Knicker Notes Goes Exploring

 

A splendid Steampunk Convivial at Gloucester, where a lovely time was had by all. 

I showed great self-restraint and didn't come home with a portrait of myself as a spirit guide in the Netherworlds. (Maybe next time.)

Mine's got to be negative, so theirs can be positive

'Salma Hayek is dreadfully jetlagged, which is one of the perils of having homes around the world and frequently hopping between them. “Let me tell you about my craziness,” she says by video chat from her home in west London. “I’m here for less than a week, then I go back [to the US] for five days for my husband’s work, then I come back here for my work, then I go back to LA because I’m getting a star on the Hollywood Boulevard! It’s crazy,” she says. After this interview she has a fitting for dresses for various movie premieres.' *

Fitting in seamlessly with Cop 26, then. 

Salma Hayek, keeping good company with Boris Johnson, House of Windsor, and most others on this planet who maintain power, connections, plus spare cash in the bank for their Gold Card Air Travel.

My only conclusion - as I lower the thermostat and turn off the gas-fired boiler at 14 degrees, when I put on another jumper - is that I need to maintain a zero-negative footprint, so Salma, Johnson and Co can continue to enjoy their carbon-gobbling lifestyles, unimpeded by the concerns of mortals.

What's to be done? Apart from boycotting Eternals and cringing over the gushing prose of adoration. Time for this style of journalism to go, and a more critical approach to come in.

As in, this newspaper could start supplying me with joined-up information. At the end of the article, I want a rating scale on these objects of adoration - how many planets does Salma need to keep going? What's the carbon footprint of Eternals? Ask the obvious question - Given The Guardian is elsewhere reporting on our climate crisis - how many homes around the world do you really need, Salma?

* Journalism at The Guardian, Wed 3 Nov 2021. Hadley Freeman, probably captivated by all the twinkling.

How Victorian can you get?

Continuing the plan to evade responsibility, discover my wild child, and live out the back of a van, come and get the Victorian note in your dining experience. It's at my gaffe, waiting for you.

Screw expander patented by Joseph Fitter, 1864. Crank handle works, original casters, lovely brass frills. Add candelabra and fireplace. Christmas sorted. 

 

 

105cm x 105cm without the additional leaf of 40cm. Height 72cm. £175, no courier cost if you're local, because we'll carry it round for free. Otherwise, we'll figure it out between us.

 If you want to come and see it, send me a message. Sadly, becoming rarer! Personally I think there should be a protected space for mechanical furniture. 

 Hopefully, we'll find that space at your house.

 

PS to the official inheritors. It's not the big one. That one is still your problem.

Buy a pair of Eames style swivel chairs

 

They're up at Black Phone Vintage Etsy shop, and I'd have them myself if I had the space. 

 As it is, I'm renting out my space so I can go and live in my lovely new micro camper van.

(Ladies who live in vans cannot take with them any pre-loved furnishings.)

What I'm hearing

'I can't answer these difficult questions, so I'm going to try and wriggle off the hook by saying, 'you have no right to ask me these difficult questions'.

And of course I'm sorry. That I was caught.

Obviously I'm not sorry for having an affair. I felt quite pleased with myself about how clever I was, looking down the corridor before having a grope. I could outwit anyone, clearly. And I bet I can outwit you by saying, 'it's personal'.

Yes, I can live with deceit. Lying to my kids, to my wife, to my employer, deceiving the public and lying to anyone who asks a tricky question is fine in my moral world. Just because my moral code is not the same as yours doesn't mean mine is wrong.

Now you need to stop asking me difficult questions because it is bad for your mental health. It will be bad for you if you ask me any more questions. You will put everything at risk and make a mess of everything and it will be All Your Fault.

So what if I put my mistress in a career position so I could carry on my affair in public while pretending I wasn't? Which man in a position of power wouldn't do that? The fact that I can do it just shows you how powerful and clever I am.

And everyone else should take some blame. I didn't take advantage of anyone. It's not like she was a student wanting help with an essay.

Anyway, it's all a question of semantics. If I wanted my mistress close so we could have sex whenever we wanted and then some snoop became suspicious about late nights closed up together in a hotel room, we could say it was work. Work, work work. It's just a word which has a specific meaning if, like me, you're having an affair.'

Thanks, Matt Hancock.

How orange is my Fungi

 

Froth me up!

 

A Baby ate a Curry and This Happened

 

My new kitchen wall colour. Not up for negotiation and no compromise.

Thank you Peepah, for everything.

