A perception of doors - the conundrum

This post should also be titled, my stupid, fucking closet doors, but I'm trying to cut back on my profanity.

Months and months ago I began to plan a new look for the closet doors in our bedroom.
When we moved in last year one of the things at the top of my list of what I hated about the house were these doors. I didn't take a good before picture, but they looked almost exactly like this,











except they had awful dirty-white plastic knobs.


















I felt like I was sleeping in a h/motel everytime I looked at them.





The only solution was Deconstruction. We ripped all the louver-things out first.

















Then I painted them black.











At this point, I began the true "learning experience" phase. I picked out a fabric that I thought would work out well and spent the past two weeks finding the best way to get it to stay on there. In the middle I ran out of fabric and felt like sticking a few of the de-louvered planks through my forehead when I couldn't find more of the same fabric. Luckily, I did.






So here is what they look like now, they're not perfect, but I'm going to let them sit there and grow on me. See, the sad thing is last weekend when I went to Illinois to get more fabric I found all these really awesome fabrics with asian designs and now I have a totally new and improved vision in my mind. Anyway, for now, I'm done.

















Now that they're done, I Really want to paint my room. Yellow sucks.







~Special message for Thisandthat~ I am fully aware that this post does nothing to dispell your belief in my Martha Stewart-like tendencies.

Saint Louis is Number 1! Yay, oh, wait....

Since I've received a few emails from family and friends that are obviously worried about my safety and well-being I decided to comment on the new list that came out. "Most Dangerous Cities"

Firstly,
this list is only taking into account the City of Saint Louis ( I'm sure this is applied to all the other cities too). St. Louis only has a population of about 330K in the city. However, the outlying suburbs rack up 980K, almost a million people! So the study was based on crimes per capita, I don't really see it as quite fair that the city is taking the blame just because almost 2/3 of the population doesn't technically live in the city. Anyone who knows much about the way things are run in St. Louis City vs. St. Louis County knows how screwed up the whole city/county border war is. I'm not going to get too deep into this part.

Secondly,
I live in one of the most dangerous neighborhoods right now. At our meeting last week our Neighborhood Stabilization Officer told us that we were somewhere near 2nd - and that our murder rate has increased 300% percent since last year! Sounds fucking scary, doesn't it? Well, to elaborate, the murder rate was 2 last year and this year we've had 6. So, yeah, 300%. That puts things in perspective. I still walk my dog in my neighborhood and have yet to get shot.

And,
that is what truly makes this whole report akin to public defamation in what to me is an unfair statistic.
Then again, it isn't the best, and I did feel way safer when I lived in Oregon and Colorado.

Which brings me to my final thought: I remember awhile back a very heated discussion on Cassie's blog about NYC, and how damn dangerous it is. How it's so much safer in the Midwest. So I thought I'd extract a few interesting examples from the list for amusement. Keep in mind the list is numbered as #1 - the safest to #371 - the worst(St. Louis)

371. St. Louis
356. Kansas City, Mo.
342. Kansas City, Kan. ( I found it interesting the KCK is safer?!)
303. Denver
262. Seattle
249. Portland, Ore.
148. Sioux City, Iowa
145. New York City

Wait....is that right? Sioux City, IA is more dangerous than NYC??
hmmm....apparently this list does not have anything to do with the danger of running into a drag queen at 3 in the morning on the subway, or any other scary culture for that matter....
The other thought that came to my mind was the irony of the city just winning the game and then this report coming out, like someone didn't want the city to get to cocky about being good at something, anything, other than killin, rapin and stealin.

Only it's a fairly chilly October night, other than that, times don't change that much

It's now time for a little Chinaski

ground zero

the consensus is that this is a difficult time,
perhaps the most difficult of times:
large groups of people in cities
all over the world are
protesting that they'd rather not be
treated like shit.

but whoever's in control
will not listen.

the suggestion is that, of course, it's
only one power fighting another power
and the real power, of course, is in the hands
of the few who run the nations
and their need is to protect those many things
that belong to them.

it is conceivable that these few rulers
will escape
when the final eruption begins;
they will escape to their safe havens
where they will watch
the eruption to its finish,
and then after a reasonable wait
they will return
again and
will begin building
a new ridiculous and grossly
unfair future.

which, to me, is not a very
happy thought
as I crack open a can of beer
on a hot
July night.

