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todayiamadaisyHonestly, that was the next question on the World War I US army literacy test. I make no comment as to its relevance today.
This week: signs of spring. The sweet peas are out, electric pink and scented. Tulips and daffodils out the kitchen window. Colours other than winter green and brown.
Also this week: we had a visit from Charlie! This is Charlie, talking to my mother:
Charlie came into our garden for a visit. My mother thought she'd seen him being walked by the new-ish family across the road, so I carried him over there, but there was no-one home. Fortunately Charlie had his name and a phone number on his collar, so I called and found it was the people across the road, who had just gone to the supermarket and had no idea he had escaped. So we kept Charlie in the enclosed patio until they came to collect him. I found an old tennis ball, which kept him occupied.
Finally, a long domestic meme from![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
emma2403:
1. What kind of soap is in your bathtub right now?
I have neither soap nor bathtub. But there is a bottle of Body Shop Wild Argan Oil Shower Gel in the shower.
2. Do you have any watermelon in your refrigerator?
It's winter, so no. Citrus season!
3. Is there anything moldy in your refrigerator?
No, the fridge is okay. I suspect there's some stuff in the freezer that's not mouldy, but older than it would be advisable to eat.
4. Are there any dirty dishes in your sink?
We do the dishes after every main meal, so the only dirty dishes will be what we've used since. In this case, one cup from when I had a cup of tea.
5. What would you change about your living room?
We need a new rug. The one that's there (a Persian-style rug, red with green, white and beige patterns) is ancient and starting to look threadbare in places.
6. Are the dishes in your dishwasher clean or dirty?
I don't have a dishwasher.
7. Do you have a can of mushrooms in your pantry?
No, I usually buy them fresh. My grandmother used to call tinned mushrooms "chimpeons". As in, that's how she'd write it on her shopping list. It's clearly her mishearing of "champignons", but I never did work out why she had separate words for fresh and tinned mushrooms.
8. White or wheat bread?
My order at the local bakery is a wholemeal loaf, sandwich sliced.
9. What is on top of your refrigerator?
Two boxes (one open, one not) of Carman's Honey Roasted Nut Crunchy Oat Clusters breakfast cereal (they have recently changed the font on the box and I do not care for it), two unopened boxes of Kleenex with Aloe Vera tissues, one container of homemade trail mix.
10. What color is your sofa?
Burgundy leather.
11. What color or design is on your shower curtain?
Our shower is in a corner, so has two tiled walls (grey), one glass wall, and one open side.
12. How many plants are in your home?
A large spathiphyllum in the kitchen, and an orchid that was my leaving gift in January from my colleagues charity I used to work at.
13. How many candles are in your home?
There's a big (as in 10cm diameter) candle under a glass cloche. I believe there are some candles under the sink for emergencies. And a ziplock bag of birthday candles.
14. Is your bed made right now?
Yes. I always make my bed.
15. If you have a coffee pot, what color is it?
I don't have a coffee pot. I have a red kettle.
16. Electric or standard can opener?
Standard tin opener. Although most tins I need to open (cat food, sliced peaches, chickpeas) have ring pulls on them now.
17. Comet or Soft Scrub?
I don't know what these are and I'm too lazy to google. I'm guessing some sort of cleaning product? I'm going to assume it's dishwashing liquid and say we have Organic Choice Lemongrass and Green Tea.
18. Is your closet organized?
I'd call it a wardrobe. It's sort of organised, in that I keep all the same types of clothes together for ease of choosing this shirt or that shirt.
19. What color is the flashlight that you use the most?
I call it a torch. I have one in my bedside table drawer, which is black. I think there's a little green one in my handbag and a little pink one in the kitchen. I can't say I use any of them all that often.
20. What kinds of things are in your junk drawer?
Which one? I have quite a few drawers filled with bits and pieces. I would say the most obvious "junk" drawer is the drawer near the kitchen sink, which a quick scan reveals to include: a box of generic brand paracetamol, cat flea treatments, three tubes of superglue, a medicine cup, several packets of adhesive hooks, half a packet of Vicks Vapodrops, some cedar balls, a lint brush and an old pill bottle of quandong seeds.
