There are some who start their retirement long before they stop working. -Robert Half

Thursday, April 9, 2009

Separation theories.

Grammy has special ways of doing things. I already touched on her various potions, magical elixirs and tendency to hex the opposing basketball team, but just wait, there's more! First, I would like to take you on a tour of the kitchen. Every cabinet and drawer is lined with this spongy liner that must have a purpose. Maybe it airs things out, since it has lots of little holes in it? Maybe it makes things stay in the cabinet? Though, I'm not sure how they could fall out. Maybe it just makes people feel more organized? I'm not sure. The spongy liner doesn't stop with lining drawers, however. Inside every cabinet, each bowl, plate and pot is accompanied by its own piece of spongy liner so that everything is organized, for example, in this pattern: big bowl--liner--medium bowl--liner--small bowl.
Nothing touches. Actually, things not touching is kind of a trend in Grammy's kitchen. When you do dishes by hand, there is a special sink-mat that sits in the bottom of the sink so things don't touch the bottom of the sink. The knives have a wooden rack in one of the drawers that keeps them separated into their own little slots. If there is a utensil that was purchased in some sort of plastic container, Grammy washes out the container and uses it to store said utensil (taking us back to Grammy's desire to reuse disposable items). The lids to the pots also have a special rack, that stands them upright so you don't have to stack them on top of each other. Good thing, too, because living with Grammy has taught me that metal on metal is not okay.

Now, we'll head to the bathroom, and more specifically the shower. For one, Grammy uses Kirk's Castile Soap and nothing else to wash her hair. She said that when she was in her twenties, her hair stylist said to never use anything but that, and she hasn't since. She also has a little gray bottle of vinegar that she squirts on her hair after she washes it to get rid of any soap scum that might be left. Vinegar: saving lives since 3000 BC.

Now for the best shower product: Grammy has this little red, rubber scrubby that she uses to scrub her hair and she straight up swears by it. She says it scrubs your scalp and makes your hair fuller, it gets the soap distributed, it helps rinse your hair and it serves as brushing. When we were little, I remember Grammy sending all of us hair scrubbies for many holidays. Since we lived in Colorado, we would get holiday packages from her and we would open it up to find hair scrubbies galore. The other day Papa was telling us how his hair is getting thinner. All Grammy said was: "Well, are you using that scrubby I put in your shower? If you were using it, your hair would be thicker!" He said he doesn't use it. Maybe Grammy should write him a note so he remembers to use it.

I think Papa lives on notes. There is a little box in the kitchen with Papa's note paper in it so that he can write things down and leave them on the counter for later. One weekend, I was going to St. Louis and then to Columbia so Papa told me: "Write that down on a note so I know where you are." He also made me write him a list of all my favorite yogurt flavors and I'm surprised he hasn't had me write him a list of my favorite breads yet. Every Wednesday morning, I go to the kitchen to make my lunch and there is a little note that says: "Clean Lion's" to remind him to clean the Lion's Club, since Bingo night is Tuesday night. He doesn't need notes for everything, though. During a basketball game, there was a McDonald's commercial that showed a guy eating this huge burger and Papa said: "Well, look at that big burger! It looks like a number 5." See, he doesn't need a note to remember the McDonald's menu. Grammy just looked at him and said: "You would know."

1 comment:

  1. I'm really intrigued. I may want one of these hair scrubby things. Do you think it will make Eric's hair grow back?

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