Sounds like that worked out really well.
Do you happen to remember what words they used to tell you that? I’m just curious how that conversation went, since I’ve never been part of one like that.
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I think you have excellent taste, and it shows in that picture and what you’re doing with furniture. I love the wood.
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Chuck me an extra 50 and I’ll get rid of that for you.
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Thank you! I’m pretty pleased with how it’s all turning out. An old friend has a custom car audio installation business and has offered to custom make me wood speaker boxes with premium speakers for the space, which is so extra I’m not even sure how to handle it. Just a few months ago all I had was a weird collection of cast off stuff I hated and now this absolutely dream space filled with all these special things with soul. Makes me happy.
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It went something like:
Delivery Guy: “hey what are you gonna do with those (points to old furniture)”
Me: “uh I dunno Craig’s List or something?”
DG: “how much were you looking to get?”
Me: “nothing, I just want them gone”
DG: “well, uh, I have some room in the truck - I could take them away”
Me: “how much?”
DG: “how about 75?”
Me: “will you take a check or I can go to the bank?”
DG: “check’s fine”
Later I asked if he’d be willing to take away an old grill we weren’t using anymore. He asked for another $10 and it magically disappeared as well.
Totally worth it.
I think what I had working in my favor was the delivery guy drove his own truck so taking on some side business was no big deal.
It certainly can’t hurt to ask - worst they will do is say no.
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Cleared a big project off of my desk today. The kind where the coding takes an hour, and the meetings and testing and the verification after the testing takes months.
The thing I’m happiest about is that there were no resourcing issues. Because pretty much every problem I’ve had in testing (besides ones related to “now run it in a testing environment which isn’t meant to run this kind of program”) has been because of the massive volume of records that this program had to process.
There’s still a small amount of after-the-fact stuff to take care of, but the stressful bit is behind me. And it went nominally.
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Oooh! The floating shelves really add to it.
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I kept noodling around looking for side table options. Most every photo of a similar bed I could find either had integrated side tables into the headboard or some kind of custom matching shelf/small table. Otherwise they would be styled without side tables, which seems like maybe the stylist for the shoot removed the tables they had because who doesn’t have side tables?
So, last minute I asked him to just take a board and put an L bracket on it - and instead he made these which have the live edge on them like the bed and they actually are a continuous piece of the live edge board cut in two. They are so nice. The craftsman is such an artist.
Next I’m working on lighting because there is no overhead light at all in this room and no windows. I’m actually thinking of a sort of chandelier over the bed, if that makes sense. Of course I cannot wire into the ceiling, but I have a couple of ideas of how to do this with swag lighting. Fortunately my friend who is moving here soon was an electrician for over 20 years, so I will have some professional help.
I also have a friend who has a custom car stereo install shop. He is an engineer by training and super handy - he’s the kind of guy who has 5 vintage cars that he restores for fun. He has an elaborate Tiki bar in his back yard. He recently posted a photo of his current Tiki bar project - custom wooden speaker boxes with a live edge on them. I commented that they would look nice with my bed, in that social media kind of way. Now he has offered to make me custom speakers for the room, which also means I will have an expert helping me to pick out the actual speaker part and rest of the system. So now my room will be this total retreat with beautiful acoustics.
So what is odd is that this bed and the idea of a calm space with a fantastic sound system but no video have been in my head for so long I can’t remember, and these two artists have, like, ripped the fantasy from my mind and made it come to life.
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I put some of my PTSD journal entries on gendered/sexual misconduct together into an article, and it was published today.
Feelin’ good.
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Way to go!!!
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He almost certainly should have realized I’m not the kind of bitch who can just be put down. I feel like I could bare knuckle prize fight the whole Ivory Tower today.
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It could use it.
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Funded.
I’m not sure they cut anything out of my budget … but honestly, whatevs. Fully funded for three years.
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Hooray! Congrats!
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I myself am by no means a rockstar, as it’s defined here. The people who helped me get over my recent slump of sucky-bad luck, however ARE rockstars, and I’m most graced to’ve received their assistance.
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THAT TIME I STARTED A VANILLA COMPANY AND IT WAS SUPER WEIRD
Today was a very weird day for me, in a good way, but still surreal.
5 years ago I had a little baking blog. It was when I was bored at work and had to look busy. During this time, I decided that Chocolate Chip Cake should be a thing. And for some reason it’s not a thing, except for people who take a white cake box mix and throw in some chocolate chips. I started inventing it. What I discovered is that it’s hard to get a really rich vanilla flavor in a white cake, which is what you need to make the right flavor contrast to chocolate.