Bookshelves at Knicker Drawer Note Books

 

 

 

Here. With fakery, truth, madness, revenge, joy, curiosity, mortality, despair, love, forgiveness, brutality, revenge, bravery, honesty, humanity, resentment, kindness, determination, wonder, graciousness, resolution, thoughtfulness, steadfastness, memory, sacrifice, poison. It's a life.

Salvage from the local skip

 

Another freakin' makeover

Mezzanine floor, supported by scaffolding (expensive) and original Victorian cast iron drain pipes (cheap, from the scrap yard).

Copper tank, thank you Peepah!

Column, painted up, waiting for the place of its abode (watch that space, literally, in the pit).

Beautiful little window on the upper floor, with shutter, overdesigned in Steampunk style. Metal framed window rescued from a pile destined for the tip. Little lock works beautifully. I'm told it came from an outhouse. (Freecycle at its best, I'd say.)

Rrrraaahhh! With many thanks to Mr M and Mr R for sharing ideas, creative processes, thoughts, whimsies, and everyday laughter. I've not taken a welding course and have not yet had a go with the angle grinder, so much yet to learn. 

Still to come: more painting, table, sink, suspended bed, suspended sofa, swing (possibly), toilet, Belfast sink (thank you Freecycle), copper tank table, shower, lighting, solar heated water store, stove, outdoor dining area...
 

From dump space to work shop

I want to be in a place which tells me what it is to be human. A place which is made up, unique, bolted together; a place which shows its resourcefulness, wit and craft. 

I want to feel a playfulness at every point. I want to be invited to linger here, to touch, be curious, laugh. Flick a switch and see what happens. I want a space which is for ever a wondering space. What is this for? What could be?

I need a place which is honest, true to itself, unashamed of rough edges, scars, slips of the saw and wobbly location of the drill. I need to track the bone structure and neural pathway; I want to know how one thing connects to another along textures, threads, lengths, lines of light.

I want to reject the fancy layers that conceal and deceive. I need to know how my place does not disguise how it is held together. I want to see it revealed, straightforward in its declaration of itself, unconcerned with superficial coverings of smooth walls and oh-so-very nice floors.

I want a place that uses what we have, the material objects buried in the ground, scavenged and scrounged. The chains pulled from the earth and the metal walkway discarded in a pile of scrap; the door thrown away and the wood salvaged from the tip.

I want a place which uses all of itself, from top to bottom, side to side. Let no place be hidden from exploration. Let no corner be a place that we hurry from, or neglect, or draw over a curtain and shudder. I want to see it all.

I want a space for day and night to come to play. Where the light arrives, suddenly, strongly and sharply. But departs in a snap. You wonder what happened to fade and shadow. You can find those curving shapes in grey tones and slips of drawn grey, but then you'll be startled with the black and white, sharp and bright, so you'll need to keep your curiosity alive as you examine every part.

I want a place that stitches together our connections to the past to the present-day maker's marks filled with thoughts of the future. People made this place happen before, using hard tools and rough hands and steady thought; their respect and care for the day's work and what could be made in the future. And we make it happen, each day we pick up a sanding block, a power tool, a cloth rag to wipe away the dust.

And this space must be raw-edged, but warm: I want the cold wind to shoot through, but I want heavy fabric drapes and rough, warm textures too. I want the tingling chill of cold water and the luxury of hot water at the dip of your toes.

We're keeping those design values as we go. And slowly, bit by bit, day by day, it's taking shape.

Best memories

 

My first thought is to serve a legal notice

I'm clearing out the garage.

From a heavy lump of metal I peel back layers of a newspaper. The Evening Standard, Wednesday, 8 March 1972.

On Page 10 is the article for London News. A rap for both the boss and secretary

Britains's secretaries are given a rap across the knuckles today for a decline in the standard of their work.

But their bosses come in for a few criticisms as well, from a man who should know what he's talking about - Mr Lance Secretan, managing director of Manpower, which supplies more than 10,000 office workers to firms throughout the country.

[...] Mr Secretan has written a book called How to be an Effective Secretary, to be published on Friday.

[...] The traditional pitfall for a secretary, the amorous pass from the boss, produces 'few complaints' coming back to Manpower from its girls.

'The intelligent ones deal with it and stay in their jobs. The unintelligent ones resign, or something.' said Mr Secretan.

But his book warns secretaries not to get involved in the boss's private life unless 'you are sure it is in both his and the company's best interests.'

The rummage continues

Memories of Seahouses 2010