21. Do you drink out of glass or plastic most of the time at home?
Glass. Although since I am paranoid about spilling drinks on my work laptop, while I'm working I drink out of my bamboo keep cup because it has a lid, so that's getting a lot of use lately.
22. Do you have iced tea made in a pitcher right now?
It's winter, so no. Also, iced tea isn't really a thing here. You can buy a single serve bottle of it in the refrigerated drinks section, but I've never made it at home. Or drunk it at home. Or known anyone who had it. (Also, I'd call what it's poured out of a jug.)
23. If you have a garage, is it cluttered?
There are shelves at the back of the garage that are a bit cluttered, yes. Assorted tins of paint and garden tools and car things, which are okay. An old fish bowl, which could probably be thrown out. A cast iron shoe last, which my grandparents used to use as a doorstop. A box of leftover tiles from the bathroom.
24. Curtains or blinds?
Plantation shutters in the bedrooms, with plans to install more through the rest of the house. Until then, curtains everywhere else, except for the kitchen, which has wide wooden Venetian blinds. The west side of the house has retractable external awnings to keep the summer sun off the windows.
25. How many pillows do you sleep with?
Just the one. Well, two, I suppose, as there's one on the other side of the bed, but I only use one at a time.
26. Do you sleep with any lights on at night?
No. Having said that, although I turn the lights off at night, I frequently wake up in the morning to find my bedside lamp on and a smug cat sunning his face under it. Not recently, but at various times in the past when I lived alone, I've woken up to find all the lights and sometimes the TV on. Not a sleepwalker but a sleepswitcher.
27. How many ceiling fans are in your home?
Four: one in the living room, one each in the two bedrooms, one in the office/sewing room (that is really meant to be a third bedroom). Also a bathroom fan, but that's a different sort of thing.
28. How often do you vacuum?
Me, about once a week with the big vacuum. My mother will often use the light vacuum to do the rugs during the week.
29. Standard toothbrush or electric?
Standard.
30. What color is your toothbrush?
Clear blue with silver and purple stripes and blue and green bristles.
31. Do you have a welcome mat on your front porch?
There's a doormat, but it doesn't say WELCOME. It's just a semi-circle of coir. There's a similar one at the back door.
32. What is in your oven right now?
Nothing.
33. Is your microwave clean or dirty?
It's so clean. I recently bought one of these. Pop some lemon juice and water in and the microwave smells delightful.
34. Is there anything under your bed?
My bed has drawers in the base, so it's got spare blankets and such under it.
35. Chore you hate doing the most?
I am not keen on ironing, so it's handy that my mother says she finds it good thinking time. On the other hand, she hates scrubbing tiles, which I don't mind, so that's my job.
36. What retro items are in your home?
There's a shelf of the kitchen cabinet full of matched cup/saucer/small plate sets from the 50s. I always think I should use them more, but the cups are too dainty for the hearty sized cups of tea I like.
37. Do you have a separate room that you use as an office?
Yes. As mentioned above, it's really a third bedroom, but as we don't need it, it's an office/sewing room. Two desks, a sewing table, a cupboard full of craft supplies, a small bookshelf of my work stuff, and a bookshelf built over one whole wall.
38. If you have a yard, who mows it?
Garden, not yard. Both my mother and I mow it, me on the weekends, my mother if she thinks it needs mowing during the week while I'm working. Our neighbour often mows the nature strip we share (that's the strip of lawn at the front of the house), in return for some homemade biscuits.
39. Is there anything on your kitchen floor right now?
Other than furniture, there is a red placemat with Alistair's food and water bowls on it.
40. How many mirrors are in your home?
There's a big one with backlights in the bathroom; a full-length one in the office/sewing room; a small one in my room on the wardrobe door; a small one in my mother's room by the door; she might have another one in her wardrobe too.