Me being me, I started researching extracts and pretty soon I had myself a little project to make my own extract - it’s not hard, just cut up some vanilla beans, stick them in vodka, store them for a few weeks, strain and bottle. I made a bunch and gave it friends and family for Christmas that year and everyone loved it and wanted more.
I had ordered an entire pound of vanilla beans (the ones for extract aren’t as pricey as the ones in the store and there is a big difference between bulk pricing and not). Even making several jars of the stuff, I barely touched my stash.
Which is how I still have at least a half pound of vanilla beans.
I’ve noticed that the price of vanilla has gone through the roof lately. As I’m getting into starting up my business, I’m looking for the easy cash. Making some vanilla seemed like a really easy surefire way to make some money, considering that I already own the beans. I could make several hundred dollars for almost no work and no expenses.
In Tennessee, you can legally make some food items at home and sell them. This seemed like it could be one of those things I could do at home. I popped into a local networking Facebook group and asked if anyone had more info on the law.
By the end of the day, I had a commercial kitchen lined up, a venue to sell them at (crafts fair, end of April), and 6 orders, including from 2 caterers.
Which was weird but not so so weird. Just very sudden.
BUT WAIT IT GETS EVEN WEIRDER
For some reason, lately, I have been getting A LOT of friend requests from men on the internet. A LOT. Today I had 91. They are men all over the world. No women for some reason.
Since I have an online yoga business, I frequently friend people in India, and it takes me some time to weed through the people who honestly want to connect and sort out the people who are just weirdos and scammers.
But the last few days, it’s not just India. It’s Nepal, Bali, Bangladesh…a lot of places. A lot of doctors and ayurvedic doctors, mostly.
Finally I catch up with a guy who messaged me a couple of days ago. I look at his profile - seems legit. Lives in Paris, from Uganda. His page has pics of him and his wife, his kids, not, like weird creepy GIFs of roses like you see on the profiles of the scam artists.
So we chat and he speaks English fluently. He just moved back to Uganda.
As we are talking, he mentions that Uganda is known for vanilla and cocoa. I say that’s interesting, I literally today just started a vanilla extract business. Small world. We keep talking.
Then he asks would I like any vanilla beans? What? Yes, he’s a vanilla farmer. Also a cocoa farmer.
Didn’t you just move from Paris last week, I ask? How are you a farmer already? He explains that it takes 2 years to grow and his family has people that do the planting and such.
He also has a charity (distributing menstrual products and building homes for widows) and he is connecting me to people in Texas that have traveled to help him with that. My aunt works in International Development, so I’ll get her to help verify that he is legit - but, his profile is not suspicious; the people he mentioned working with on the charity have photos and conversations about their work with him. If it’s a scam, it’s an elaborate and strange one.
AND SO… I HAVE A SUPPLIER, A PLACE TO COOK, A PLACE TO DISTRIBUTE, AND SOME ORDERS
I will talk to my business connections for info on importing.
Oh yeah, and I can also get cocoa from him, which I can definitely sell with no commercial kitchen - all I have to do is repackage that.
So now I have a new business that I never even intended to start before today, it appears, and it seems like there is a definite market for it.
MY LIFE IS WEIRD
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I LOVE YOU FOR YOUR WEIRD!
That is so great!
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My experience is that it’s very difficult to get a rich vanilla flavour anywhere.
Aside from vanilla ice cream (where it’s the only flavour present), the only products that I’ve had where I can recall tasting vanilla have been various sodas (vanilla coke, some brands of root beer, and butterbeer at Universal Studios Orlando come to mind).
…Which is kind of weird, considering how many recipes contain vanilla (it’s a joke between myself and my mother that every recipe in every cookbook everywhere requires exactly one teaspoon of vanilla extract, regardless of what other flavours are present and how many people a single preparation of the recipe is supposed to serve).
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I love vanilla, and find the same.
The most vanilla things I make both involve soaking a vanilla pod in gently simmering syrup. I have a modernised 14c recipe for juniper poached pears in white wine syrup like that, and and a winter fruit salad recipe where the dried fruit gets simmered with a vanilla pod and lemon zest in a light lemon syrup.
I find it tends to disappear in things like cakes, although it can be pleasant in Rice Krispy squares if you use the real stuff and not vanillin.
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