Saturday, May 22, 2010

Weekend #2

Saturday involved a full day of clearing away more stuff from around and under the house. Russell spent the bulk of the day in the "basement," a crawl space under the southeast corner of the house. The combination of tools and shoes continued in the basement, with the addition of some landscape paintings, electrical motors, antlers, boxes of screws, crutches, Xmas decorations, photographic chemicals, false teeth samples, cigar boxes, 7UP six-packs circa 1990, a spyglass, a marksman's medal, Listerine, and one gigantic light bulb.

Steve from down the street hung out most of the day, salvaging a few pieces of metal for future sculptures. Frank, another neighbor, came by with a trailer for metal scraps that he will haul away for free!

I worked on consolidating the shoe collection, then clearing out the northeast corner of the house. Lots of small piles of junk, tons of flower pots and planters, a half-buried table saw, a bottle of rum, and several empty oil drums.

One of my favorite oddities in the whole property is the Jesus in the birdhouse. It sits on a post under the huge coast live oak. Helena and Tadeusz may have remained religious after emigrating from Poland, or maybe it was just a function of habit, but regardless, the little hints of religion emerge in the 23rd Psalm plaque tucked in the kitchen windowsill and the angel tchotchoke in the planter. The horseshoes nailed inside the kitchen and garage doorways may indicate a superstitious layer to their spirituality as well.

We finished the day by tearing out the gardening shelves by the back porch, revealing more of the wonderful boulders that could make a funky garden grotto someday.



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