41. Do you have any hidden emergency money around your home?
There's a little money box shaped like a cottage on the kitchen dresser; that's got some loose change in it. I have a little blue piggy bank that I usually put a gold coin in each week, but I haven't had any since lockdown started. I owe it about eighteen coins now. I wouldn't class either of those as emergency money, though, unless it was an emergency that could be solved with a coin.
42. What color are your walls?
Through most of the house the walls are a sort of pale apricot colour; I can't remember what it was called. In those rooms, the ceilings are a pale grey-blue colour called Edge Water and the skirting boards are a darker version called Rainy Day. It was a very fashion-forward colour scheme when the house was painted last century. We have begun discussions about repainting, but that will take a while. (Also, some of the rooms have blonde wood panelling on the lower part of the walls.)
The only rooms that aren't that colour are the bathroom and laundry, which were renovated a couple of years ago. The walls there are pale grey-green, with white ceiling and trims. I suspect when the rest of the house is painted, the white ceiling and trims will be carried through with a complementary colour to the green on the walls.
43. Which rooms in your house have wallpaper?
None. Or the bedrooms, which have loose wallpaper lining the wardrobe shelves.
44. Do you have a peephole in your front door?
No, in my part of the world front doors usually have a mesh security door in front of them, so you can open the front door and not let intruders or mosquitoes in.
45. Do you keep any kind of protection weapons in your home?
No. I suppose the kitchen knives might do in a pinch.
46. What does your home smell like right now?
Nothing in particular. Nothing noticeable, at any rate.
47. Favorite candle scent?
None. I do not enjoy scented candles.
48. What kind of pickles (if any) are in your refrigerator?
I know I've got some marinated capsicums. There might be some gherkins.
49. Who are in the pictures you display?
We mostly have paintings or arty photos on the walls. I think the only personal photos are two big photos of my grandparents on the kitchen wall, and two smaller photos of my mother's grandparents on the kitchen dresser. (My mother also has photos of her late partner and me in her bedroom.)
50. What color is your favorite Bible?
What an intriguing vista into the lives of people who have enough Bibles to have a favourite one. My school Bible was teal; I think that's in the bookshelf somewhere. My mother's school Bible has a dark red cover; I know that's still around, but I don't know where. I wouldn't say either was my favourite.
51. Do you have plenty of cabinet space in your kitchen?
Not cabinets as such. Our kitchen has deep drawers rather than cabinets; there's also a dresser and a walk-in pantry. Plenty of space.
52. Ever been on your roof?
Yes. We have a roofed patio now, but before that was built, that side of the house had easy access to the roof (provided you had a ladder), and was ideal for watching New Year's fireworks. I liked up there; the house has had parts added over the years, so it's not a single roof, but one with hills and valleys.
52. Do you own a stereo?
Yes, there is an old stereo in a cabinet in the corner of the living room. It's got a record player, tape deck and CD player, and probably a radio too. I can't remember last time it was used.
53. How many TVs do you have?
Two. One in the living room, and a smaller one tucked away in the dining room.
54. How many house phones?
My mother insists on keeping a landline, so one. Which came with two handsets, now I think about it, so there's a second phone in a cupboard somewhere.
55. Do you have a housekeeper?
Ha, no.
56. What style do you decorate in?
The house, or the first part of it, was built in the early 1900s, so it can carry some older, Art Nouveau-ish stuff. Mostly it's decorated in a style called Comfortable Mishmash.
57. Do you like solid colors in furniture or prints?
Solid colours.
58. Is there a smoke detector in your home?
Yes, it's compulsory by law. Ours is a ten-year one.
59. In case of fire, what are the items you would grab if you could only make one quick trip?
Mister Alistair Cat hopefully, and if I couldn't get his carrier out of the garage, I'd probably have to make do with grabbing his lead too. Other than that, practical things: phone, wallet, laptop, change of underwear. Which makes me sound horribly unsentimental, but I can't think of one particular thing I'd grab in a hurry. Maybe a couple of photo albums, or my mother's jewellery box?
60. Do you know how to work your electrical box?
Sort of. I know where it is and I can flick switches as necessary. I haven't had to do anything with it for ages.
