Show and Tell: Slogging through

I'm still going. Slowly and complainingly, but I am.

My car is in the shop (again) so I'm sticking mostly to home this weekend. Friday ended on a nice note - I had a meeting, but we held it in the bar across the street. And it was a good meeting, with the old guys telling stories. Is there anything better than that? I love listening to stories, which is probably why I like blogging so much. Even if I didn't have my blog, I would still be reading your stories.
After the bar meeting I walked with my boss over to his neighbor's house. The three of us sat on the porch while Charlie and Betty (the standard poodle who also comes to work every day) played with Henry, who is a black goldendoodle puppy that my boss's neighbor was puppysitting. He is so adorable - he's like a small bear, all furry and lumbering and wiggly. Size-wise, he's right in between Charlie and Betty. So these three black dogs had a ball running around in the yard while the sun glinted through the trees and we slurped beer and margaritas. 'Bout damn time something nice happened, even if it was just the beauty of nothing really happening.

I've been horribly terrible about commenting - I apologize if you were looking for my incredibly witty and insightful comments on a recent post. Every time I went to google reader this week I ended up reading, starring to comment on later, and then realizing I had starred ninty posts and deciding to unstar them all. But I am listening, I promise.

For Show and Tell this week I am showing my backsplash.



Yeah, not all that exciting. And it's a pretty simple and tiny one. Just nine square feet of white subway tiles. And um, my paint still needs a second coat over there. And my sink has dirty dishes in it. And that plant in the bottom of a two liter is the habanero peppers I planted a while back that really should have been put in the ground a couple weeks ago.

But I told Kelly I would send her a picture and I am also feeling for Kate, who has bravely and recklessly embarked upon redoing her bathroom. (I am ALL ABOUT starting big home improvement projects at inopportune times. As soon as I can afford to start IVF, look for me to rip up my own bathroom.)

Here's a closer look at the tiles. Still not terribly exciting, but I like them and it was a great afternoon project. (Of course, I still need to do the section on the wall right there. And please ignore my hideous countertop. I hate it, but somehow black soapstone isn't in my budget right now.) Those are my favorite kind - like painting a room or putting freaking drawer pulls on after a year and a half of having to sort of hook your finger along the side of the drawer to get to the spoons.

And because I took a picture of it, the opposite side of the room:
The white door was the ironing closet, but the ironing board was long gone before we got here. I made it one of my little projects by painting the back the same green as the kitchen and building tiny white shelves for our spices. (It's also out place to hanging dried things, like those flowers and the half a pepper from last year's crop.)
We also have this built-in. (I *really* should have cleaned this out before taking a picture. Oh well. Please don't judge. I know I have a whole bunch of empty wine bottles. I keep thinking that last little bit can be used for cooking.) Originally, a table and two benches were attached and could be pulled down or put back up, but the table broke and the woman before us tore them off. So sad.


Next up is the floor. Right now it is the ugliest white and gray vinyl ever. I want to do black and white checkerboard. What do you think?