Tiny Supermarket

A local supermarket did a promotion of giving out items to build one of your own shops. We didn't bother collecting at the time, but a couple of years later someone offered their collection to us that they hadn't done anything with.

My wife decided to assemble the supermarket and I let her do it alone. Both of us working together at this tiny level, we would have got in each other's way. We bought bases to assemble the supermarket on and then put it on a heavy board to stabilise it further. It was soon completed and ready for customers!

I do find miniature things fascinating and for now it sits in the dining room for visitors to see. 

You can see a farm version by clicking here. There is also one below of it in one piece.

Ugly Minimalism

It seems to be a current trend to make things minimalist. The less you can see the better. Hidden away are plenty of features but you have to access them. That takes time. It's all about form over function or comfort. For a few examples.

How about a car dashboard. There used to be buttons and knobs to quickly access something you wanted. Now these are accessed via a touch screen.

Legislators are now going to downgrade safety scores for vehicles that don't have physical controls for important features. Why? Because time spent wading through menus and sub-menus is time your eyes are not on the road. Putting form over function and risking occupant safety.

A kitchen, in case it was hard to work out. No utensils hanging handily to grab in an instant. No herb trays. Regularly used appliances have to be found and lifted out. 

All of this inconvenience to create a formless waste. Cold, uninviting and impractical. If the owners eat out, order in or have preprepared bought dinners, I guess they don't need a practical kitchen. It's still ugly.

Another form over function fashion style are sofas with low backs. It works if they are used for slouching on but to sit up on? 

Again, it's all about the style and not good posture. I wouldn't touch a couch like that with a barge pole. The floor and a cushion would be more comfortable for me. I can't even say I think it looks nice.

Functionality is for me always more important than style. Car dashboards with sensibly laid out tactile controls look better in my opinion than a touch screen and blandness. 

A kitchen with nicely placed kitchen tools and appliances looks far superior to slabs of nothing. 

Furniture with proportions that accommodate the human frame looks more inviting than one that is nothing more than an uncomfortable styling exercise. Uglier too to me.

Photos: Freepik.

The Jigsaw

My wife and I enjoy jigsaw puzzles, which we do together. We chanced on this one but without the original box so no picture. We got through it OK but it took longer without a picture to work from. As it was comprised of larger pieces that made it much easier but a full 1000 piece would have been a tougher assignment. Once completed, we thought the picture was unusual in a nice way. 

Life can be like that. If we don't have a clear picture of where we are going, it can lead to problems. Smaller issues we may get away with but bigger ones can end up causing headaches. If we can't avoid the situation, then treading carefully and seeking sound advice as we go can lead to a satisfactory outcome. 

Simple Knitted Doll

My wife knitted this doll. It has 28 stitches and 40 rows without any shaping. The arms and legs are not separate from the body but are differentiated by a stitch line 

It also needs some stuffing to give solidness to it. Add a little hair, some sort of hat and little facial features and it's all done. 

Different themes could be chosen. It would be nice as a gift to a child or anyone who would like this sort of thing as a cute accessory around the home. 

Bricks Farm - The Video

If you see the pictures of the same name on an article recently posted (see here), you'll notice there are some differences. It's larger for one and the layout has changed. There are now three farms, the main one in the middle and two smaller ones. There is a full screen feature to the right of the word YouTube you could click on the YouTube words and see the video on YouTube. It was taken by my drone camera circling overhead (just kidding).

Bricks Farm

We're not big on collectibles at Supermarkets as you have to buy so much to get anywhere. We decided to collect a few and hand them on to others but it ended up the other way around. Now, we have a full set of items, we added some buildings and vehicles which can be purchased as individual items, unlike the other things.

So here is what we ended up with. A Lego style farm divided into three farmlets: produce, livestock and orchard. It's surprisingly therapeutic. The pictures are below. 

Afterward, you may want to see an updated version in a video. For that, simply click here.

For a supermarket version, simply click here.

Full layout 

Full layout the opposite direction

Orchard 

Livestock

Produce

Orchard Rear

Homestead Rear 

Produce Rear

Livestock & Orchard Rear

Produce Rear

Thirty Three Years Married

I have been married to my cariad (Welsh for sweetheart) for thirty three years. We saw this on someone's fence, showing their address. It's made of china cups. We thought it fitting to take a snap as we had just celebrated our anniversary.

