a day in january

Okay, this website has sucked up numerous hours in the last few days:

http://hookedonhouses.net/

I love it, get lost wandering around in it, forget all about the things I’m supposed to be doing.

I don’t care about that cowboy dude’s house on the main page. It’s the TV and Movie Houses that I can’t stop looking at. That’s the fourth choice across under the header. I went there to look at the Home Alone house—I love that one.

But then I got stuck in that section and couldn’t leave… I know it’s ridiculous, but that house on Bewitched… it was just a stage set. Yeah. I’ve seen Samantha’s DeLorean oven in real life though. There are a few of those beauties still in use in homes in my own town.

The day was not a total goof-off however. I did manage to get Tim’s room cleaned. I hadn’t really worked in there since before Thanksgiving and the Gray Layer was getting pretty outrageous. I even found the little part that was missing from my camera’s battery charger. I've looked for that thing! Oh, how I've searched.

Originally I’d found the part in my own room, and not recognizing what it was, thought it was a part to some random remote control car.

I clearly remember tossing it down the hallway from my bedroom doorway to Tim’s room. And then I never saw it again. A day later I realized what it was when I wanted to charge the battery, but it was too late.

Now, two months later, after I bought a generic battery charger—it reappears, in a pink princess dance bag that we used to take beach toys to the pool. Wow. Well.

Adding to the dumbness—I don’t remember where I put the original charger now. Good thing we don’t need it, eh? Sigh. This is pretty much how my life works, how it always has.

Anyway, after Tim’s room was all cleaned, all the junk that didn’t belong in there taken out, everything dusted…. I even used the broom and dragged out all the debris he’s shoved under his bed since November…ran the vacuum… Apparently Tim saw the room because I overheard him in the stairway, “Julia! Julia! You have to see how beautiful my room is!”

Okay, it’s not beautiful. It’s neat, and a pleasant enough room, but beautiful? Nah.

This is the ceiling, in need of re-plastering. This room used to be a porch and has a flat roof over it. We have re-plastered this ceiling at least three times. The flat roof was replaced, and the second floor roof beside it. There’s a door upstairs that goes out onto the flat roof, and we’ve messed with that to eliminate leaks, put up gutters.

And still a year ago, “Mom! It’s raining in our light!” You never like to hear that.

It hasn’t leaked for a long time now, so we may have it this time. (We’ve only been battling this for 20 years.) I’m ready to tackle it again, maybe this year.

Oh, and the blue sponge painting? That time has come and gone. I did that the summer before Tim was born, and hmm... still like it, I guess, in a way. But it’s time to move on from blue clouds.

Okay—the best part of the day? Lydia’s lemon cake. Even from a mix—divine. Love, Val