A House Is Not a Home...

... without a magnetic Leslie set and poetry set on the fridge.

Well, a proper Travis Heights house, anyway.

I'm still trying to get unpacked, and probably will be for weeks. There's nothing else quite like moving to make you aware of how much unnecessary crap you've accumulated over the years. You have no place to put it away; you don't know when you'll ever use it. But how can you possibly throw it away? Even the most humdrum of objects have such history attached to them. Here's a slightly hideous ceramic knick-knack with unicorns (horns all long since broken off) and a big empty ring in the middle which once held a mirror. It's useless and stupid-looking, but it was a present (the last one, as it turns out) to Katie from my mother. Here's a vase we got as a wedding present from some friendly neighbors who later came to hate us because I can't edge a lawn in a straight line. Here's a handmade corner table I got at a garage sale 15 years ago for only $4. It wasn't pretty, but it was sturdy, until a moving mishap left it with one leg nailed on at an unlikely angle. (So it turns out I am not a natural carpenter, okay?) There isn't room for it in the new living room; but I've had it for so long! And it was only $4! And here's a very nice microwave, which I'd love to plug in and use, but the idiot manufacturer appears to have put too many prongs on the plug.

Then there are the cats, which, decorative as they may sometimes be, are almost never useful.

Leslie and magnetic poetry, on the other hand, are a must-have for any well-appointed kitchen.