Simple Tips

Using the ring on your opening tab to hold the straw

A staple remover opens a key ring without ruining your nails

Spreading a sauce container makes dunking easier

A nifty way to hold your wooden spoon and it makes no mess

A wooden spoon stops bubbles spilling over

Book Marks (real ones)

Do many people read real books much these days? Is reading off a screen or a page made of paper? Both of course and I for one much prefer the real thing. I'm sure many find a screen practical but not as relaxing on the brain (is that a generational thing?) I also like to the broader scope of a paper publication than the smaller snapshot on a device. One thing I do prefer on a computer is the ability to find things. To go back to a place later in a paper publication you need to use a tag of a bookmark.

My wife enjoys crocheting bookmarks from embroidery cotton, shown below. She gives them out to friends or charities and their popularity would suggest reading from a real book hasn't gone out of fashion.

Victor Nunes' Artwork

Pen caps

Shaving razors

Pencil shavings

Popcorn

Sunflower seeds

Sweet wrappers

Pretzel sticks

Tattoos

I notice that the tattoo has become mainstream. When I was young, it seemed that sailors had them but not people generally. They were often done in areas that were not visible because of the stigma. That negative perception would still be the case in certain areas of society but music performers and sports stars are often covered with them.

I don't get why you would do this
to yourself. 

However, in the business world they are taboo. Why? I know when I go into a shop or any professional situation I would feel negative if someone had visible tattoos. The same would be true if a person was inappropriately dressed, had body piercing or used coarse language.

Skin is such a beautiful thing and it looks delightful just as it is. Graffiti on a wall is unsightly yet it even goes beyond that. It also shows disrespect. A tattoo gives me the same feeling. It is unsightly and I feel the person cheapens themselves by having one. Body piercings on young people put me off too.

Some may view it as art and I have put it under that category on this blog. Graffiti is art to some but most would call it vandalism. In some ways I view tattoos as vanadalism too, against the beautiful body. The human body is wonderful and skin is beautiful. I want it the way it was when I was born. I cannot enhance it, only denigrate it.

Some Home Craft

My wife enjoys making things and knitting or crocheting is something she likes doing. Some of it is around the house somewhere, other items end up with friends or donated to charities for raising funds. Here are three items recently made.

A blanket for a child

A small wrap for a baby

Two more baby wraps

Technology Prediction Fail : Recorded Music

Without getting too detailed, recorded music was originally on a cylinder but were soon superseded around WW I by flat vinyl records. They held the market for a long time despite the arrival of Stereo 8 cartridges. I used to have all my LP records in plastic sleeves that sealed to keep out dust and no LP was played without carefully being wiped by a special dust attracting cloth. I even set the weight of the playing arm to an absolute minimum lightness to preserve quality.

What LPs failed to compete against was the convenience of the cassette tape, that became popular around the 1970's. They took over the recorded music scene. The LP looked set to follow the original cylinder recordings, although they had a small, devoted following that kept them in existence.

While the cassette was convenient, quality soon dropped if the cassette player heads weren't kept clean. Sound quality was not up to the standard of LPs despite Dolby and other systems to improve it. 

Digitalising of music meant that the Compact Disc was invented and they took off during the late 1980's. The cassette was soon left in its dust, although a few still work with them.

Just when the CD looked to be the way for years to come, the Internet became a medium where people could download music. With portable devises to receive and playback music, not only was the CD in danger, so too were the stores that sold music.

Most music today is transmitted to us rather than bought as hard copy. Amazingly the LP is making somewhat of a comeback as the quality and the way the brain receives music from that medium (I have heard) is the best way. However, it seems that music will mainly be sent to us rather than brought via a physical medium.

Anyone that thought the cassette would kill the LP and the CD both of them have only been partially correct. The fact that the LP is reviving is one prediction few, if any, saw coming. And who anticipated that music would be transmitted to us as digital files? One is doomed to fail when trying to make technological predictions.

Underwater Photography

Clever Cleaning Ideas

A window cleaning squeegee 
to lift pet hair off carpet

WD 40 to remove crayon marks

Leave a denture tablet 20-30 minutes in the toilet, 
then use the brush to remove stains

Stainless steel shines using Cream of Tartar and a non stratch pad

Half a lemon on your shower mixer to remove calcium buildup

Or ladies, why not just get a man to clean up for you?

Clever Home Ideas

A coat hook rack becomes a shoe rack

Sheets stored inside the pillowcases

Using a rubber band if the thread is stripped

Using a rubber band to stop clothes slipping off

Cutting sandpaper with scissors to sharpen them

Coffee filters placed inside plant pots to stop soil leaking through

Handy watering device made from a plastic container