Other Cool Things

I was SO excited when I first saw Atomic Ranch magazine on a newsstand in 2004. A whole magazine about Mid-Century Modern houses? Ross happy! Instantly, I subscribed and now have every issue. But…but…this is the only magazine subscription I have where I don’t look through it the day it arrives or the day after….

For my whole life I have watched incredible buildings be demolished. And I am now old enough to frequently hear, decades after some magnificent treasure was smashed to the ground: “Gee? Why did we knock it down? Looking back, it was actually an incredible building. We should have saved it.” Yes, should have. The wonderful…

Recently, my beloved treasured adored cherished fabulous Gilda departed after sixteen years together. Even more recently, the extraordinary Emerald departed. And the inside of my house became…silent. And felt dead. For my whole life I lived with animals, and suddenly at fifty-nine my house was devoid of furry creatures. However….just outside…I have a lot of…

Seven days ago I did a post about an old stray cat which kinda sorta adopted me. He went blind at some point, and it was evident that he was now in a rapid decline. My days and patterns adjusted to Emerald’s ever-changing new realities, and of late he became extra picky about the food…

Twice daily I feed about a dozen stray cats which hang around my immediate neighborhood. Some were left by neighbors who moved away, some ARE neighbor’s cats but aren’t being taken care of, some wandered into the neighborhood, and some were dumped in the neighborhood. Sigh. One such cat I named Emerald because he had…

  As the heavens raged, I received a text from a friend. A house was being demolished tomorrow. He knew I had always admired it. My heart felt crushed. Another text: the house is open. Wanna see inside? It was pitch black outside, save the dramatic streaks of lighting. Rain dashed against my windows. The…

I have written several posts about Gilda, my gold cat. My old gold cat. My favorite ever cat. She arrived in my life, totally unexpectedly, one day in early 1999. My dear friend Christina (who lived across the street) and I were talking in my driveway when a tiny kitten, perhaps just five-weeks-old, scurried up…

In my office are two very large identical desks. I have a thing about pairs. One is for my Apple computer. I love love love my Apple. I also normally keep this desk quite clean. It is intended as my oasis of calm & order. The other is where I restore my lights. This table…

There are a spate of TV shows showing viewers how they can renovate and “update” an old home. Oh the horror. The horror. The result of this televised saturation is that a great many people think nothing about painting gorgeous wood interior trim white, knocking out walls to create “open plans”, discarding original lighting for…

    I am a sucker for an architectural damsel in distress. And this house pushes my every button. It just intoxicates me. Had I not purchased the Cross House I might well have gone after this faded beauty. The house was featured on the fabulous Old House Dreams, where you can learn a lot…

Wow. What a year it is going to be, politically. In November, there is a presidential election, and in my lifetime I cannot recall such, well, surrealism. The Republicans started out with sixteen candidates. This keeps getting whittled down. And I continue to gasp at what comes out of the mouths of some of these…

I was born in Detroit, a 1957 model. While my family lived in suburban Detroit, my father’s parents lived in outer Detroit, and my grandfather often took his four grandchildren downtown on the weekends. I wrote about my vivid memories of these adventures, and this was published a few years ago. My family left Michigan for Florida…

WAY back in 1979, I watched the very first episode of This Old House. And was mesmerized. I ate up each subsequent episode. When a book came out about that first season, I snapped did up, and devoured it. I was twenty-two. As the years have passed, as the decades passed, I became aware that…

Once upon a time, in a faraway land called Scotland, in a sprawling, gritty city known as Glasgow, there lived an eccentric and brilliant architect named Alexander Thomson. Today, most people, even those with an interest in architecture, think: Who? When one thinks of Glasgow, Charles Rennie Mackintosh comes to mind, a world-famous architect who…

Reading the news of late one would think that America is in imminent danger from Muslims and Syrian refugees. DANGER! BE AFRAID! Ahhh…no. You see, politicians love to scare us. And while the world IS a dangerous place, I am wholly unconcerned about Muslims and refugees attacking America. Why? Because, since 9/11: There were 45 deaths…

A few weeks ago I received an email. Did I know about the Sternberg Mansion in Wichita, Kansas? Why…no. So I clicked on the Realtor.com listing, and my heart was instantly seized. Before me was a FABULOUS house built in 1886. But, before me was also a house in alarming condition. Thus, the seized heart. I…

Today I was looking at the Facebook page of somebody I sorta know. I will call him Tom. Tom posted this image:     Under the image Tom wrote: During the Industrial revolution in the Victorian and early Edwardian era Every city was spewing Coal and Wood smoke into the sky. We burned wood or…