Home 11: The Hallway

It's been a while  since I've lived in a place big enough to have a hallway.  If I were still young, no doubt I would appreciate being able to climb the walls (my favorite thing about hallways when I was a kid).  The seller did some serious damage to it when moving out, so there are some weird dents and gouges that weren't there during the inspection, but it's been repainted a nice clean white to try desperately to make it a little brighter than the cave-like dark grey I think it was before.  For some reason, the hall light, which appears sized for two bulbs to make it nice and bright can only hold one, so it's still pretty dark.

My current favorite thing about the hall is that two different light switches operate that light.  You can turn it on from a switch by the bedrooms or one by the front door.  I don't know why this is so exciting to me, but I was really pleased about it.  Too bad we don't have any idea what that third light switch is supposed to do . . .

Last but not least, the hallway contains the closet formerly known as the Stankwood Closet ™.  More on that in a bit.

Home 10: Guest Bedroom

The title is a bit ambitions.  Right now it's where the odds and ends that have yet to be unpacked and the books that have yet to be sold or donated are squatting.  It has makeshift curtains (required by the Association rules) and some furniture.  I've cleared enough room that the air mattress can fit, and I have sheets and a blanket for it, so I'm ready for visitors.  Some day, I'd like to finish cleaning it up, move everything out, and maybe adopt a teenager (they have the hardest time getting placed in homes when they are up for adoption, and a sadly surprising number of them want a home with just a mom and not a dad).  I can't really do that until my health is better, so I'll be working on that in the coming years, too,  as I try to clean the room up more to make it ready for someone who needs it to add his or her own personality to it.

Home 9: Bedroom closet

Technically, I had a walk-in closet at my last apartment.  You could take at least one step in there, so I suppose it was technically a walk-in.  Sturdy and well-constructed it was not.  The cheap, do-it-yourself quality shelving and hanging rods collapsed more than once.  A walk-in closet was not really a requirement for me when I was house hunting (except when I was looking at 2-bedroom places and thinking I would sleep in the closet instead of wasting a whole room I couldn't put anything in due to allergies [see part 8]).

The "master bedroom walk-in" closet here did not inspire me.  It had all these shelves and things in it that made it too narrow to put any kind of bed, so I was going to have to actually use it for clothes.  The shelving units were somewhat poorly installed with gaps and overlapping bits and wire baskets that kept falling off in ways that made me nervous.  But it was deep, and it had more than adequate space for my clothes.  After one of my friends managed to fix the improperly overlapped bits with only the sacrifice of one ancient Borders-rescue butter knife, I even thought it might have some structural integrity if I didn't challenge it too much.

And nothing (except that wire basket) has collapsed.  Yet.  Win!

There's still some work to do figuring out where to put things currently squatting in the guest bedroom, and I anticipate some donations once everything is in the same place, and I can sort through it all at once ruthlessly.  You know, eventually, when I finally get all the unpacking done.  Maybe by next June in time for the 2nd anniversary?

Providence in winter

here, now, a feeling

of destiny connects us

you, me, this book, yes

Why am I reading an Eldritch horror novel when I don't even like Eldritch horror novels?

Interviewer (I): So, you recently finished inhaling the first 9 Robin Hobb books. 

Me: Yep!  It was finally time!

I: The second book in the new trilogy about Fitz & co. just came out. I bet you really want to read that.

Me: Do I ever!

I: So what are you going to read next?

Me: Oh, I dunno. I started collecting the next chronological books, but I'm buying them on super sale because of budgetary concerns, and, to be honest, I don't really want to read them. It's kind of torture to know there are other Fitz books out there that I haven't read and still be good and read the next non-Fitz series in order even if it makes more sense that way and you get mind-blowingly adorable lines like, "There's nothing wrong with his nose" out of the bargain.

I: You could just, you know, read the new Fitz books.

Me: And be left hanging for a year or more for the conclusion?! I'd forget everything!

I: And have a really good reason to read them all again when the last one comes out.

Me: Point. But I feel like I should read the dang Rain Wild nonsense to catch the nuances I'll miss there if I go much longer without reading them.

I: You say this like it's a problem, but you seem to have two good choices. Why does it feel like you are choosing a third because it's the least good for you?

Me: . . . 

I: Yeah, I'm familiar with your small acts of self-sabotage. Don't do it! Pick one of the good choices and enjoy the heck out of it. It's okay to do that, especially when your health is kind of crappy, and this gives you something to do when you aren't sleeping.

Me: You make a compelling case.

I: Which you are going to totally ignore, of course, because your health problems fog your brain.

Me: I might not!

I: There's a first time for everything, I suppose.

Me: You wound me.

I: Yeah, the truth hurts. So, what are you going to read next?

Me: . . .

I: Sigh.

he was kind of terrible

that she could make me weep
at his death -still- despite all
he did is perhaps a sign of her
great storytelling ability or
maybe just my total exhaustion

Blame the book

I have not been sleeping very well lately.  (It comes and goes with and without the pain.)  I'm not sure if that's why all I've felt like doing lately is lying down somewhere with my legs propped up and reading a book.  It might also be good books making me feel that way.  And summer.  Book book book.  I'll blame the book.  This kind of book is definitely part of why I am not an author.  I would much rather read books like this than even write, and I always have.  Mostly unrepentantly.