Monday, May 21, 2007

Finished projects

Towel Racks
Our bathroom has one very lovely towel rack. Since we moved in, I’ve been putting my towel over the door to dry. This is not dissimilar to our situation in the fortress of solitude where we only had one towel rack. For almost a year one of us would dry our towel over the door of the shower. I finally got sick of that and installed three towel racks. It was a sweaty, most-of-the-day job involving a level, many toggle bolts, much too much marking on the walls, followed by a lot of erasing, a lot of drilling and eventually, success.
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I’m happy to report I learned from that experience and installing two towel racks was much easier this time.

Behind the door is where we are putting the towels. At that point, the ingredients for the towel racks had been sitting there three weeks, attracting all that gunk that floats around in corners if you don’t clean your floors fairly often.
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First I got out the level and marked a horizontal line for the first towel rack. I only marked the far left and right side instead of drawing a line all the way across which I would have to erase. Then, I assembled the towel rack and marked the vertical lines. Then, I had an amazing realization.
When I first installed the towel racks, I didn’t have any instructions and I had to figure out how that rectangular piece of metal works. After installing it upside down the first time I called in technical support and Matt pointed out that the lip had to face up because that was what the tiny screw on the bottom of the rack holder grabbed a hold of.
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So I conquered that learning curve. This time, I realized that I didn’t have to put a toggle bolt in both the top and the bottom holes on the bracket. They had included a handy middle hole. So, instead of drilling eight holes, I only had to drill four. Incidentally, the 12 large holes in the Fortress of Solitude’s bathroom was one of the only things the landlord complained about after we moved out. I think that that is what he gets for not giving us any towel racks. Really! How does it work that two people have one towel rack between them?
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Things went up quickly. I drilled, I toggled, I screwed, I repeated for the other side and then again for the next rack. Voila! Towels on racks!

Then I swept the bathroom floor. I’m on a mission to get everything off the floor. Which brings me to:
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Hooks
I don’t know if there has been any study, but I am willing to bet that people who primarily use public transportation have more bags than the average car driver. Why? Because when you have a car, you can shove the various things you are carrying with you in a dozen nooks and crannies, but when you are navigating the world via public transportation everything comes with you on your shoulders, back, hips, arms or head. Sometimes you need the big backpack, sometimes the middle one. Sometimes the small purse, sometimes the hearty purse. This is my excuse for having a lot of bags. But believe me, I use them.
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I also love hooks. Hooks are easy to install, you just need an anchor and a hook, hammer and drill. Sometimes, you don’t even need a drill or an anchor. They are also cheap and portable. I’ve got some hooks that I’ve had since I lived in South Boston. They were originally attached to my loft bed and moved with me to my yellow, orange and green room in Somerville, my studio in Portland and then the Fortress of Solitude.
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Hooks were what I installed in the office and all those bags sitting on the floor are now neatly contained on a wall. Then, I happily swept of the detritus from that corner.

Knife Holder
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I love my knife holder. It was cheap, it came from Fred Meyer, but I think it is one of the most useful kitchen items ever. Your knives are RIGHT THERE! On the WALL! Not in a drawer, not in a butcher block which takes up too much room on the counter and you have to move to wipe the counter under it. You can wash the knives, dry them on a dish towel and BAM! Back onto the holder. And it is magnetic. Who doesn’t love magnets?

After I installed the miraculous object, I put up the knives and then wiped down the counter.
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Bliss.




1 comment:

Shawn S. said...

Again, I am quite impressed! I love the knife magnet wall holder thingy! So cool. I think I might need one of those in my kitchen! Ands there is nothing like having real towel wracks! Very nice! -Sara