A cooking island is the ultimate kitchen design dream for many families and if you’re blessed with the space to do it, it can be used to great effect.

Cooking islands don’t just provide an extra preparation area; they can house sinks, hobs, ovens, cupboard storage and breakfast-bar style dining facilities. They can even be used to separate an open-plan kitchen from the living/dining area, defining the boundaries of the kitchen without complete segregation of the two areas.

This allows for communication between the two rooms creating a more relaxed, flowing atmosphere and allowing for ease of serving at meals times which is not possible with dividing walls. It is also a much more contemporary design than the 1960s serving hatch.

To add the finishing touches to modern kitchen islands with hobs, cooker island hoods are a great complement. The Smeg KEIV90 Island Cooker Hood, made from stainless steel and glass, can easily become the central focus for any kitchen. It’s as functional as it is beautiful incorporating the choice of recirculation or external venting, running at a quiet 46dB and featuring two spotlights to brighten up your island.

Range cookers have typically been found in the kitchens of Victorian town houses or country cottages, where their classic design fits fluidly into these timeless settings. But if you live in a new build or are aiming for a more contemporary feel to your kitchen you can still benefit from the immense cooking power of a range style cooker.

Stainless steel range cookers are as large and as practical as classic cast iron appliances. However, they offer a more modern take on the range cooker and will fit into any kitchen, especially if your other appliances are also in stainless steel.

One of the best selling range cooker appliances is the Electrolux EKM70150X Dual Fuel Range Cooker. Cooking takes place in a single large cavity which doubles up as a grill – great for people who regularly cook meals for many.

Other range cookers such as the Smeg Symphony SY4110 Dual Fuel Range Cooker have many cavities for cooking – much like the classic appliance.

Yes we have finally moved to our new house, a place we can truly call our own. The house is like a warzone now. There are boxes just about everywhere. For 2 nights, we slept on the sofa bed in the living room while waiting for our new mattress to be delivered. Though the hubs would disagree, I find it exciting to be living in a camping sort of state , digging for clothes and cooking utensils in boxes. It reminds me of when I was little and we played camping in tents on our front yard.

For posterity’s sake, I just HAVE to put up this picture. I find it really cute (hopefully not rare )

Awwwwwww

Altogether now…..AWWWWWWWWW

But seriously, credits to him. The HB is a stickler for clean and tidy. I prefer just clean.

I will not post many pictures for now as the house is still in a state of disarray. There are still little things that need to be fixed, i.e. wires, some pipes here and there etc.

Warzone!

This is how the living room looks like now. >____< We have another room filled with boxes, and the entire corridor has boxes lined up too. I have no idea where all the stuff comes from. *turns around slowly and looks at the HB*

My favourite part of the house is no longer my bathrooom, but….my kitchen! *beams*

The kitchen is quite small compared to the rest of the spacious house, but I think I did well to have chosen the right colour and style for the kitchen.

The kitchen..... BEFORE

I absolutely adore the white sliding door

I discreetly took pictures while the guys were assembling the kitchen cabinets. They had such fierce faces I think they would have confiscated my camera had they seen me taking pictures of them at work. That would explain the hastily taken, blurry pictures.

Men at work

Kitchen cabinets being assembled

My groovy Smeg oven

My oven is so shiny, it reflects like a mirror!

And the end product…….jeng, jeng, jengggg………

My white kitchen

And because I love my kitchen so much, here’s another picture

My white kitchen

That wooden part of the house you see is the balcony which we have converted into a dining area. It makes a great lounge area too, and I am sitting here right now, blogging

I asked the hubby to help me clean the fridge and fill it with foodstuff that needed chilling while I washed the bathroom. I came back an hour later and found that he put 1 (ONE) item into the fridge:

THE most important item in the fridge

His wine. >______________<

My dear dependable white fridge, please forgive me as I admire these colorful pretties …

Icebox blocks by (Electrolux Design Lab) stack up to keep the peace in shared kitchens.

Art meets appliance in the LG collection.

Juicy jelly beans by Smeg.

Pastel dinner mints by Big Chill.

Forget the kitchen. This furniture-quality piece by Meneghini demands to sit in the dining room. Let’s swoon, shall we?

Decided on a range cooker and went for the Smeg. We’ve had one before and we found it robust as well as competitively priced for what you get.

