![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rebeccmeisterWorking on writing papers means I'm spending a lot of time sitting in my office. That means I'm spending extra time staring at and thinking about the floor in my office. Bike commuting through wind, rain, sun, and snow means my office floor often gets dirty. So I've been idly contemplating getting another mat like the one we recently bought for our back door at home.*
But that would mean another trip to the Big Box Hardware Store (sigh).
This morning, while biking to work, I rode my bike right across some old door mat that had somehow made its way into the middle of the street. So then I turned around, waited until there was a lull in traffic, picked it up, rolled it up, and stuck it in my pannier.
My father would be so proud. "Roadside treasure!" he would declare. My mother usually greeted this declaration with skepticism (depending, of course, on the nature of the rescued object).
I gave the mat a pretty thorough rinse in a sink. Seeing as it is a big doormat that was in the middle of the street, a lot of grime came out. I probably didn't get all the grime out, but then again our sinks aren't really big enough for cleaning such objects. Still, it's now cleaner than it was.
It's old and starting to fall apart a little around the edges, but it'll do.
*When we moved in, our landlord had put in some cheap industrial carpeting just inside the back door that kept on slipping around all over the place. S narrowly avoided getting severely hurt once when he slipped on it and almost fell all the way down the basement steps! So we replaced it with a rubber mat that has been awesome: stays in place, traps the dirt.
But that would mean another trip to the Big Box Hardware Store (sigh).
This morning, while biking to work, I rode my bike right across some old door mat that had somehow made its way into the middle of the street. So then I turned around, waited until there was a lull in traffic, picked it up, rolled it up, and stuck it in my pannier.
My father would be so proud. "Roadside treasure!" he would declare. My mother usually greeted this declaration with skepticism (depending, of course, on the nature of the rescued object).
I gave the mat a pretty thorough rinse in a sink. Seeing as it is a big doormat that was in the middle of the street, a lot of grime came out. I probably didn't get all the grime out, but then again our sinks aren't really big enough for cleaning such objects. Still, it's now cleaner than it was.
It's old and starting to fall apart a little around the edges, but it'll do.
*When we moved in, our landlord had put in some cheap industrial carpeting just inside the back door that kept on slipping around all over the place. S narrowly avoided getting severely hurt once when he slipped on it and almost fell all the way down the basement steps! So we replaced it with a rubber mat that has been awesome: stays in place, traps the dirt.
no subject
Date: 2019-06-19 07:48 pm (UTC)When I clean my car windows, I'm always disturbed by the amount of black crud I get off. The mat is probably in worse shape, since it was driven over.
no subject
Date: 2019-06-20 01:41 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-06-20 05:06 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-06-20 03:30 pm (UTC)Recently we finally have room for a (small) table (which, entertainingly, we use way more than when we had a big oak formal dining table). And shortly after we got it, my grandmother sent me a package—she does this sometimes, usually with a few things she's recently found in her occasional attempts at decluttering, and never with any note of explanation. Anyway, one of the items in this package was a light pink handkerchief (almost certainly not meant to be used as a suggestive accessory, though I admit to some temptation on that front). Which got me reminiscing to Brian about how she used to have a giant stack of bandanas she'd use for napkins when I was a kid and she and my grandfather would host cookouts/family dinners.
And Brian was all, "Do you think she'd have more?"
And I blinked, and thought, and said "She almost never throws anything out, so probably. I could shoot her an email?"
And now we have a giant stack of vintage bandanas that make excellent (and interesting) napkins, and didn't cost us a cent. Hooray recycling!
no subject
Date: 2019-06-21 06:27 am (UTC)And for whatever reason, I never knew that about handkerchiefs. Good to know, given that I use the colorful ones to wipe my nose on a regular basis, and thus keep them in a pocket (not showing, at least).
no subject
Date: 2019-06-21 04:19 pm (UTC)