61. What temperature in your home is most comfortable to you?
My preferred range is 20 to 25C, although I don't mind colder.
This week: signs of spring. The sweet peas are out, electric pink and scented. Tulips and daffodils out the kitchen window. Colours other than winter green and brown.
Also this week: we had a visit from Charlie! This is Charlie, talking to my mother:
Charlie came into our garden for a visit. My mother thought she'd seen him being walked by the new-ish family across the road, so I carried him over there, but there was no-one home. Fortunately Charlie had his name and a phone number on his collar, so I called and found it was the people across the road, who had just gone to the supermarket and had no idea he had escaped. So we kept Charlie in the enclosed patio until they came to collect him. I found an old tennis ball, which kept him occupied.
Finally, a long domestic meme from
emma2403:1. What kind of soap is in your bathtub right now?
I have neither soap nor bathtub. But there is a bottle of Body Shop Wild Argan Oil Shower Gel in the shower.
2. Do you have any watermelon in your refrigerator?
It's winter, so no. Citrus season!
3. Is there anything moldy in your refrigerator?
No, the fridge is okay. I suspect there's some stuff in the freezer that's not mouldy, but older than it would be advisable to eat.
4. Are there any dirty dishes in your sink?
We do the dishes after every main meal, so the only dirty dishes will be what we've used since. In this case, one cup from when I had a cup of tea.
5. What would you change about your living room?
We need a new rug. The one that's there (a Persian-style rug, red with green, white and beige patterns) is ancient and starting to look threadbare in places.
6. Are the dishes in your dishwasher clean or dirty?
I don't have a dishwasher.
7. Do you have a can of mushrooms in your pantry?
No, I usually buy them fresh. My grandmother used to call tinned mushrooms "chimpeons". As in, that's how she'd write it on her shopping list. It's clearly her mishearing of "champignons", but I never did work out why she had separate words for fresh and tinned mushrooms.
8. White or wheat bread?
My order at the local bakery is a wholemeal loaf, sandwich sliced.
9. What is on top of your refrigerator?
Two boxes (one open, one not) of Carman's Honey Roasted Nut Crunchy Oat Clusters breakfast cereal (they have recently changed the font on the box and I do not care for it), two unopened boxes of Kleenex with Aloe Vera tissues, one container of homemade trail mix.
10. What color is your sofa?
Burgundy leather.
11. What color or design is on your shower curtain?
Our shower is in a corner, so has two tiled walls (grey), one glass wall, and one open side.
12. How many plants are in your home?
A large spathiphyllum in the kitchen, and an orchid that was my leaving gift in January from my colleagues charity I used to work at.
13. How many candles are in your home?
There's a big (as in 10cm diameter) candle under a glass cloche. I believe there are some candles under the sink for emergencies. And a ziplock bag of birthday candles.
14. Is your bed made right now?
Yes. I always make my bed.
15. If you have a coffee pot, what color is it?
I don't have a coffee pot. I have a red kettle.
16. Electric or standard can opener?
Standard tin opener. Although most tins I need to open (cat food, sliced peaches, chickpeas) have ring pulls on them now.
17. Comet or Soft Scrub?
I don't know what these are and I'm too lazy to google. I'm guessing some sort of cleaning product? I'm going to assume it's dishwashing liquid and say we have Organic Choice Lemongrass and Green Tea.
18. Is your closet organized?
I'd call it a wardrobe. It's sort of organised, in that I keep all the same types of clothes together for ease of choosing this shirt or that shirt.
19. What color is the flashlight that you use the most?
I call it a torch. I have one in my bedside table drawer, which is black. I think there's a little green one in my handbag and a little pink one in the kitchen. I can't say I use any of them all that often.
20. What kinds of things are in your junk drawer?
Which one? I have quite a few drawers filled with bits and pieces. I would say the most obvious "junk" drawer is the drawer near the kitchen sink, which a quick scan reveals to include: a box of generic brand paracetamol, cat flea treatments, three tubes of superglue, a medicine cup, several packets of adhesive hooks, half a packet of Vicks Vapodrops, some cedar balls, a lint brush and an old pill bottle of quandong seeds.