Bought it from ‘Appliancecity’ online. Just can’t argue with the price and the delivery service is first class. They called yesterday to confirm it will be delivered between 7am and 11am .. and true to their word the cooker arrived at 8.00am this morning .. and the guys carried it into the house into it’s resting place. We have 48hrs to make sure it isn’t damaged and it of course make sure it works.

Looks like we’re going to be having a roast this weekend in the new house!  OHHH YES!

Yes it’s time once again to delve into the world of cinema’s little brother, the greatest tool of communication known to mankind, until their youngest brother the internet was born, television. TV, as the kids call it, has been there for our species for some time now. It’s helped us to view man walking on the moon, the fall of the Berlin wall and an endless stream of outrageous acts carried out by morons on thousands upon thousands of reality TV shows.

TV has also delivered some of the greatest characters from fiction in modern times. The very nature of television means that we can become incredibly attached to those heroes and villains that inhabit  the flickering box, more so than movie characters simply because we spend so much time and, in some cases, so much of our lives with them.

Now for a rule that I decided to impose on myself. I’ve decided that I’m only allowed to choose one character from each series. If I didn’t then this list would probably be made up by far few shows than I should and that would be stupid. Also no animated characters. They’ll get their own list. So with that out of the way, let’s get onto the list.

10: Mike Nelson – Mystery Science Theater 3000

Mystery Science Theater 3000 is still a very little know show in the UK which I think is a damn shame. Too often in this country we accuse the Americans of having no sense of wit, that their comedies are often boorish and low brow, though the tide has definitely been changing. Still this could all have been avoided if we’d only had MST3K since it’s beginning. The story is a classic one: A working class guy gets blasted into space on the Satellite of Love as part of an experiment by an evil genius to force him to watch bad movies. He builds a few robot companions in order to stave off space insanity and help him endure the cinematic shit fest that he is forced to watch.

The role of the human aboard the Satellite of Love was originally played by Joel Hodgson who managed to escape about halfway through the shows run. His place was taken by Mike Nelson, a hapless temp who the evil Dr. Forrester and his assistant TV’s Frank decide to send to the satellite as a replacement.

Now, my choice of Mike as my favourite character may be controversial among some long time MST3K fans but there seems to be a general consensus that your favourite host is generally the first one that you see and we in the UK only got the shows after Joel’s departure. Now I’ve seen many Joel episodes since thanks to the DVDs but Mike was my first host and will always be my favourite.

There’s something undeniably likeable about Mike. He’s a likeable, if sometimes dim-witted and naive fellow, without the technical expertise of Joel. There’s no doubt that he certainly wouldn’t have been able to build the ‘bots had he been the first one sent up. He’s just more of a regular Joe who suddenly finds himself in this ridiculous situation and he just tries to go along with it. And that’s great.

9: Dave Lister – Red Dwarf

From one working class schmuck stuck in space to another. Curry and lager loving Liverpudlian Dave Lister finds himself as the universes sole surviving human being after a radiation leak on the mining ship Red Dwarf causes him to be kept in stasis for 3 million years. His companions are a hologram of his former bunkmate, the insufferable Arnold Judas Rimmer, an evolved cat known simply as The Cat, a mildly senile super computer named Holly and, eventually, a neurotic service droid by the name of Kryten. (And eventually Kristine Kochanski as well but for the purpose of this piece I’m gonna kinda overlook those episodes.)

Lister is interesting as a character mainly because he’s lazy, slobby and a bit of a dick but in general eminently likeable. You can’t help but feel sorry for him because he finds himself in a universe where all of his best friends are dead, the love of his life is dead and the only company he has are a cast of misfits who all have as deeply flawed personalities as himself. Despite this Lister tries to make the best of a bad situation, possibly the worst situation one can find themselves in, and he seems to remain cheerful and optimistic even when things look there worse. And I can’t finish this section without mentioning that Lister was part of one of the funniest conversations ever committed to film:

8: Victor Meldrew – One Foot In The Grave

Victor Meldrew was the voice of anyone who ever got annoyed at anything. The grumpiest man in Britain, Victor’s annoyance at the smallest of inconveniences only seemed to worsen the situation to such a degree that it would often spiral off into the superbly surreal which would, of course, merely make Victor angrier and angrier much to the chagrin of his long suffering wife Margaret.

Victor’s lot in life wasn’t helped by the people who surrounded him such as Margaret’s friend, the mildly insane Jean Warboys and the insufferably cheerful neighbour Nick Swainey. And so it was that Victor Meldrew could have been just another nasty, old bitter git.

