... the cat has intimated that this is not his area of responsibility ...
Oh yes it is. He needs to get his priorities sorted out!
I always assumed that the reason we were plagued with mice in St. John's was because there were several cats in the vicinity, but as our house was a cat-free zone, the mice felt it was their prerogative ...
Word of advice, don't Google "glory hole" - the meaning has changed somewhat and there is a much better known urban dictionary version that has taken over the original meaning. (I'm being nice to piglet here and not linking to it)
FWIW, that “don’t google” meaning is the only meaning I’ve ever known, and I first heard it at least 40 years ago.
What IS the original meaning of "glory hole"? I only know the NSFW version.
I don't have a walk-in pantry, but I did figure out a good solution to an acute lack of storage space in my kitchen. (I'm only the second owner of this relatively new house, but bad design is timeless.)
Said kitchen has a center island; the refrigerator was on the far side of it from where food preparation takes place. So when I redid the kitchen, I had said appliance moved to a more convenient spot. I added more cabinets, including one over the fridge (as if I could reach it) and another short one, taking the cabinets to the outside wall.
That left me with a very deep pantry space. I found some pull-out shelf units online - German-made, and stereotypically efficient - with tall ones for the main pantry and short ones (for pots and pans) to go under them. I also had a shelf added to a deep rectangular space above the wall ovens (apparently designed for a TV) and cabinet doors put in front of it. The pathetically narrow pantry I found when I bought the place is now reserved for brooms, cleaning materials, and the like. Voila! Space!
In French, I believe the term is 'debarras' - we stayed in a gite once which was advertised as having one such, and when we turned up, it was an absolute treasure trove of Stuff - Mr S's father adored rummaging around among the broken prams, farm implements from the Middle Ages and so on.
Now we have no garage, only an outdoor store room/workshop, and she is known as Debbie (it's shorter than almost any other way of referring to her!)
We also have a Russia House - the Up Stairs Sitting Room - but still struggle with a pet name for the hall/breakfast room/conservatory!
I seem to remember a shipmate who some years ago used the line, "Don't anthropomorphise inanimate objects - they don't like it". I thought it was very wise.
There is a church in Edinburgh which many of my friends attend.
Just before you go into the sanctuary /auditorium /body of the kirk there is a small recessed area (like a broom cupboard/ janitors closet).
I think it used have shelves for hymnbooks and someone would stand there to hand them out and welcome people, now it has the monitors for their CCTV
They all refer to it as the "glory hole"
But could be used in place of a rawlplug?
I impressed one workman by having the contents of my drawer in a multipocketed plastic thing hung on the back of the utility room door. I can see everything! Lakeland have stopped selling them.
Ruamoko - the Maori God responsible for earthquakes. Today's one was small (3.2) but close by, noisy and shallow - noisy always makes it seem worse and close by and shallow always feels worse.
TICTH the irritation felt when it’s obvious that those posting on social media pages are not of the group they are supposed to be representing. They are posting what they think ‘they’ should want rather than truly representing us.
This is why you shouldn't have heroes. TICTH the arsehole who has been one of my favourite authors for years and a deep influence on my world view and approach to online communities turns out to have been a serial sexual harasser. Bastard I am heartbroken and livid.
Got one of those, too, for the same and with the same caveat. The utility room one is at least twice as long, sort of three quarters the length of the door. It's got fuses, garden twine, allen keys, cup hooks, small screwdrivers, secateurs (some pockets are bigger), garden labels, S hooks, wire strippers, fuse wire, wire closures for plastic bags, sticky stuff removal sachets, rooting powder, WD40 in a tube with a pen type applicator, steel tape measure, washers, wood scratch cover pens and a lot of other stuff which, being two floors up I can't instantly recall, but, when there's a job to be done, I go and stare at it for a while, and find something which will do the job. Or else I find that I already took the tool I need and didn't return it. I'm definitely missing a set of three small screwdrivers from a cracker*, slot, cross head and an awl in a plastic case.
Missing mini screwdrivers are a right pain, especially when the really tiny ones for glasses get lost or are walked off with. Both Mr Dragon and I wear glasses, so I have one but can rarely find it when I need it!
@Pendragon I think your mini screwdriver and mine have gone and hidden in the same place. When it's also my clarinet's set of screwdrivers, it's a massive pain.
I am thinking of taking the mini-screwdrivers in my house (when I find them, of course) and hanging them on a nail in the kitchen like I did with the scissors. I always put the scissors back and figure I would do the same with the screwdrivers.
Penny, that sounds like the most useful of contraptions - especially if all the contents are where you think they are! We had a tool-box, which served a similar purpose, but as you can imagine, things that were taken out, even for perfectly legitimate purposes, were rarely put back.
If I ever get my own place, I may well invest in one, and find a suitable door from which to suspend it.
Your New Place may well (one hopes) already have at least one door...
I keep a handy selection of small tools in an old butler's knife tray (the tray is old - I suspect the butler is buttling in Heaven...).
