you are so far right Hitler would feel uncomfortably LIBERAL next to you. Er, shouldn't those balloons be red (photo above)? But maybe the Alaskans who decorated Sarah Palin's governor office think red means "Communist" - or possibly, "Socialist" and so they didn't want to use the Republicans' TRUE COLOR. I mean, darlings, what could possibly be more Socialist or even outright COMMY RED than spending a trillion dollars and more of taxpayer money to bail out Wall Street and the rich sons of bitches who pitched this country headlong into probably the worst "recession" (it's actually going to be a Depression, as in Great Depression) in living memory. This COMMUNISM under the Bushites. Make no mistake, the Bushites' motto is SCREW THE MIDDLE CLASS INTO NON-EXISTENCE, and isn't that exactly what the Communist goal was? Of course! So, we have Socialist/Communism for the rich bastards, and everyone else is screwed. It will take at least eight years, and quite possibly the rest of my life, to recover from the incredible destruction that the Bushites have wrought upon this country. The Bushites, starting with Carl Rove and the Vice-President, should be taken out and shot as traitors to this country. All current descendants of George Bush, Sr. should be sterilized so they can no longer reproduce and pass along their defective genes to another generation. Of course, we're civilized, so we won't do that. Sometimes -- if we could only be just a little bit more "Russian" as in Putin-Russian, the evil smut, where "enemies" of the state get poisoned or shoved down stairwells or out of a window from the 29th floor in a building somewhere. Oh well. In a neat trick of reversal, which the Bushites are very good at, one can only hope that someone will do the world a favor and shove Miniputin down a bottomless pit - with a stake through his heart.

I'll be working probably until I drop dead around age 100 to make up for the money my 401(k) plans have lost since October, 2007 when the Great Bear Market began, just to try and maintain my current standard of living (such as it is). Food prices up 30 to 40%; natural gas prices up 40%; electric bill up 30%; water bill up 35%; sewer bill up 20%. Just in the past 12 months. Who knows what the hell my property taxes will be? One thing I know for sure - they will not GO DOWN! Health insurance coverage costs for 2009 - up 90%. That's not a mistake. My monthly premiums are increasing from around $61 a month to $110 a month if I want to maintain the same coverage (I won't be able to do that - I cannot afford it). My raise - I won't know until early January, 2009, but suffice to say it won't be anywhere NEAR the cost of living increase during the past 12 months. Let's see, I'll probably lose about 32% total purchasing power - but I should count myself lucky, because I still (may) have a job. Silly me - what am I thinking. There probably won't be a raise. In 2009, they may even ask me for money back - well, those first years who are earning $150,000 must be fed, and I do have to lose more weight...

Things are so bad, even the state of Wisconsin is telling their very well-pensioned retirees that their checks will be smaller this year. The screams of rage are still echoing around the hills and valleys. I suppose I shouldn't wish that some of those retired hunters and members of the NRA would go "bear hunting" on Wall Street. Perhaps all MBA degrees should be banned in this country. Think of it - people with common sense and everyone's interests at heart actually running things in the banks and financial industry if all of the pricks and greedy Gordon Gekko wannabes were wiped out. Hell, even if we killed every single one of the sods tomorrow, their claims for deferred compensation and company-paid life-insurance would probably bankrupt the country. Expect full employment for lawyers for the next 500 years, but a vicious cycle of declining beginning wages for first years who may actually have to WORK 60 hours a week in order to earn their $150,000. Oh oh, they may even have to do their own typing, copying, mailing, filing, scanning, archiving, taking abuse from irate clients. I may be out of a job soon - growing vegetables in my upstairs bedrooms under green lights until the power is cut off, chopping down my trees for firewood to keep warm in the winter, luring my currently fat and sassy squirrels into traps for meat. Thank heaven the Family has lots of land up north. We can hold out up there for years, I'll just have to get used to using an outhouse while holding my nose. dondelion and I may be relocating sooner than we thought...

The President of Italy is being hoisted, roasted, and everywhichway toasted over a big fat Italian fire for a joke that is silly, juvenile and absolutely inane, but harmless. So Barack Obama has a "suntan" - so what? How can this be an insult in the United States where every day on the bus and in populars videos and music I hear dark-skinned kids and pale-skinned Polish descended kids calling each other NIGGAH. So now sudddenly the WORLD is getting sensitive about noticing the color of someone's skin? Hey, music video and record producers, better sit up and take notice, darlings. There's a new world dawning where words really DO mean something, so get rid of the racist crap. Yeah, right.

Times are tought all over. Even the plastic surgeons - oh, excuse me - costmetic artistes - are offering discounts to keep their pockets flush during this economic catastrophe some pundits are euphemistically calling a "downturn."

The first "measureable" ice/sleet/snow is expected here tonight. The house is exactly the same temperature it is at all times throughout the five month heating season (64 degrees F), but it feels COLD! I'm going to do a Mr. Cratchet (Bob Cratchet from "Scrooge") and light a candle at my computer desk to warm my hands over! Hopefully I'll acclimate as the temperatures continue to drop and the snow begins to pile up. But every year it gets harder. Retirement, which used to be 10 years away before the geniuses on Wall Street decided to do their best Stalin imitation of wiping out all and asking questions never, is now an impossible dream. Good bye, warm, dry, climate - the dream that never was... Hmmm, what was the name of that Jodi Foster movie where she learns how to shoot and fight dirty in order to get revenge on the assholes who killed the love of her life? I think I need to watch that movie, and sign up for some lessons... I have LOTS OF REVENGE I want to work out.

Good night darlings, if you can.