But he wasn’t. What made Victor a truly great character was that people could emphasise with him. He generally tried to do the right thing only to have the situation rapidly decline on him. He genuinely cared for his wife Margaret and would seem quite upset whenever she lost her temper with him. In fact I think it says something about the two characters that Victor would always become frustrated with the situation but rarely his wife whereas Margaret would often become frustrated with her husband when she couldn’t take anymore of his complaining. And I think people did feel sorry for Victor whenever Margaret got pissed off with him. After all, it wasn’t his fault that he was that way, it just seemed as though the world transpired against him. Besides it’s not many TV characters that had flowers left for them at the location of the scene where they were killed. That certainly says something about the impact Victor had on the British public.

7: Father Ted Crilly – Father Ted

On the remote wasteland known as Craggy Island there live three Catholic priests and a tea obsessed housemaid. The oldest priest is Father Jack Hackett, a foul mouthed, violent alcoholic who rarely leaves his fetid chair. The youngest priest is Father Dougal McGuire, a man-child who professes to having no belief in the afterlife and claims to believe in Darth Vader more than he does in God. The third is Father Ted Crilly. Ted is a man who’s plans for fame and fortune are ruined by those around him and ultimately by himself.

Ted came to live on Craggy Island as punishment for some event in the past, something about some charity money that was ‘just resting in his account.’ Ted’s ultimate goal is to leave Craggy Island the troglodytes who inhabit far behind him and set up a parish somewhere like Las Vegas or Los Angeles. This never comes to pass, however, in part due to the immense disdain his immediate superior, Bishop Brennan has for him. Also, much like Victor Meldrew, Ted’s problems often start as something small and mundane but as the episode progresses these things tend to spin out of control until it all comes to an crescendo, generally leaving Ted worse of than he was when the episode started.

Like many on this list, Ted is likeable despite having a seriously flawed personality. He’s greedy, cynical, pessimistic and sometimes takes just a little too much delight in getting back at others, particularly when he wins a Golden Cleric resulting in a speech which last for hours and is full of distain for all those who have ‘fecked him over’ in the past. Ted’s likeability is probably increased by the fact that in the strange and surreal world of Craggy Island, he’s probably the most normal person there is, making him something of a reality anchor for the viewers.

6: Bernard Black – Black Books

Bernard Black is the epitome of characters who we like despite massive personal failings. He’s an alcoholic, pessimistic, argumentative misanthrope who isn’t happy unless he’s drinking wine or insulting someone. For some reason he owns a book shop despite his apparent loathing of everything to do with owning a shop. The only thing Bernard really likes about his shop is his books and the fact that, as his own boss, he can drink whenever he wants.

He’s abusive towards his assistant Manny Bianco, who’s biggest crime seems to be having  a cheery outlook on life, something Bernard apparently abhors. There’s also the fact that Manny tries to help Bernard around the shop, once selling every book which infuriated Bernard as it meant he had to deal with the distributor and order more books. Despite this it is shown that on the occasions Manny left Bernard to his own devices, either by quitting or running away, Bernard was reduced to even more of a mess than normal, barely able to function on a human level. The only other person in Bernard’s life is his best (and possibly only) friend, Fran Katzenjammer. The two share a number of similar characteristics which aids them in getting along, namely smoking and drinking.

Like all of the great arsehole characters in television, Bernard has a softer side which occasionally shines through. He has shown that he shy and awkward around women, he develops a certain jealousy and possessiveness whenever Manny finds other friends to hang out with, he’s certainly intelligent, though he generally seems to do nothing with his intelligence, and obviously loves reading and he genuinely seems to be scared or confused by the outside world, choosing instead to hide from it in a drunken haze inside his shop. It is also revealed that his general outlook on life may have been caused by an incident involving an old fiancée.

Well that’s it for now. Come back for more tomorrow. Laterz.

I saw these great refridgerators on my friend Soleil’s facebook at her friend’s house and I just had to find out more. They are from a company called SMEG, and their website can be found HERE. Aren’t they fabulous?

*First photo is from my friend Soleil’s facebook, and the other two are from the SMEG website*

Tristan the Advertising Cadet tossed fretfully on his futon. He really needed All Bran this morning. Fifteen days of Froot Loops had left him twitchy, constipated and more than a little paranoid. Once again he fantasized about sabotaging his Smeg Random Breakfast Generator.

