Dozing polar bear, Indianapolis Zoo

Monday, June 11, 2007

Dead lizards and blue toilets

Most of the people who read this blog know that my husband and I bought his dad's place near a small town in Montana last year. The house is on a steep road that winds up a mountain, through our gate and around some ponderosas and deposits you next to a woodpile. It's an interesting place to have a house and I still can't figure out why anyone thought to build it there. But so they did, along with our neighbors' place down the road.

It has one small claim to fame. Holly Hunter, I am told, stayed there in the 1980's while she was filming the movie Always.

I wonder what she thought of the orange carpet.

I've been planning a green remodel of this place since before we signed the papers. It's not merely that it sports decor that would frighten a baby. It's that things are starting to fall apart. Which secretly pleases me to no end, because now I don't have to feel guilty about replacing the bright blue toilet and the mauve sink. This is an architecturally interesting home, with rooms placed in counterintuitive spaces, a crow's nest on the top and a solarium pulling it all together. But I really can't stand the blue carpet with the brass track lighting. It taunts me.

My father-in-law lived there during the summers for six years and the atrocious decor didn't bother him a bit. Of course, neither did the dirt. The epiphany that my father-in-law is oblivious to his surroundings arrived when I pulled open the front door last fall and found, lodged in the doorjamb, the perfectly preserved skeleton of a chameleon who'd been in the wrong place at the wrong time. When that wrong time actually was is anyone's guess, but I'm betting on at least two years.

So it falls to us to rid our mountain space of the reptile carcasses and orange carpet. I was reminded of all this by a post from Redneck Mother on her imminent green bathroom remodel. This reminded me that I have Things To Do before our next trip over the Fourth of July, and I scurried off to gaze at wool carpets, cork flooring and composting toilets.

She got a couple of chickens to ease her anxiety over her remodel. What do I have but a dead lizard?

6 comments:

Jennifer (ponderosa) said...

I wondered how you acquired a place out there! Post a pic when you have a chance?

Trailhead said...

Yeah, sure.

I have the chameleon on video but not on a still shot -- I should totally take a picture of that too. It's actually kind of funny.

Unknown said...

Sounds like a place Austin Powers would dig (shagalicious baby?!). I will admit we still have little mumified mices back under the eaves of our a-frame. Have fun with the remodel!! PS, you don't want carpet ;0)--maybe throw rugs, but no carpet.

Trailhead said...

Carpet in one room only -- and it'll be wool carpet. The other kinds offgas noxious crap and are generally annoying. I'm not a fan of carpet as a general matter.

kris said...

Pix of the blue toilet and mauve sink would be very entertaining too! Have fun with the decorating - it sounds like a totally cool place to have.

Trailhead said...

Actually, there is one bathroom that is completely mauve, and one bathroom that's completely blue. I know.

I shall take before and after pix. We're planning on ridding ourselves of the entire mauve (well, dark pink really) bathroom this next trip, and possibly the blue tub. The blue toilet will have to wait! It will survive to taunt me another day.

And wyldthang -- the Austin Powers thing cracked me up.