A Stainless Steel Toilet.

You know you’re out of your normal realm when you find this…and since you blog…you HAVE TO take a picture…

Yep, that’s a stainless steel toilet. It was a public restroom. Well, I had to go!

Moving on…

We’re in LA.

The housesitter/petsitter dude is taking care of Tal and the fort. Speaking of the fort…the gazebo started to blow away and was smacking up against the house and attacking my garden…so I took the scissors to it and killed it. The Fiance was heartbroken. What can I say? I valued property damage over a $20 gazebo…and it was late at night…and…and…and I had to fly the next morning. So there.

I met a shopkeeper today that was so…ridiculous. It was actually quite a funny experience. I tried to explain to the shopkeeper that I have a blog and although it’s mostly about my house, I do like to spotlight interesting shops/attractions and that I knew of atleast one major home decor magazine that reads my blog. He was adament that I must have a business card. I don’t – not for the blog. Then he insisted he had to check me out before he would permit me to take a picture since “people come in here to steal my designs”. Frankly, the store had some cute stuff…but nothing that I hadn’t seen in a million other stores for dozens of years. He appeared to think he had invented the concept of white-washing old (mostly French) furniture and hanging chandeliers. He had done a really nice job of spray painting a crystal chandelier black – but that’s been done hundreds of times. He also had a lot of mercury glass items – but again…that’s not ground-breaking. A few items he carried kinda killed his credibility in my eyes…they were a tad “ballard designs outlet-ish”. You know…those wooden signs that say “Beach” with an arrow or “Bonjour” and those enormous faux-French clocks that seem to wind up broken and shattered for $19.99 in TJ Maxx. Anyway…I finally walked out…but not before telling his (very nice) assistant (whom I had helped hang some shutters in the shop with) that her boss was an :::insert expletive here:::. Fast forward 15 minutes later and I meet up with the Fiance who was at another shop. I asked the woman in that shop….”Hey, what’s the deal with the guy that owns that store over there?” and she replied “oh, him – well he’s a jerk”. So I got back to the hotel and checked the store’s website. He has pictures of all his products on the site…so anyway whomever wants to “steal his precious design concepts” can just go there…people really are nutty. No links to his store here, he sucketh as an individual. He did have cool crown hooks in his shop and I almost bought one for $18.95. This douchebag man insisted he had to travel all over the world to find them. Well, I google’d and found several stores that have them…including Shabby Chic’s…for MUCH LESS. Here’s another store with the hooks…CLICK. Assume he found them at the Gift Show. Conventions…what a novelty.

I’m at a publishing convention for the next few days…will try to check in when not stalking my favorite authors, editors and publishers and begging my authors to sign more books (hand cramp? that’s for wimps!). Mmmm Convention Food. Blech.

Hey…almost forgot to mention…a friend of mine and I developed a “television show concept” and we got an email today…well-known Producer is interested. Hurrah! Maybe when it becomes a massive hit (hah!) I can run off and by this house that’s in the midst of being built…