Happy anniversary to my darling wife.

Seven years today since my bride walked down that aisle to me, and I am still silly, madly, profoundly, achingly in love with you, my sassy, bratty, sweet, sweet baybeegrrl. Without question, you are the finest woman I have ever known: strong, tender, golden, so beautiful and so alive. I hope I live long just to be blessed with more days with you by my side. A lifetime will never be enough.

I even treasure the struggles, my love. There are not words to say how your good love has enriched, challenged, and comforted me. I don’t know how this magic graced my life, but I am so grateful. Our souls mingle in a pure place that we can’t even begin to understand.

I only made one vow in my life, a solemn promise that I would never let go of your hand. To me, our union is holy.

Cheers to more snapshots for the memory book of our hearts…!

I will love you always,
One Lucky Daddy

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What a stellar weekend. My best friend Austin is here, and his girl Cressie. I love them both. Last night Dawn and Terry (some of ya’ll might remember Dawn - she led some events at our pj party in Vegas) came over and somehow we drank two enourmous bottles of Vodka and a twelve pack of shitty low carb beer. Talking all kinda shit and laughing our asses off and singing.

Today we went to an AMAZING art exhibit at the Kimball Museum in Fort Worth. My favorite artist is Caravaggio and Austin’s is Dali, and the stellar exhibit was called “Caravaggio to Dali”. The pieces were all on loan from the Atheneum Museum of Art in Hartford, Conn. I got to see so many paintings I have loved - Gentileschi, Magritte, all the Baroque masters. It was a walk through art history. Yes, I love those shiny pink toes and get my nose right up to the old cracked canvases to stare at the brushwork. LOL

Tonight, we are going to DINE. In Dallas, that means… yummy.

Everyone is calling me. Gots to go.

Hope everyone is having a sweet weekend.

Rhon

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Okay. I would like to hear from home-owners, dreamers, creatives, penny-pinchers, rational types, and ALL of you opinionated folks…
To see if renovating our kitchen could be a reality, I am taking some time to pull my thoughts and research together this afternoon. Thought I would post it to my journal in hopes of feedback.

I have been thinking of updating the kitchen since we bought the house and have been looking at designs for about three years. Not only would we enjoy a nicer kitchen, but I am trying to think of this as an investment, as money that we will get back if we ever sell. I love our little house and can’t ever imagine selling it, but if our business takes off, Chris would like to move to a larger house with a pool. Part of the reason I also want to remodel is to get some more experience with contractors and the whole renovation process. Whether we sell our first house together or not, my dream retirement plan is to refurbish older homes for rentals.

