An elegant lifestyle

Happy Demolition Day!

Though we eat little flesh and drink no wine,
Yet let’s be merry; we’ll have tea and toast;
Custards for supper, and an endless host
Of syllabubs and jellies and mincepies,
And other such ladylike luxuries.

~ Percy Bysshe Shelley

Before the big demo

It’s Saturday night as I start this post.  With NaBloPoMo going on, I figure I better get a head start or I might not be able to get a post out today (which is really tomorrow, but you’re reading this today so it’s today).  M and I are right on schedule with our kitchen work.  We spent a full day removing what was left of the old kitchen.  We also finished the painting.

By the time we finished, there wasn’t any daylight left for taking photos.  The new lighting makes it nice and bright, but not quite nice and bright enough for me to take some shots without dragging out the tripod.  I’m not even sure where the tripod is at the moment.

The removal of the “cabinets” and counter top went smoothly, and wasn’t nearly as bad as I thought it might be.  I was afraid that when we lifted the shelves off the flooring thousands of mice and millions of roaches would come pouring out of a large black hole in the floor.  We did find evidence of mice.  Lots of mouse poop, to be exact.  Thankfully it was old and dry.  At least we didn’t find any bodies.  Last week while cleaning out a ceiling register, M found a dead mouse sitting on the grill.  It wasn’t the first dead mouse we’ve come across (the first was under the fridge).

There has been one live mouse.  M and I were sitting in the living room one evening a couple of weeks ago, watching a movie, when Izzy walked in carrying a mouse in her mouth.  It was, of course, alive.  She dropped it and looked at me with such excitement.  “A new toy!!!”  The first thing I did was draw my feet up because there is something about a mouse that makes me want to keep my feet off the floor.  (Yes, I’ve been known to stand on a chair when I know there is a mouse running around.  I am such a stereotype.  It’s all nonsense.  I know that.  That poor little mouse isn’t going to go running across my feet.  It’s going to run in the other direction.  But I protect my feet for no reason anyhow.  It’s how I roll.)  After much ado, Bella caught the mouse that Izzy dropped, and M took it from Bella (she thinks he’s a god and will give him anything, even the food/mouse out of her mouth) and disposed of it outside.

In addition to mouse poo, we found mold and mildew on the plywood flooring under the cabinets we removed.  Lots of bleach later, it looks pretty good, but we’ll leave it up to the kitchen installation people to decide whether or not the plywood should be replaced.  If they want to tear it out and redo it, great.  If not, the bleach (and drying it out) has hopefully taken care of things.

No roaches, by the way, came pouring out.  There was no black hole, either.  Just thought you’d want confirmation of those things.

Foggy day

I did get out for a walk before nightfall yesterday.  Saturday was a gray, foggy, misty day.  The weather prognosticators said we’d see some sunshine, but they were wrong.  Perhaps they had sun in the northern section of the Delmarva peninsula.  The weather folks cover the whole area when they start predicting, and occasionally the weather here in the south differs from the weather up north.  Even without the sun, it was a fairly warm day.  Today (which is still tomorrow for me right now) is supposed to be even warmer.  In the 70’s kind of warm.

Oak leaf

Our first dinner without a kitchen was quite luxurious.  We had grilled lobster tails, a cucumber salad, and baked onion rings.  The lobster tails were a treat.  On the way to points south of us (Pocomoke City, etc.), there is a large Sysco food plant.  They have a store where the general public can buy food at sometimes great prices.  M and I went by the store a few times over the weeks they were advertising lobster tails at a fantastic price.  We finally stopped one day, went in to explore a bit, and came home with the lobster tails which we saved for this occasion.

November mistiness

We should be installing part of the new kitchen floor today.  There is a corner section we need to have done before the cabinets are installed.  The rest we can finish once the cabinets are in.  Hopefully I will remember to take photos first thing in the morning so I can show you how it looks now that we finished painting.

Misty green

Well, I’m tired and should start thinking about powering down for the day (because it’s still Saturday night as I type this).  Thank you for dropping in and having a look around the kitchen.

Early morning

Be good, be kind, be loving.  Just Be.  🙂

Today’s joys:  Restorative yoga.  A walk in the fog.   The laundry room sink that’s almost perfect for washing dishes.  (Without it, I’d probably be washing dishes in the bathtub.  Been there, done that, and it’s not fun or easy.)  Music to work by.  The Little Bird that flits around me when I go out for my walks.

Little Bird