i get paid again today and i’m struggling between buying myself some more new clothes (because i really need a new wardrobe) or buying myself some new, smaller furniture for my equally as small bedroom
So the house exploring went good! Went along with Friend’s mother and Family Friend (who grew up in the house, and was the one my friend purchased it from). Started cleaning out the attic. I had to bug out after about twenty minutes, because even with the particle respirator, I couldn’t breathe up there.
The paper respirators were black by the time we finished. This was about two hours’ worth of work.
Think I learned a pretty valuable thing: never become a serious collector. Family Friend’s father had a thing for garage sales and antiques, and he collected a lot of stuff (esp glass bottles), intending to get them appraised and sold. Guess what never happened. We were taking boxes of glass bottles, unwrapping them from gross old newspaper, dumping out the rodent shit and dead bugs, wrapping them in new newspaper, then packing them into new boxes.
I’m personally of the opinion that going through all that and cleaning it isn’t worth the effort (most of it is only garage sale quality). But hey. Friend was p specific about saving some stuff.
We did find a large glass crock. Picture the jugs of water in office water coolers. About that size, unbroken and unchipped. Guessing that a glass piece that size would be worth a bit, but I’m not sure I want to find out.
Gross shit below the cut. Also, ghost stories and fiber craft!
I was carrying the crock out to the car, had it held against my chest, the opening in my face. Caught a whiff of Oh Holy God, took a look inside, and found one of the nastiest things I’ve ever seen in my life:
A freshly dead mouse. That’s not all tho. The bottom of the crock was covered in a brown sludge that I realized was the mishmash of many decaying rodents. Fur, paws, tails, all mixing around and liquefying.
I’m not cleaning that crock out. Dear god in heaven I refuse. I don’t care how much money it might be worth.
Anyway, on a lighter side, Family Friend also told us some ghost stories about the house. She and her family had plenty (esp. before the house was electrified [sometime in the 70s]). Here’s the good one tho:
The house was vacant for about thirty years, 1930s to 1960s. During WWII, there was a colony of honeybees living in the kitchen wall. Sugar was rationed during the war, so that honey would be a real treat for anyone who could get it. The neighbor kids decided to try their luck.
The girl, about nine years old, sitting on her brother’s shoulders, a lit torch on her hand to smoke the bees. She caught a reflection of light in the kitchen window. Thought it was her torch at first, but it didn’t move with the torch.
She saw a woman in a long white dress, carrying a lit railroad lantern. She jumped off her brother’s shoulders, and ran screaming all the way back to her house, about a mile up the road. Family Friend knew her as a kid, and she has not set foot on the property since.
(For what it’s worth, the Ghost, who Family Friend referred to as Granny, doesn’t sound malevolent at all. Just coexisting, and putting blankets over a kid who is cold in the middle of the night.
After bugging out of the house, went back home. Friend’s mother showed me all the fiber craft equipment she’s picked up. She’s trying to learn the drop spindle right now (which apparently the spinning wheel is actually a p modern invention. I’m trying to picture the drop spindle being the primary method of making thread for thousands of years. Crazy!). I played around with a small pin loom, which you use to weave small squares from one piece of yarn. It’s very fun!
So we got a rare date night last night and we went to IKEA looking for stuff for our porch....we finally found some art instead. They’re dictionary pages with pics over top of the words. I really like them.
Edit-We also shot bows and arrows on our date night...we’re not totally lame. I have a pretty good bruise from snappy myself. Lol
Hay and COS teamed up to propose a range of product. Each features a circular top and is supported by three legs, one of which takes the form of a thin coloured pole.
