1. Finish that damn closet. Yep, it’s finished! And it actually looks awesome. Who knew that painting the inside of a closet, replacing the wire shelf with a real shelf, and adding some hooks and organization could be so much work? But it was totally worth it because I’m convinced this is the type of thing that’s eventually going to sell this place.
Sound crazy?
Think about it. You can walk into a place you’re potentially interested in buying and it might appear clean, but then you open a closet and see where the mess went. Subconsciously, this makes you wonder what else the homeowners might be hiding.
Well I’ve got news for you, judgy wudgy – we ain’t hiding nothin’ but some dog leashes and a Dyson. No skeletons in this closet, thankyouverymuch.
The other closets in the house are another story.
2. Sell a bunch of the “big” items taking up space in the garage and office so they can both get cleaned out. Well, I sold almost everything I listed: 2 desks, kitchen range with hood, and a dining table with 4 chairs. The only thing I didn’t get any bites on was an office chair, so I’ll wait a bit and try again. I have a few other things I want to try selling, so I consider this a successful start.
Now. Here’s the kicker.
I don’t have pictures of the garage and office for you tonight. It’s getting too dark to get a decent picture of the closet, and I’m covered in primer and paint, and I still need to take the mutts on a walk and give them baths, and I’m so hungry and I need a beer.
So those things need to get taken care of. Not necessarily in that order.
But I will update this post tomorrow with photos.
Pinky swear.
And I never go back on a pinky swear.
Notice that I picked the multiracial pinky swear photo from Esquire.com to emphasize the fact that I’m not racist.
Or maybe it was just one of the first photos to show up.
My friend Leslie was kind enough this morning to point out that I neglected to fulfill a promise I made last week about keeping you posted on my weekly goals so I can finally get a bunch of projects done around this wreck of a house.
I was supposed to tell you yesterday (Monday), but instead, I was actually working on fulfilling said goal.
But Leslie made me realize – If I don’t disclose the goals on here (or to anyone, for that matter), I’ll never get them done.
Because no one would give me a hard time about it.
And that’s what friends (and blog readers, who are practically friends because there isn’t much on here I don’t disclose about myself) are for – to give you shit when you start slacking.
Because they care.
I actually have 2 goals for this week:
1. Finish that damn closet so our coats can get off the guest bed and back into the closet where they belong. Haven’t you heard? It’s springtime, baby!
2. Sell a bunch of the “big” items taking up space in the garage and office so they can both get cleaned out. That’s what I was working on yesterday – putting our old dining table, range, 2 office desks, and an office chair on Craigslist in the hope of selling them sometime this week.
Because this is what the garage looks like right now:
Nope, it ain’t pretty.
So far I’ve learned 2 things:
1. I priced the dining table and range too low. I’ve gotten about a billion responses, and now I’m kicking myself for letting people convince me I couldn’t get very much for them.
2. Craigslist folk are unreliable. The lady who was supposed to buy the range told me she’d be here before 10:00. It’s now after 11:00, and she still hasn’t shown. She’s probably going to be pissed when I call the next guy in line, but sorry lady! You snooze, you lose. This thing has got to go.
I should’ve known, though. Erin warned us once about the perils of Craigslist:
So, yeah. It’s not going that great so far.
On a completely unrelated note, have you ever seen the movie Spanglish with Adam Sandler?
It’s one of those movies that wasn’t originally my cup of tea, but for whatever reason I watched it again, and then again, and then again because there’s just something about it that’s so honest about human nature and our flaws and our idiosyncrasies that it just feels raw and real and… I don’t know… imperfect. But that’s okay, because that’s the point.
Anyway.
There’s this scene where Adam Sandler’s life is just crap. He’s an amazing chef with a beautiful house and family, but it doesn’t matter because things are falling apart in his marriage, the kids are suffering from huge self-esteem issues inflicted by their crazy mother who can’t recognize the reasons she’s so unhappy, his mother-in-law lives with them and happens to be a raging alcoholic, and their entire family is having a negative impact on the “pure” and holistic upbringing their nanny, who is a beautiful, single, illegal immigrant from Mexico, is trying to impart on her own impressionable young daughter.
And all of these things are weighing on him. They tear him down every day.
But in this scene he’s about to have a moment – a moment of pure bliss. He’s fixing himself this amazing sandwich. We’re talkin’ the mother of all BLT’s, with crispy bacon, fresh butterhead lettuce and ripe tomato slices, mayo (of course), and thick wheat bread with some Monterey jack cheese that’s been broiled to perfection, all topped off with a glorious fried egg whose yolk doesn’t break until he slices into the sandwich’s divine center belly, the golden fluids bleeding out onto the plate for a perfect dipping opportunity.
Then – then – he pours himself some kind of gourmet-looking dark beer into a tall pilsner glass (at which point I completely jizz in my pants) and the entire scene is done in silence with just the sounds of the egg being fried, the crack and fizz of the beer as it’s poured into the glass, the grate of the knife on the plate.
Perfection.
I will never forget that scene. It’s like this moment he so desperately needs – just himself, the paper, the perfect sandwich, and a beer.
Of course, it all gets ruined for him before he can take the first mind-blowing bite, but that’s beside the point.
The point is that sometimes you don’t have to get too fancy to have a completely satisfying meal. Sometimes a sandwich – a sandwich that you take a little care and time to prepare correctly – can be the perfect ending to an otherwise less-than-perfect day.
And I want to thank my sister, who reminded me of that last night when she encouraged me to make this:
Known henceforth as the “Orgasm Panini,” which, if executed correctly, could cause a paninigasm (thanks Jeff, for the term).
For a list of ingredients I used, check out the description of this photo on the Domestiphobia Facebook page.
Yep. I’m sneaky like that.
***UPDATED***
Here are is the cast of characters for the Orgasm Panini (I figure it’s only fair if you stumbled across this later to not make you search for the ingredients) from bottom to top:
Some type of thickly sliced bread, mayo with lemon juice and basil, Cajun turkey from the deli, fresh tomato, freshly sliced or grated Mozzarella, cooked bacon, artichoke hearts, fresh baby spinach. Toast in panini press and enjoy.