‘Wallpaper’ magazine had claimed that random cereal generation was the ultimate way for young executives to prove their ability to handle whatever life threw at them. The concept was so exclusive that global distribution was restricted to one client per postcode.

Tristan bid furiously online for the personality assessment, triggering a call from his Help Desk Officer, who he told to f*ck off. He won the auction, noting in the disclaimer that random generation was not recommended for Capricorns. He earned a borderline pass and secured his order with a massive down payment. At last he had the means to erase office memories of his mother’s mortifying muesli porridge deliveries.

After four months wait and a three-day installation nightmare, the Random Breakfast Generator (or RBG as Tristan was now entitled to call it) dominated his apartment. The cost was crippling.

He threw a party and was amazed at the number of work colleagues who came. Guzzling his designer beers, they filed murmuring around the gleaming cylinders of what looked like a monstrous paint-tinting machine. Tristan poured schnapps for the creatives and learned with delight that they’d visited the web address he’d emailed them.

‘Twelve months eh, Cobber?’ The Art Director swapped looks with his team. ‘Reckon you can handle it?’

Tristan refilled the shot glasses. ‘Piece of piss, Andre; just you wait.’

‘We’ll be monitoring your progress.’

‘Go for your lives; the website’s updated every day…’

‘We know.’

Tristan’s favourite Account Coordinator approached the bar, achingly lissom in a Christopher Kronos spray-on. Tottering on her Nine Wests, she hefted Tristan’s Orrefors pitcher and sent a sparkling fragment into the salad centrifuge.

‘Oops! Sorry Trist; my bad. The Boys said we need another jug of Midori.’

Tristan gritted his teeth and emptied another textured bottle. It was Danni, more than anyone, that he wanted to impress.

She put her elbows on the bar and leaned forward smiling. ‘Nice toy.’ She flicked her eyes to the RBG. ‘Cost a bit?’

Tristan’s knife missed its lime completely. ‘F*ck yeah! I mean – yeah. A bit.’

‘So how’d you manage to pick thirty cereals? I can only think of… four.’

‘They gave me a list of hundreds; I just had to rank them. They had every cereal from round the world. Even ones they don’t make any more.’

‘Yeah?’ She took a slice of lemon and stroked it absently over her tongue. ‘Even Chocco Nuggets?’

Tristan blinked. ‘Chocco Nuggets? I can’t believe you said that! How d’you know about them?’

‘I used to have ‘em at Grandma’s.’

‘Fair dinkum?’

‘Fair dinkum.’

‘Sh*t! So did I!’

Danni put the lemon in her mouth and bit hard. Her freckled nose wrinkled. ‘Wow!’

Tristan stirred the pitcher and tossed in a sprig of parsley. ‘I put Chocco Nuggets third; I haven’t had them for ages; I wouldn’t mind if I got them every day.’

Danni grinned. ‘That’d kinda defeat the purpose though, wouldn’t it? Still, I’d love to have ‘em again one day too.’

‘You would?’

‘Yeah!’

Tristan’s heart began to thump. ‘Well, maybe…’

‘Oi, Danster!’ A large Sales Rep gestured from the balcony. ‘Tell Ted to hurry up with that f*cking jug!’ The Sales Boys always called Tristan Ted. Short for Sh*thead.

‘Coming!’ Danni grabbed the pitcher. ‘Gotta go, Trist; great party. I hope you get Chocco Nuggets every day.’

Tristan gazed after her, then realised the creatives were staring at him.

The copywriter lifted an eyebrow. ‘Chocco Nuggets?’

**********

Smeg contracts were Draconian by design. Tristan was glad; it was going to take a lot to make up for his failure to stop the Sales Boys pissing in his spa. He scanned the pages over his first random breakfast of Froot Loops, left buttock still aching from his NanoBot injection. In a few hours, the implant would advise Smeg Client Service that Tristan’s meal had entered his duodenum and was past the point of return.

Failure to receive this message every 24 hours would elicit a warning. Unless Tristan could prove an eligible medical condition, his contract would be terminated, his huge surety forfeited and his loser status proclaimed on Smeg’s RBG microsite. When he arrived at work, he was stunned to see every browser displaying this exact site.

‘We’re all eager to see how you get on.’ The Copywriter’s breath was hot at Tristan’s ear. ‘We’ve even organised a little communal bet, if you’re feeling confident.’

