I'm smitten. Head over heels, out of my mind, reel me back in if you can.
Our friend Montana lately turned me on to "Picker Sisters," which airs Tuesdays on the Lifetime channel, and I could tune in 24/7 and never come up for air, food or water.
Well. And die happily, I guess.
Finally, I fit in somewhere. Kindred spirits have been let in the house. An explanation for who - or at least why - I am like I am.
I will have to nail Fearless Leader's shoes to the floor or maybe his feet, if I'm in a rude mood - and make him watch at least one episode so he'll get I'm not the only one in the world who hears the Sirens' call to industrial parts and all things rusty that could "surely be turned into something different and wonderful, someday."
See Fearless Leader, who doesn't share my affinity for rust and parts, roll his eyes.
A little bit about the show: Two best friends have a furniture/design shop in Hollywood (translation: very high-end clientele). What sets them apart is that they travel all over the country - farmland, mostly - and haunt junkyards, backyards, barns and anything else that looks promising in the way of housing scrap metal and rust.
Cuties, they wear short shorts and cowboy boots and wheel and deal and flirt with old codgers who look at the piles of junk in their backyards, a couple of pretty young women who surely don't know what they're doing, and see dollar signs.
Truck and tractor parts. Old radiators, scales and fans. Fusty remnants of farm implements and all things industrial - decades gone to ground - and the haggling begins.
From this haul, the sisters' handyman takes their direction and reconfigures parts into one-of-a-kind sofas, chairs, dining, coffee and buffet tables, lamps, clocks, vanities . . . yada,yada,yada.
I consider this the ultimate in recycling and reclamation and absolutely the stuff of my dreams. I want to go with them. I want to be them.
Go Sisters.
Piggy heaven for such as me, even though it ain't gonna happen at this address.
If only I were a welder. Or a talented carpenter. Or even remotely a decent upholsterer.
Well, or a visionary. And lived in Hollywood, where clients sashay in with a want and the means to pay for it.
But I'm not and I don't. None of the above. Ergo, I get to dream on my couch, which I did not build myself out of truck fenders, but which I have made a sincere dent in with my rump.
Ah, well. Maybe watching the creative process can be enough.
This morning, Walter "Batman" Matsui presented us with a recent visitor, plopped on the oriental carpet in the living room. I guess he had the last laugh - if cats could laugh - and I don't even want to contemplate where that bat had been hanging out since he got in over a week ago.
I will say this: Bats, postmortem, aren't nearly as scary as when they're flapping around one's head in the wee hours of the morning.
That taken care of, Fearless Leader is outside, awaiting delivery of a shed that, once assembled, will house all the yard-care equipment. Mower, chain saw, shovels, rakes and such. That the driver will have to back his tractor-trailer up our somewhat steep driveway will be a feat of pluck and daring and, possibly, the death of our fence if he just got his big truck driver's license.
Well, and fast forward some. The wannabe shed is on a pallet in our driveway and the fence is unscathed - but our next-door neighbor's mailbox took a direct hit.
FL, who made a fast track to the golf course as soon as the thing was off the truck, has a little evening chore to take care of. Hopefully, he made par.
* Lynne Horner is a former Maui News features editor and writer who now lives in Springfield, Ore. Her "Second Thoughts" column appears every Tuesday. Send email to her at lynnenhorner@yahoo.com.
