1. I am trying to convince myself it is time to give up my chai that I buy by the case from this one place in Santa Cruz. I can’t get two cases that taste the same each time and it is making me crazy. Right now I have 5 gallons of a lot I can’t stand. No amount of tinkering with it is making it right. I am seriously bummed because it is Saturday and I like to sit and drink many cups of chai while working at the computer. Regular tea doesn’t do it for me. Not enough something to help me pop up.
2. If I give up chai I might go back to coffee. A few expressos in the morning would be good. But if so, I am going to have to buy one of those wonderfully expensive automatic ones that my friend Mac has so all I have to do is put the cup under it and push a button. It even cleans itself. If you have one and you love it, tell me what kind/model. If I don’t do chai or coffee I really need a breakfast drink. Part of it is to help me wake up (not a morning person) and part of it is the routine of getting into my morning by prepping those things.
3. Same friend with the fancy expresso machine remodeled his kitchen and gave us his nearly new Bosch dishwasher to replace our very ancient one. It is waiting to be installed by someone who won’t cross the wires and burn the house down. But here’s the thing, the dishwasher is white. All the other appliances are black. I like the black. I put black handles on all the cabinets. Black works. I think the black is going to bug me a lot. Hubby won’t even notice. Bosch does not, like other dishwasher manufacturers, make a replacement panel for it. Sigh. So I am wondering if I have it installed in white or try to take it to an auto shop and have them paint it black. What would you do?
4. Cassie is being tapered off the steroids and I can see hints of our wonderful dog coming back to us. Poor thing has serious steroid hunger pangs and wants to eat all the time. I found a woman on the German Shepherd forum whose dog Sean also has this auto immune disease and has been doing fine on the Atopica for many years. That’s heartening. And I had a realization about Cassie last night. Every since we have had her she has sneezed a lot. I mean every day, every time she would get up from sleeping she would sneeze several times. Considering how many naps she took every day, that’s a lot of daily sneezes. Since she has been on the medicine she hasn’t sneezed once. Makes me wonder how many other things are going on inside this poor kid. Ditto her ears. She was always shaking them as though they bothered her but the vet could never find anything, even going deep down to look. We finally just decided that she didn’t like any wax buildup at all and I just clean her ears a lot, which she is fine with. But since the medicine, no issues with the ears. Which leads me to her coat. We thought her problem with her coat was a bad diet. When we got her at about 9 months of age she had a shiny stripe down her back and dull, lifeless coat everywhere else. We figured good food and fish oil would help and it has some. Now instead of a 1 inch healthy fur stripe she has one that’s about 5″. She is slowly getting a shiny coat but now I am wondering if it isn’t also tired to this auto immune disease that she has?
5. I am frustrated with my pot ponds. After all the work I did soaking them to get them to hold water up to the top, now that I have them planted the water is leaking from some places and the wood won’t swell back up again. I am really tempted to dump the one in the backyard and give in to my desire to have a bigger one that is partway in the ground. But it would mean a fence around it to keep Cassie out because she thinks it is her job to remove anything that is floating in water, from the water.
6. There are still a few spots left in my online class on Social Networking for Authors and Illustrators. We’ll explore all the various online opportunities authors have today (Blogs, Facebook, Twitter, Myspace, etc) and how authors can best use them to build their online presence. I’d appreciate it if folks could help pass the word along. I don’t post at Verla’s or the Blue Boards (or are those the same?) and would feel awkward to go sign-up just to post about my class. But if you do, maybe you could mention it there? Thanks!
Whoops! I forgot to add the link for the class info/sign-ups.
http://www.backup.susantaylorbrown.com/classes.html
I’m so glad Cassie’s doing better. And I bet ALL these things are related to the auto-immune; I think skin (fur!)is a big deal with those diseases. 🙂
Yeah, me too. I love that dog soooo much.
I think the same thing, that the auto-immune has to have something to do with it. I’m also going to ask the vet about the possibility of allergies.
I saw something on HGTV about repainting your dishwasher, but I’m sorry I can’t tell you exactly what to do. But I know it can be done.
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20061121083109AA7wgyN
I googled “repainting your dishwasher” and found a lot of things. Here’s one.
Black and white
Hi Susan,
I think your white dishwasher can be a good accent to the black appliances you have. What about decorating the front of the dishwasher with black designs? Or decorate the other black appliances with white designs. Or add some center piece or art work that will pull it all together.
Carma
Re: Black and white
Good idea, Carma! Thanks. See my response below to Lisa about the recent install adventure. Grr.
Again, cat with an auto immune disease, but Andy’s was triggered by allergies, and it seems like all those other things you mention could easily be as well. Have you had Cassie tested for any allergies?
Good point. Well the giant bumps were biopsied which is what gave us the diagnosis but I will ask the vet about allergies too. Thanks.
I’m SO envious of your Bosch dishwasher. I’ve heard wonderful things about them. If it’s going to bug you, I’d figure out how to paint it. I bet other people probably wouldn’t notice, but you’re the one who will be looking at it everyday so… 🙂
I know it would bug me. Sigh. This is not a good day for appliances. The guy was just here to install the new microwave and it sticks out from the cabinets by 2″. That REALLY bugs me.
The guy is going to check with Bosch to see if we can get black panels that will fit on this one. I still can’t believe my friend just gave it to us! Plus he gave us his wine cooler too!
In answer to #3…
First of all, I am so envious of your nearly new dishwasher. The dishwasher that came with our not-so-new house is the kind you pull out and roll over to the sink and hook up to the water faucet. It’s harvest gold. It still works, so my husband sees no need to replace it. Needless to say, I just use my hands. So, you could just count your blessings that you don’t have my dishwasher – lol!
Also, you could look at Home Depot or an appliance store and get some appliance paint to paint your dishwasher black. I’m not sure how much it costs, but it’s cheaper than a new dishwasher, for sure.
Re: In answer to #3…
Oh dear, I remember that harvest gold. I had that in another house of mine.
And my grandmother had one of those roll it over to the sink things. You have my sympathy.
I am very grateful for the dishwasher but I also want to not make my pretty house look worse, ya know? 🙂
Okay, I’ll be honest here. Unless I were seriously short of cash, I’d buy a new dishwasher that a) fit the space, and b) matched the other appliances. These are the sort of things that drive me nuts. I’m not obsessive, but my eyes would drift to those anomolies rather than focusing on all the other lovely things going on in my kitchen.
Habitat for Humanity took our almost-new but white dishwasher when we were forced to do our kitchen remodel. Since I was switching to stainless steel, I wanted the new dishwasher to match. We got a healthy tax deduction and someone got a great machine at a greatly reduced price–plus, their money went to a very worthwhile cause. Major win, all the way ’round.
(I still have a white refrigerator, but that’s not an installed appliance, and it’s on an opposite wall, so I can deal until it dies.)
Yeah….the dishwasher we have now is black and I really like the all black appliances in the kitchen the way it is now.
I’m hoping that the appliance guy who came and installed the microwave will have an answer for us. He is calling Bosch to see if he can get a balck panel to replace the white one. If not, I’ll have to decide what to do.
Sigh.
In answer to # 3
It sounds a little cheesy, but you might try contact paper. My second wife and I received an avocado (yuck!) refrigerator from her aunt. I covered every exposed surface with white contact paper and it looked great. When we split up I got custody of the fridge and did it again in black. It takes some patience but can actually turn out looking quite nice.
– Fred (Higgins)