21. Do you drink out of glass or plastic most of the time at home?
Glass. Although since I am paranoid about spilling drinks on my work laptop, while I'm working I drink out of my bamboo keep cup because it has a lid, so that's getting a lot of use lately.
22. Do you have iced tea made in a pitcher right now?
It's winter, so no. Also, iced tea isn't really a thing here. You can buy a single serve bottle of it in the refrigerated drinks section, but I've never made it at home. Or drunk it at home. Or known anyone who had it. (Also, I'd call what it's poured out of a jug.)
23. If you have a garage, is it cluttered?
There are shelves at the back of the garage that are a bit cluttered, yes. Assorted tins of paint and garden tools and car things, which are okay. An old fish bowl, which could probably be thrown out. A cast iron shoe last, which my grandparents used to use as a doorstop. A box of leftover tiles from the bathroom.
24. Curtains or blinds?
Plantation shutters in the bedrooms, with plans to install more through the rest of the house. Until then, curtains everywhere else, except for the kitchen, which has wide wooden Venetian blinds. The west side of the house has retractable external awnings to keep the summer sun off the windows.
25. How many pillows do you sleep with?
Just the one. Well, two, I suppose, as there's one on the other side of the bed, but I only use one at a time.
26. Do you sleep with any lights on at night?
No. Having said that, although I turn the lights off at night, I frequently wake up in the morning to find my bedside lamp on and a smug cat sunning his face under it. Not recently, but at various times in the past when I lived alone, I've woken up to find all the lights and sometimes the TV on. Not a sleepwalker but a sleepswitcher.
27. How many ceiling fans are in your home?
Four: one in the living room, one each in the two bedrooms, one in the office/sewing room (that is really meant to be a third bedroom). Also a bathroom fan, but that's a different sort of thing.
28. How often do you vacuum?
Me, about once a week with the big vacuum. My mother will often use the light vacuum to do the rugs during the week.
29. Standard toothbrush or electric?
Standard.
30. What color is your toothbrush?
Clear blue with silver and purple stripes and blue and green bristles.
31. Do you have a welcome mat on your front porch?
There's a doormat, but it doesn't say WELCOME. It's just a semi-circle of coir. There's a similar one at the back door.
32. What is in your oven right now?
Nothing.
33. Is your microwave clean or dirty?
It's so clean. I recently bought one of these. Pop some lemon juice and water in and the microwave smells delightful.
34. Is there anything under your bed?
My bed has drawers in the base, so it's got spare blankets and such under it.
35. Chore you hate doing the most?
I am not keen on ironing, so it's handy that my mother says she finds it good thinking time. On the other hand, she hates scrubbing tiles, which I don't mind, so that's my job.
36. What retro items are in your home?
There's a shelf of the kitchen cabinet full of matched cup/saucer/small plate sets from the 50s. I always think I should use them more, but the cups are too dainty for the hearty sized cups of tea I like.
37. Do you have a separate room that you use as an office?
Yes. As mentioned above, it's really a third bedroom, but as we don't need it, it's an office/sewing room. Two desks, a sewing table, a cupboard full of craft supplies, a small bookshelf of my work stuff, and a bookshelf built over one whole wall.
38. If you have a yard, who mows it?
Garden, not yard. Both my mother and I mow it, me on the weekends, my mother if she thinks it needs mowing during the week while I'm working. Our neighbour often mows the nature strip we share (that's the strip of lawn at the front of the house), in return for some homemade biscuits.
39. Is there anything on your kitchen floor right now?
Other than furniture, there is a red placemat with Alistair's food and water bowls on it.
40. How many mirrors are in your home?
There's a big one with backlights in the bathroom; a full-length one in the office/sewing room; a small one in my room on the wardrobe door; a small one in my mother's room by the door; she might have another one in her wardrobe too.
41. Do you have any hidden emergency money around your home?
There's a little money box shaped like a cottage on the kitchen dresser; that's got some loose change in it. I have a little blue piggy bank that I usually put a gold coin in each week, but I haven't had any since lockdown started. I owe it about eighteen coins now. I wouldn't class either of those as emergency money, though, unless it was an emergency that could be solved with a coin.