Our love nest is a 1920’s Tudor cottage. Smallish, but full of sincere charm. It’s in a fairly desirable area close to downtown, and since it was a sad little rent house before we found it, we got a really good deal on it. I’ve polished just about every corner so far. Similar houses on our block are selling well over what we paid for ours, so the equity is definitely there if we decide to remodel the kitchen. The kitchen is original, with plain solid wood custom-fitted cabinets that are little wonky and beat up from the years and the house shifting on it’s piers and beams. The cabinets are well-cared for their age, and the paint is smooth, but they aren’t anything special. The kitchen is rather sunny with two double windows in the breakfast nook, and a small window over the sink. It has an adorable built-in hutch in the breakfast nook with windowed doors. It’s a fairly wide galley kitchen that runs from the dining room to our family room in the back. Our appliances are stainless steel. When we moved in, the cabinets were painted a very unfortunate, dreary, chocolate milk, dusty brown color. I am sure the hideous kitchen is why the house remained on the market for awhile. The fag in me can’t live with no kinda ugly, so me and one of my Butch buddies set out to sweeten it a little. Tore out the old brown ceramic sink and put in stainless. Tore out the old laminate countertop and put in some discount tile that I don’t really like. Painted the old cabinets a nice cream and added a few touches. Soft sage is the accent color now. The kitchen is no longer an embarrassment or an eyesore, but it is still kinda beat up and definitely lackluster. Only one floor tile is cracked, but we hate the flooring. The oversized slick ceramic tiles are dangerously slippery, and the grout always looks gross.
	I really favor the traditional, formal look of rich, reddish cherry and black granite. Since I am not certain such a stern style would agree with our rather simple, sunny cottage kitchen, I am thinking of using alternating materials to define spaces, creating a “furniture” look by combining cherry and white painted cabinets, as if the room developed over time. Warm reddish-brown walls, and red clay saltillo floor tiles. (Saw some gorgeous mottled saltillo that was finished to look old.) I don’t have a ton of cabinets, so if the price is not astronomical, I think I would go custom as opposed to pre-fab. I still would need to talk to some kitchen remodeling folks to get bids on the cabinets, custom and standard. I just can’t see replacing solid wood with glued veneers. The room has high ceilings and I would like to add dark wood beams or a stamped tin ceiling. I would like to use a silvery metal-look tile for the backsplashes.
On the right is a photo of my sink and cupboard wall. I’d like to treat the two cupboards on both sides of the sink as furniture, with corbels holding up the upper cabinets, and glass windows in the doors. The “hutches” would be in cherry. The sink cabinet would be painted cream-colored, and I would pull the sink cabinet out to a different depth as a focal point, maybe even use an antique piece of furniture for the sink, painted cream. I would use dark granite around the sink and maybe butcher block for the “hutches” that will flank the sink (or maybe something more durable…a stainless surround for the sink and granite for the hutches?) Or maybe a continuous slab of granite for the whole length of this wall of cabinets? Your thoughts, please. Do you think the different countertop treatments would add to the furniture look, or just look…jarring? (PS In case you are curious and squinting, the sign I made on the soffit above the sink says “The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams.”)
	Guests crowd into this breakfast nook and drag chairs in from the dining room. I’d like to be able to pull two chairs around a cherry-stained table flanked by an “L” shaped upholstered banquet along the walls, with storage underneath. Then about six people could sit there comfortably, and I would have storage for seldom used stuff. The windows are long ago painted shut throughout the house, so it would be awesome for kitchen ventilation and for some added roominess in this small nook if I could replace these old double windows with a bay window, maybe one of those prefab box bays.
There is an antique built in on the other side of the breakfast nook. Undeniably the cutest thing in my kitchen. I would leave it cream to match the new cabinets, and put in a cherry display rack above it to tie it in with coordinating woods in the rest of the kitchen. Maybe top it with granite.
This is the other wall of my galley kitchen. I truly hate it. It only has one cabinet, and I put that one in myself from Homo Depot.	I got my eye on the Jenn-Air stove below, with a stainless microwave vent hood. I’d like to center the range in this space with small cabinets on each side. To tie in with the two-tone wood theme, I am thinking cherry cabinets on the bottom, and cream on the top. Some interesting tile configuration to make a focal point behind the range. Dark granite countertops and handsome embossed tiles in a silvery tone for the backsplash. I’d like to make the biggo stainless ‘fridge look built-in with the surrounding cabinets, too.
This ugly ass wall separates my family room from my kitchen. I would like to knock the wall down at the height of the other cabinets and put a wooden (or granite) ledge and a support post. It wouldn’t be a real bar, but it would open the room up some, offer a little counterspace, and interaction with the family room when we are entertaining. Plus, this wall is the first thing you see when you walk into the kitchen. It is a natural focal point, but right now, it’s pretty dang ugly to look at.

Below are some photos that show the style I am envisioning, plus some metal tiles… (of course, these photos are of much higher-end kitchens) Anyone ever tackled a project this size before? Kwan? Anyone have any input? If you made if this far, THANKS for wandering through my compulsion! And now… please tell me what you think.

PS. Please don’t share these photos with anyone. I am very private about my house.

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“The truly creative mind in any field is no more than this: A human creature born abnormally, inhumanly sensitive. To them… a touch is a blow, a sound is a noise, a misfortune is a tragedy, a joy is an ecstasy, a friend is a lover, a lover is a god, and failure is death.” (Pearl Buck)

I have felt this way my whole life, and this is why I almost didn’t survive my childhood. I swing between wanting to numb and wanting to experience life full blast.

“I am convinced that there are universal currents of Divine Thought vibrating the ether everywhere and that any who can feel these vibrations is inspired . . .” (Richard Wagner)

I have always believed this to be true. Whether you are an inventor, a faith healer, an artist, a writer… the evolution of all of those who came before us is swirling in the air and will move through you like electricity if you are open.

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Come on, po’ workin’ folks, and dream with me!

What would you do if scored a squillion dollars in astronomic lottery winnings?

First, I would take my brat on one of those really long Mediterranean cruises that go to the French Riviera, Greece , Spain , and Italy . If we got bored with it, or found a port we loved, we just wouldn’t get back on the damned boat! Then I would buy a house for me and BabyGrrl here in Dallas , a spacious home that could still pull off some homey charm, classically beautiful but not too showy. Maybe have a closet of my own? Guest quarters with enough room for a pack of friends. A cozy but spacious kitchen where everyone could hang out, with doors out to a pretty deck and pool. And a loft in NYC for getaways. I would help out my Mama cuz she is a poor woman with no retirement. I’d like to spoil her a little if she would feel good about it. I’d be tootin’ round town on a phat chopper and a Chevy SSR truck. And I would give this stupid PC away and get a Mac! I wouldn’t retire, though. I’d like to buy real estate, restore old homes. I would fund Miz Chris on her tech bidness ventures, or whatever she wants to do. I would help out a few of my friends who need it. I’d hire some developers to help me make Butch-Femme.com truly kickass, and someone to answer the damned webmaster mail, too. LOL Every summer, I’d charter a yacht and go pick up all my friends at ports near and far. We’d grill shrimp on the deck and drink beers and be free for awhile. If Chris and I were both gone, I would leave my fortunes all to my little three-year old nephew who called me the other day and said, “Me be your friend!” That is just about the sweetest thing I ever heard, and worth more than a squillion bucks, really.