Larger tools live in the wheelhouse of the Ark, and, utilising lockdown, I recently overhauled the collection, cleaning some, and disposing of others...
I have a Stanley cantilever toolbox which used to live in the garage, but is currently in my study. I bought it for school because the head decided I couldn't have the desk with the locking drawer, so I needed something I could lock for the craft knives. I have a tool bag which lives on the landing of the second floor for stuff I need for a job. The small screwdrivers may be in there. Biggish things should be in one or other of those. The hand drill and the yankee screwdriver and the bits for them live in a very nice wooden box I found in Oxfam. It had a curious label on the underside of the lid, and investigation proved it had once held a device for inserting into torpedoes for testing them. I consider this to be a spears into pruning hooks job.
My sister has a lovely big wooden chest that belonged to my grandad and the tools that went in it, and uses them.
I can't remember when I last saw the spectacles drivers, but I have a set of precision drivers in the door hanging, which will do the job if required.
Free advice, and also worthy of consignment to a hotter place. Don't ever buy a black plastic toolbox. Small tools will vanish in the bottom for years at a time. Like cars, red ones perform much better.
I have a collection of used Christingle candles in our kitchen drawer, together with a box of matches. If we ever have a blackout, I know they can easily be found. There’s also a torch in there.
Whilst giving the interior a wipe round, I noticed what I thought was a piece of packaging I'd forgotten to remove.
I removed it, whereupon it broke in two pieces (it's made of a sort of cardboard).
I became suspicious - had I done Something Stupid?
Yes. I had.
On enquiring of my friend Mr Go Ogle, I find that it was, in fact, a Most Necessary Item, preventing short-circuits. I have, therefore, had to order replacements from my other friend, Mr E Bay.
Government legislation that mandates that I have to make decisions about the autumn and next summer this week, when everything is in flux, and some of the answers I need to make plans bare not straightforward to find. (The thought that there are about 15 weeks to October is also a bit scary.)
Online forms that ask you for specific information, and then won't take what it asks for. I've entered every possible combination of the alphanumeric codes required separately and together (both ways round) and still it asks me for a valid code.... I checked with the supplier of the codes as to which bits I needed; I entered what they told me, and still it won't take it.
I have gone back to online form owner to ask if I can do this another way... ie mail them the details!
People who leave 'stuff' outside closed charity shops, even when the windows of those charity shops have been cleared of goods and have notices posted up saying they are closed for the duration, that they are not accepting donations, and please not to leave anything outside the shop,
@Roseofsharon, I do not know if this will help you, but when we had the same problem at our church thrift store I called the local paper and asked them to do an article about the problem. They pointed out the cost of taking away trash people had left, things ruined setting out in the rain and not useable. The good the shop did for the community and how stuff left outside meant less we had to help others. It seemed to help a lot for a year or so.
TICTH the Evil Daystar. It's 26C today and due to get worse. Indoors is stuffy, outdoors is unbearable as there are no clouds and the sun hurts my skin. Fortunately lockdown means I don't have to put up with human Salamanders telling me how lovely it is.
Would it make you feel better to know that here in the Phoenix area it's supposed to reach 43C today? (That in addition to Trump coming here.)
Not really. That heat would kill me, and I don't mean metaphorically. My ideal is 20-21 with at least 50% cloud cover. I drink but it gives me relief for a few seconds. I can't take any more clothes off without causing acute visual discomfort to everyone else. What can I do?
We own a movable air conditioner. Not the most eco-friendly of devices, but it does help cool things down. It was very useful a couple of summers ago, when we were using our west-facing box room as the office.
I am in full support of KarlB.
Even with the help of the sea breeze I can only function before 09:30 and after 18:30 at the moment.
At least we are over the longest day, and the sun will, slowly, be getting a smidgeon less time to torment us.
It is just above 100F 40 C here today. The dog and I get up at 6:30AM finish walk and outdoor watering by 8:00 I do minor chores and am pretty useless until 7:30 PM when I do laundry, cleaning and such. I just nap between 1 and 3 with air conditioner going and a small fan. Thankfully we get breaks in this during the summer and it cools off at night.
I'm starting to melt just reading those temperatures! I heard from friends in Fredericton that it was in the mid-30s there last weekend, and I was very glad to be in cool, gentle Edinburgh!
Having said that, I've just looked at the Met Office website, and it's to go up to 24° on Thursday, which is Too Hot.
My comfort zone is a good frosty day around 0°C, and anything above brings out the worst in me. It was in the 30s until today, which has been a little easier, in the low 20s, but with rain, so horribly muggy. The thing that works best for me is lying on the bed under the ceiling fan - a heavenly invention, and better than air conditioning. Persons who use compression stockings and suchlike are to be avoided right now - we are not nice to know.
I bought a mosquito net with the idea of supending it over my bed and spraying it with water to evaporate and cool the surroundings. It was no good, being synthetic and water resistant*. I need a lot of muslin. I have a peculiar lighting fitment from IKEA with two leads like trolley bus wires crossing the room, and my bed, and five directional lights between them**. It would be ideal to hang a coathanger with wet muslin from, if I could find the muslin. I have loads of thin sheets, but too heavy I think.