42. What color are your walls?
Through most of the house the walls are a sort of pale apricot colour; I can't remember what it was called. In those rooms, the ceilings are a pale grey-blue colour called Edge Water and the skirting boards are a darker version called Rainy Day. It was a very fashion-forward colour scheme when the house was painted last century. We have begun discussions about repainting, but that will take a while. (Also, some of the rooms have blonde wood panelling on the lower part of the walls.)
The only rooms that aren't that colour are the bathroom and laundry, which were renovated a couple of years ago. The walls there are pale grey-green, with white ceiling and trims. I suspect when the rest of the house is painted, the white ceiling and trims will be carried through with a complementary colour to the green on the walls.
43. Which rooms in your house have wallpaper?
None. Or the bedrooms, which have loose wallpaper lining the wardrobe shelves.
44. Do you have a peephole in your front door?
No, in my part of the world front doors usually have a mesh security door in front of them, so you can open the front door and not let intruders or mosquitoes in.
45. Do you keep any kind of protection weapons in your home?
No. I suppose the kitchen knives might do in a pinch.
46. What does your home smell like right now?
Nothing in particular. Nothing noticeable, at any rate.
47. Favorite candle scent?
None. I do not enjoy scented candles.
48. What kind of pickles (if any) are in your refrigerator?
I know I've got some marinated capsicums. There might be some gherkins.
49. Who are in the pictures you display?
We mostly have paintings or arty photos on the walls. I think the only personal photos are two big photos of my grandparents on the kitchen wall, and two smaller photos of my mother's grandparents on the kitchen dresser. (My mother also has photos of her late partner and me in her bedroom.)
50. What color is your favorite Bible?
What an intriguing vista into the lives of people who have enough Bibles to have a favourite one. My school Bible was teal; I think that's in the bookshelf somewhere. My mother's school Bible has a dark red cover; I know that's still around, but I don't know where. I wouldn't say either was my favourite.
51. Do you have plenty of cabinet space in your kitchen?
Not cabinets as such. Our kitchen has deep drawers rather than cabinets; there's also a dresser and a walk-in pantry. Plenty of space.
52. Ever been on your roof?
Yes. We have a roofed patio now, but before that was built, that side of the house had easy access to the roof (provided you had a ladder), and was ideal for watching New Year's fireworks. I liked up there; the house has had parts added over the years, so it's not a single roof, but one with hills and valleys.
52. Do you own a stereo?
Yes, there is an old stereo in a cabinet in the corner of the living room. It's got a record player, tape deck and CD player, and probably a radio too. I can't remember last time it was used.
53. How many TVs do you have?
Two. One in the living room, and a smaller one tucked away in the dining room.
54. How many house phones?
My mother insists on keeping a landline, so one. Which came with two handsets, now I think about it, so there's a second phone in a cupboard somewhere.
55. Do you have a housekeeper?
Ha, no.
56. What style do you decorate in?
The house, or the first part of it, was built in the early 1900s, so it can carry some older, Art Nouveau-ish stuff. Mostly it's decorated in a style called Comfortable Mishmash.
57. Do you like solid colors in furniture or prints?
Solid colours.
58. Is there a smoke detector in your home?
Yes, it's compulsory by law. Ours is a ten-year one.
59. In case of fire, what are the items you would grab if you could only make one quick trip?
Mister Alistair Cat hopefully, and if I couldn't get his carrier out of the garage, I'd probably have to make do with grabbing his lead too. Other than that, practical things: phone, wallet, laptop, change of underwear. Which makes me sound horribly unsentimental, but I can't think of one particular thing I'd grab in a hurry. Maybe a couple of photo albums, or my mother's jewellery box?
60. Do you know how to work your electrical box?
Sort of. I know where it is and I can flick switches as necessary. I haven't had to do anything with it for ages.
61. What temperature in your home is most comfortable to you?
My preferred range is 20 to 25C, although I don't mind colder.