So what would you do with enough dough to stuff a king-sized mattress?

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“Mr. Darwin to the gene pool, please… Mr. Charles Darwin to the gene pool.”

MELBOURNE, FLORIDA | June 29, 2004 | local6.com

A 23-year-old man was killed and another later died of complications when fireworks in the back seat of their car exploded and ignited the car.

Police said Aravis Walker, 23, and Antonio Robinson, 27, were lighting fireworks and throwing them at passerbys from their vehicle while driving.

At some point, an amber from a cigarette or one of the lit fireworks fell on the back seat of the car and ignited several other explosives.

Robinson was able to exit the flaming vehicle after crashing into a light pole at Carver Street and Walker Street. However, Walker was not able to get of the car and sat in the car as it burned.

“They actually had to hose him (Walker) down to treat him,” Assistant Fire Chief Greg Anglin said.

Walker died at the hospital. Robinson died a few days later.

Officers at the scene said the vehicle had fireworks still exploding from it when they arrived. (!!!)

“Move along, folks, nothing to see here.”

Sad, but kinda predictable, don’t you think?

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OPPS! Wrong house. (Never mind.) Anti-abortion Protest Staged at Wrong House WTOV-TV 9 Steubenville “An upstate New York woman says she feels ‘terrorized’ after about 50 anti- abortion activists showed up at her house. The protesters thought they were demonstrating outside the home of an Albany, N.Y.-area doctor who performs abortions. Instead, they chanted and held posters of mutilated fetuses outside the home of a couple with a 2-month-old daughter. The protesters used a bullhorn to yell ‘Evil dwells here.’ The group apparently meant to target a neighbor who’s an executive with Planned Parenthood.”

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WARNING: Do not leave the lid open when you box up your baby!

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XXX WARNING: HARDCORE! (not)

“Try sprinkling some Victorian phrases into your bed-talk and watch your lover come alive, or at least stare at you funny. Ask her to spread wide the honey’d vermillion lips of her cunny, or demand that he lay you to waste with his impudent spearthrust of a weapon. Tell the guys on the golf course how she lowered her haunches upon your mast! Brag to the girls at the office how he loosed your stays and laid your milky-white bosom bare so that it was if a new light had come into the room! If you can type fast enough, you can easily outclass anybody else in your sexchat (I am engorg’d with your tender morsel; redouble your efforts and stir my vitals, lest I swoon!)”

Why give good money for Harleqiunn romance novels, when you can skip right to the good parts online with The Victorian Sex Cry generator ?

“Ah, let your fingers play and twine in the young tendrils of silky down that cover’d the very seat of my womanhood!”

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What would you do if your cousin “slipped” and accidently grabbed the bride’s ass?

A) Fatally stab him?

B) Eat him?

C) Feed him to your wedding guests?

D) All of the above?

>> Police: Wedding guests eat victim

Tuesday, August 10, 2004
Posted: 7:28 PM on CNN.com
MANILA, Philippines (AP) — Four members of a family have been arrested and charged with murder for allegedly killing and eating a relative during a wedding reception — and serving his flesh to unwitting party guests, police have said. At the July 17 wedding of his daughter, Eladio Baule got angry with his cousin Benjie Ganay who tripped and accidentally touched the bride’s bottom, said Senior Police Inspector Perla Bacuel, at Narra town in Palawan province, southwest of Manila. A few hours later, Baule, his son Gerald, another cousin Junnie Buyot and a nephew, Sabtuari Pique, allegedly confronted Ganay, then drove him to a secluded place where they stabbed him to death, Bacuel said. Buyot, who surrendered to police and is acting as a witness, told police they then roasted Ganay’s body using coconut leaves and kerosene, Bacuel said. Baule senior later forced Buyot to take a bite of Ganay’s flesh, which he claims he threw up but was then forced at knifepoint to swallow, Bacuel said. Buyot told police that the group returned to the party and served some of Ganay’s cooked remains to guests who were still celebrating the wedding, Bacuel said. “It was perhaps due to their drunkenness. They probably didn’t know what they were eating,” he said. Buyot reported the incident several days later to a local village leader who took him to police. Pique also surrendered, and Baule and his son were arrested. Superintendent Rey Lanada, Palawan provincial police chief, said cannibalism would be treated as an aggravating circumstance in the crime.

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