Tristan flushed. ‘Oh really?’ His voice shrilled as heads popped from every cubicle. ‘You’re bloody on!’

A cheer went up and the Copywriter handed Tristan a pen. ‘Nice one, Squadron Leader, sign here!’

The contract was printed on the studio’s best paper. Through smarting tears Tristan beheld a terrifying figure in double bolded comic sans.

**********

Tristan barely slept that night. He was hocked to the eyeballs; if he lost the bet, he’d have to default on his BMW. He glared at the pristine hoppers glinting in the moonlight. Suddenly they gave an unearthly groan and began to rotate. Tristan leapt like a deer, straight through his Japanese changing screen. Then he remembered: the RBG self-cleaned daily.

He’d nominated 3:00pm; the cycle was twelve hours early. For fifteen minutes he watched the machine behave like a mantis after feeding. The awful scrapes and whines raised his hackles repeatedly. Thoroughly spooked, he watched his ‘Lost in Space’ videos until it was time for breakfast.

He got Froot Loops.

The probability of two consecutive identical cereals was 1 in 900. This figure appeared in the RBG’s metrics monitor, which also advised Tristan that the odds of his next breakfast being Froot Loops were 1 in 2,700. Though tempted to test them, Tristan’s contract constrained him to wait until the following day, whereupon his china bowl rang again with little coloured rings.

The same thing happened the next day.

And the next.

He didn’t even like Froot Loops. He’d put them thirtieth – too timid to chance the nasty looking offerings from Yemen, Belarus and Chad. The cereal was painfully crunchy. The coating, which could only be dissolved by pancreatic amylase (thereby freeing radioisotopes for NanoBot detection), could be optioned to keep every morsel milk-free. Tristan rued his choice; preference changes were only free at the annual major service.

He couldn’t believe that having crunchier cereal than anyone else in his suburb had ever seemed like an edge.

**********

After two weeks of the sickly fruit treats, Tristan’s bowels became capricious. He called Smeg and a voice synthesiser offered a service visit, provided he undertook to pay for it should no fault be detected. Miserably he pressed ‘1’. The voice then asked him to confirm his apartment access code so the Technician could plan his or her day without constraint.

That evening, a crisp printout on Tristan’s dining table informed him that comprehensive diagnostics had shown the RBG to be in perfect working order. He converted his remaining share options and went to bed defeated. At 3:00am, the self-clean cycle scared the bejesus out of him yet again. Four hours later, the RBG presented him with another pristine serve of Froot Loops.

Tristan regarded the bowl white lipped, then flew to the bathroom and smashed it into his chrome toilet. Flush after flush failed to sink the impermeable rings, which bobbed gaily like so many life preservers. Then Tristan’s mobile bleeped with a text message:

‘Your Smeg RBG bathroom sensor has detected undigested breakfast material. Please remit proof of your medical condition to avoid breach of contract. Get well soon!’

Irradiation did more than keep the RBG’s cereals fresh and sterile, it made them easy to track. Tristan sank to his knees and stared long at the strobing sensor peeping from his s-bend. Suddenly it all seemed too much. What was poverty, compared to this hell? In a year or two he’d be back in the black. He’d had enough.

Riding in the office elevator he felt a faint stirring in his guts. His body seemed to be affirming that his decision, however painful, was the right one. The door dinged open and he exited with a faint smile – straight into a phalanx of manic colleagues.

‘He’s here; he’s not sick! Wooo hooo! We’re in the money! We’re in the money!’

Tristan’s image stared from every terminal, a crimson ‘WARNING ISSUED’ plastered across his Smeg file. The Copywriter began an exponential conga line and Tristan choked as Danni sashayed past – a hairy pair of sales hands at her supple hips.

For dinner, Tristan fished one Froot Loop at a time from his toilet, rinsed it in a bowl of vodka and washed it down with more.

**********

Mountain dawns and ocean sunsets swept unheeded past Tristan’s picture windows. The odds of Froot Loops were now so titanic, the metrics monitor expressed them as a formula. In return for a month’s free consumables, Tristan had allowed Smeg to run an article on his freakish statistical experience.

Now he spent his evenings bitterly declining invitations from chat rooms. Smeg’s home page had even begun scrolling up to the minute data and commentary on his progress.

At work the mood was hostile. It was almost Christmas and Tristan’s colleagues were sweating on their windfall. Their premature jubilation had soured to resentment at his stubbornness. Surely it was only a matter of time.

