Is something wrong with me?
I am finally getting over a cold and cough that has had both Fred and me sick for about two weeks. I am grateful it doesn’t appear to be the flu because the symptoms were just stuffy noses and deep rattling cough. It is a blessing neither of us had any nasty gastric components to go with the cough.
Being sick in bed leaves a lot of time for watching mindless television programs.
Beside the cold, I think there is something else wrong with me. I’ve been reading up on the whole XY chromosome helix and I have some questions. Are there any other letters available to describe my gender? Things that seem to excite my girlfriends that are carrying the XX designation typically don’t appeal to me. Maybe I just have an extra helping of apathy. Maybe my genetic code is NIX instead of XX?
Recently I have developed an interest in those reality television programs where the people buy, repair and then resell houses. This fascination developed when I was searching for a new house to rent. If you are not familiar with these programs, the format is simple. Teams of attractive young people find distressed residential property, tear out walls. They then install new floors, cabinets and plumbing fixtures. They then spend part of the allotted hour fixing up the house, which they sell for a whopping profit.
One based in Florida found an alligator in the swimming pool. They lured it out of the pool with fried chicken and had an exterminator take it away. Snakes and alligators scare me green!
Here is the part that confuses me the most about these shows.
Before they hold the big open house hoping to attract buyers they bring in yet another group of attractive young people to “stage,” the house. They call it staging when they bring in a load of rather generic furniture, artwork and throw pillows in what I can only assume are attempts to create a homey environment.
I can understand baking chocolate chip cookies or an apple pie with lots of vanilla and cinnamon in the recipe to give the house that homey, just-baked-in smell. Nevertheless, how am I supposed to visualize my vast collection of belongings decorating my possible new abode when somebody else’s stuff is already in the house?
Another fun program on the DIY (Do-it-Yourself) channel is “Flea Market Flip.” On this game show, two couples are given a list of three projects, $500 and one hour to shop at a large flea market on the east coast. The project lists typically contains mandates such as storage containers, glass, lighting, mirror or seating. The contestants seem to make a lot of wine bars and bar carts.
After making their purchases, the merchandise is taken to a warehouse-workshop for renovation. They are also given an extra $100 to obtain embellishments to dress up their unique one-of-a-kind items.
In the workshop, the players are assisted by a team of professional artists as they repurpose the flea market items.
After the overhauls, the merchandise is returned to a flea market where the teams have one day to sell all three projects. Depending on how much the team invested in the items they bought and what they are able to sell them for, the team that makes the most money wins $5,000.
I admire creative people who can make things of beauty out of cast-off junk. My mother was famous for this type of creativity with her sewing machine. She once took our bathroom curtains, turned them into an angel costume for my elementary school Xmas pageant and then turned them back into curtains after the show.
Since beauty is said to be in the eye of the beholder some of the finished projects look worse to me than when they started.
The last time I went furniture shopping the salesman told me my sense of fashion is stuck somewhere in the mid-1970s. Anytime I am considering a piece of furniture, I want the wood to be walnut. Lighter colored woods are currently more popular than dark ones.
Watching these “fix-um,” programs, I cringe when I see people slap paint on a nice wood grain. The cabinets in my last house had no handles on the doors and drawers. They all featured a recessed area at the bottom instead. Those types of cubby-hole handles are tough on my fingernails. My new house has little round brass knobs with what appears to be pearl or a ceramic center. I can see nice wood grain on the kitchen cabinets underneath the cream-colored paint.
If I were buying rather than renting this house, I might hire someone to come in and strip them back to woodgrain. On the other hand, maybe not, that super-size order of apathy is kicking in again!
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Have a great weekend.
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Readers may contact Tami Jo Nix by emailingtamijonix@gmail.com or following @TamiJoNix on Twitter.