*Last seen protecting the bramble from the birds.
**https://s.ecrater.com/stores/54622/542615cc29187_54622b.jpg Something like this, with the lights spread across the width of the room, and the sphere on the ceiling. I've changed the halogens for LEDs. No prongs. Not my choice. I was going to change it, but the position for the pendant would mean I couldn't see into the wardrobe the other side of the room.
Anyway. Muslin. The company Mum used for that sort of thing has gone.
Comments
I always assumed that the reason we were plagued with mice in St. John's was because there were several cats in the vicinity, but as our house was a cat-free zone, the mice felt it was their prerogative ...
I don't have a walk-in pantry, but I did figure out a good solution to an acute lack of storage space in my kitchen. (I'm only the second owner of this relatively new house, but bad design is timeless.)
Said kitchen has a center island; the refrigerator was on the far side of it from where food preparation takes place. So when I redid the kitchen, I had said appliance moved to a more convenient spot. I added more cabinets, including one over the fridge (as if I could reach it) and another short one, taking the cabinets to the outside wall.
That left me with a very deep pantry space. I found some pull-out shelf units online - German-made, and stereotypically efficient - with tall ones for the main pantry and short ones (for pots and pans) to go under them. I also had a shelf added to a deep rectangular space above the wall ovens (apparently designed for a TV) and cabinet doors put in front of it. The pathetically narrow pantry I found when I bought the place is now reserved for brooms, cleaning materials, and the like. Voila! Space!
Now we have no garage, only an outdoor store room/workshop, and she is known as Debbie (it's shorter than almost any other way of referring to her!)
We also have a Russia House - the Up Stairs Sitting Room - but still struggle with a pet name for the hall/breakfast room/conservatory!
Just before you go into the sanctuary /auditorium /body of the kirk there is a small recessed area (like a broom cupboard/ janitors closet).
I think it used have shelves for hymnbooks and someone would stand there to hand them out and welcome people, now it has the monitors for their CCTV
They all refer to it as the "glory hole"
Said drawer being "junk drawer" or "jumble drawer" here, IME.
* If you asked my mum where something was, the most likely answer would be "in the second drawer down" (in the kitchen).
I once heard of such a drawer which contained a Paper Bag labelled 'Bits of String too Short to be of any Use'...
I impressed one workman by having the contents of my drawer in a multipocketed plastic thing hung on the back of the utility room door. I can see everything! Lakeland have stopped selling them.
Neat idea!
* Of the costume variety. What I have of the good stuff is locked up.
*https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christmas_cracker I always buy ones with useful gifts inside.
If I ever get my own place, I may well invest in one, and find a suitable door from which to suspend it.
I keep a handy selection of small tools in an old butler's knife tray (the tray is old - I suspect the butler is buttling in Heaven...).
Larger tools live in the wheelhouse of the Ark, and, utilising lockdown, I recently overhauled the collection, cleaning some, and disposing of others...
My sister has a lovely big wooden chest that belonged to my grandad and the tools that went in it, and uses them.
I can't remember when I last saw the spectacles drivers, but I have a set of precision drivers in the door hanging, which will do the job if required.
Hehe...true - but would he still be buttling in Heaven? Or might perhaps an apprentice angel be deputed to buttling for him?
Whilst giving the interior a wipe round, I noticed what I thought was a piece of packaging I'd forgotten to remove.
I removed it, whereupon it broke in two pieces (it's made of a sort of cardboard).
I became suspicious - had I done Something Stupid?
Yes. I had.
On enquiring of my friend Mr Go Ogle, I find that it was, in fact, a Most Necessary Item, preventing short-circuits. I have, therefore, had to order replacements from my other friend, Mr E Bay.
(singed)
BF, Local Boob.
I have gone back to online form owner to ask if I can do this another way... ie mail them the details!
Not really. That heat would kill me, and I don't mean metaphorically. My ideal is 20-21 with at least 50% cloud cover. I drink but it gives me relief for a few seconds. I can't take any more clothes off without causing acute visual discomfort to everyone else. What can I do?
It won't get really hot until August.
The Gulf water is 87 (30.6C) now, but we sane people are not going to the beach.
Even with the help of the sea breeze I can only function before 09:30 and after 18:30 at the moment.
At least we are over the longest day, and the sun will, slowly, be getting a smidgeon less time to torment us.
Having said that, I've just looked at the Met Office website, and it's to go up to 24° on Thursday, which is Too Hot.
*Last seen protecting the bramble from the birds.
**https://s.ecrater.com/stores/54622/542615cc29187_54622b.jpg Something like this, with the lights spread across the width of the room, and the sphere on the ceiling. I've changed the halogens for LEDs. No prongs. Not my choice. I was going to change it, but the position for the pendant would mean I couldn't see into the wardrobe the other side of the room.
Anyway. Muslin. The company Mum used for that sort of thing has gone.