C. Bukowski(who else?)

I'll drink to that...

A Tangible Presence

Today the air outside is close, you can feel the mist and almost, out of the corner of your eye, see it. It is like walking in a cloud, but you can only tell that you are by looking in the distance. Up close it is not discernable, which causes everything to take on a surreal fuzziness. In this smudged reality things ironically grow sharper, in my mind. It makes my own existence a little more tangible. I am able to see myself in the distance, as a fog, and with this little piece of enlightenment I can stop looking at each small speck, grasping so desperately to see the specks for what they are, and realize that I am in the midst of it.
Today, the atmosphere gave me a gift of myself.

In not so many words

Ok, before my garden was totally dead I took some pictures yesterday morning with the help of my lovely German assistant, Anya.



(As you can see in this picture, the street surrounding us is still somewhat blighted looking, this is after many days, over and over cleaning up the debris left by others)



Dilaram and I built this wall with our own bare hands, that was probably the most labor intensive part, that and stupidly hauling BAGS of dirt from Home Cheapo, instead of having a truckload delivered.



You can almost see the arbor that has wisteria growing on it, in the background is the completely voracious cannas.



This part was full of zinnias and poppies in the early summer, now the elephant ears actually have room to grow. In the background is what survived of my herb garden, I actually found a bunch of basil when I cleaned out all the zinnias last month. One thing I learned this year, stupid lemon grass, I will not plant it as part of an herb garden ever again. It gets it's own little corner next time.


Here is the truly amazing blossom of one of the elephant ears, I never knew they did this....






Phaedra wanted to have the last word here, because while she didn't help with the garden she pretty much played the part of the foreman screaming from the window the whole time.
As far as my neighborhood garden and the empty threat of Gorn, well that will have to wait for now, it's not DONE yet.

Cassie, how did you get this bear all the way out here from Gabors?

I found this really funny, UNTIL I saw that stupid wildlife lady shooting bean bags at the bear. What the hell, the bear is drunk, you want to torment it?
I have had friends like that....

Too much Fat Tire with the Cassinator

And on World Animal Day no less!

Daily grinding

I am finally beginning to relax from the whirlwind of the past month. As I was used to asking the customers, "How would you like that ground?", my life would have answered for Espresso; heart-thumpingly quick and strong.
Now, things are becoming more like something you'd brew in your percolator over a camp fire. Ok, maybe not that laid back, but still, much more breathable. Naturally I have found other time occupiers, but things like gardening with my neighbors and walking the dog, it's just different.
I love this time of year, and I am glad that I can stop awhile to enjoy it. Coincidentally, just after I let go of the coffee shop job, my partner got a promotion at work, so it all evens out in the end, perhaps even more so.
That's all for now, oh, and this:


Three Oddest Words

When I pronounce the word Future,
the first syllable already belongs to the past.

When I pronounce the word Silence,
I destroy it.

When I pronounce the word Nothing,
I make something no nonbeing can hold.



EXPERIMENT

As a short subject before the main feature -
in which the actors did their best
to make me cry and even laugh -
we were shown an interesting experiment
involving a head.


The head
a minute earlier was still attached to...
but now it was cut off.
Everyone could see that it didn't have a body.
The tubes dangling from the neck hooked it up to a machine
that kept its blood circulating.
The head
was doing just fine.


Without showing pain or even surprise,
it followed a moving flashlight with its eyes.
It pricked up its ears at the sound of a bell.
Its moist nose could tell
the smell of bacon from odorless oblivion,
and licking its chops with evident relish
it salivated its salute to physiology.


A dog's faithful head,
a dog's friendly head
squinted its eyes when stroked,
convinced that it was still part of a whole
that crooks its back if patted
and wags its tail.


I thought about happiness and was frightened.
For if that's all life is about,
the head
was happy.
(both by Wisława Szymborska)