The agency mysteriously snared the All Bran account and Tristan was assigned to oversee the national re-brand. Bound by his contract, he dejectedly donated his pallet of freebies to charity.

On New Year’s Eve, Tristan breakfasted as usual. Hunched and rocking in the gloom of his filthy kitchen, he failed to notice the puff of powder that followed the Froot Loops through the dispensing chute. Only when his spoon made a gritty crunching sound did he look into the bowl.

Tristan began to tremble, then tore open his curtains to examine the vessel more closely. Under gentle morning sunlight, a faint residue bore witness to a vanished milk tide.

Ten seconds into the New Year, Tristan activated his RBG again. Amid a blaze of re-aimed downlights, his prayers were answered: Froot Loop dust. With a mad cackle he leapt onto his bench and tapped one of the hoppers with a cleaver. The pentatonic note was loud and pure. He hit another, and the sound was the same.

Forcing the machine around on its axis, he banged each cylinder in turn, frantically searching for the one that had to be almost empty. But the Italian steel was too thick to permit differentiation.

Undeterred, he loaded his owner’s CD and pored over the specifications, then calculated the volume of Froot Loops he’d eaten during the previous months. He carefully rechecked his figures, concluding that there could be no more than five serves of the hateful food left in the machine. If Smeg thought he were going to authorise a refill, they had another f*cking thing coming.

That week saw a transformed Tristan. Though pallid and overweight, he cut a commanding figure among his peers. Even the creatives began to look nervous. With each new dawn, Tristan happily devoured a growing portion of dust until only one possible Froot Loops serve remained.

It was Friday. For the first time in months, Tristan followed his peers to the pub. He drank heavily and even shouted a couple of rounds into his social vacuum. In just a few hours, he’d be free. As he got intoxicated, he began baiting the Copywriter and got a pleasing reaction. For once the shoe was on the other foot.

He became increasingly bold, thrilling as the Sales Boys congratulated him on his wit. Goading and taunting, he gradually worked the whole room into laughter at the Copywriter’s expense – tapping into deep-seated ignorance and jealousy of the creative function.

Then the Copywriter’s mobile rang and Tristan elatedly accepted his first free drink since joining the agency. When he turned back, the Copywriter’s furious face was only centimetres from his.

‘Alright, Arsehole, if you’re so f*cking confident, why don’t you double our bet?’

Tristan did a clumsy mental calculation and ended up with his BMW, two weeks’ holiday and enough cocaine to dust Danni’s entire body. Swayingly he surveyed the assembly, alcohol burning in his ulcerated stomach. Suddenly, all became hushed.

‘Doubleall yerbetsh? Yerrr bloody ONNN!’

The cheer was deafening. Tristan smirked at the Copywriter, who toasted him in surprisingly gracious defeat.

The summer sunset moiled huge on the horizon as Tristan slewed into his apartment. Chuckling and dribbling, he tore off his suit and slithered onto his cool Spanish granite. His pupils slid in and out of focus, then abruptly narrowed to pinpricks. At his nose was a tiny plastic toucan.

He scrambled to his feet and seized the mascot. Attached was a letter from Kellogs, thanking him for all the publicity and promising free Froot Loops for the remaining months of his contract.

Underneath was another Smeg printout, confirming that per the recent change in account conditions (as detailed in the brochure emailed to his work), his hopper had been refilled automatically.

Tearing at his face and hair, Tristan ran howling from the giant burning Froot Loop that filled his Western window.

Back at the office, his Help Desk Officer exited Smeg’s Client Control Site and deleted her hacker’s ID.

‘That’ll teach you,’ she whispered.

MAJOR IMPROVEMENTS RECENTLY in my humble East Hampton cottage.

I’ve managed to turn a drab 1930s stick rattan sofa with no cushions into comfortable seating for my screened porch. All it took was three days wielding a paintbrush (this thing has a LOT of surface area and needed priming), while listening to songs I didn’t even know I had on my iPod. That, plus $400 worth of cushions on sale from the Restoration Hardware catalogue have in turn transformed the porch into a second living room. I’m sitting there as I type this, feeling pleased with myself.

But that’s nothing compared with the fact that I finally, after three months of living without one (inconceivable, I know), had a proper refrigerator delivered today. It’s a stainless Frigidaire, and I like it. It’s not the blue Smeg of my dreams, but it’s not bad-looking — exceedingly plain. It’s fairly quiet (I would prefer complete silence, but this is as close as I’m gonna get), and it’s the right size for the space – not a monster.

For almost three months — after buying and quickly returning to Sears a cheapo fridge that drove me crazy with its grunts and groans — I’ve been living with an Igloo cooler and a fridge the size of a hotel mini-bar (with a freezer just big enough for a can of lemonade). I was really tired of all my fresh Long Island farmstand produce falling on the floor each time I opened the door.

I didn’t want to do the Sears/PC Richard route, so two weeks ago, I went to Bob Stevens Appliances, a real appliance store, located in the airport at Westhampton Beach (a safe distance from the runway). I felt I needed to see the things in situ, so I wouldn’t make a second refrigerator mistake, and it appears I have not.

Now my vegetables and bottles of Long Island Summer Ale look lost in the depths of 18 cubic feet. I see a trip to the Bridgehampton King Kullen in my future.

I still want the blue, though, so my plan is to paint the lower kitchen cabinets Benjamin Moore’s Sailor Sea Blue, or something like it. This painting thing, once you get in the rhythm, ain’t so bad.

Oh, and the cellar is nearly cleared out of the previous owner’s stuff. Just a few more trips to the dump, and then it will be time to start filling it up with my own stuff.

Deer count, last 24 hours: 4 (a mother and two fawns yesterday, and a really bold one today who came within a few feet of my back door – eyeing the impatiens, I’ll bet)

Colin from Manchester has emailed me his Smeg fridge design – it is the homepage of www.milliondollarhomepage.com, and he comments: “I believe this is a snap shot of what is currently dominating the internet at the moment and therefore best reflects our virtual internet culture.”

I like your thinking Colin! Anyone else have any thoughts, or a design idea of your own?

If you would like me to post your Smeg fridge design, go the Smeg Retro website and get creative, take a screen print and email it to me as a jpeg

If you are a fan of Smeg, read my Appliances Online blog post on their partnership with Breakthrough Breast Cancer – they will be giving 10% off all sales on any pink appliances from the 1st August.

Following my last post regarding the Smeg ‘design your own fridge’ competition, I thought I would post my design so you can get an idea of the kind of thing you can do with it.

I did put this together quite quickly, so it may not be as imaginative and creative as some of your designs, but it serves it purpose!

If you have designed, or are thinking of designing a Smeg fridge, email it to me with your name and any comments and I will post the best.

Also please post your comments on my Fight Club inspired design (be gentle, I’m very sensitive to criticism!)

Smeg have launched a competition giving you the chance to design a retro Smeg fridge of your very own. The Smeg freestanding fridge has gained iconic status in recent years; not only do they come in every colour you could imagine, but it is now possible to buy a Paul Smith-esque stripy fridge and even a union jack fridge. But the innovative guys at Smeg obviously feel that this isn’t enough, and they need your help for their next creation.

In partnership with Wrappz.com, Smeg would like people to choose from a range of iconic art, music & film star images, or upload your own image, and submit your design to them. This will then get entered into a prize draw with the chance to win a retro Smeg fridge with a Wrappz of your design.

In the name of research I had a go myself earlier, and even choosing one of the images in their list allows for a reasonable amount of creativity. The tool allows you to choose the base colour of the fridge; adjust the size and dimensions of the image when on the fridge and add text where ever you like in your chosen font and colour. One thing I did find is that it’s quite easy to get carried away, so just bear in mind that there is a chance your fridge could actually be made for you and make sure you design something could actually live with!

Back in ‘89, there weren’t many stateside options for an anglophile in need of a Britfix. Cable TV offering international fare was still years away, so it was pretty much a steady diet of PBS or starve. I’d grown up watching shows like The Goodies, The Young Ones, and of course Monty Python’s Flying Circus, and as PBS and I both got older, I was treated to dishes like Rising Damp, ‘Allo, ‘Allo, Are You Being Served? and Chef!, all of which I grew to love.

Who would’ve known, then, that when PBS changed up its programming–which it did without warning all the time, and much to my grumpy dismay–one of the replacement series plated up that year–Red Dwarf–would keep me both satisfied and yet always craving more for the next two decades?

“This is an SOS distress call from the mining ship Red
  Dwarf.  The crew are dead, killed by a radiation leak.  The only
  survivors were Dave Lister, who was in suspended animation during the
  disaster, and his pregnant cat, who was safely sealed in the hold.
  Revived three million years later, Lister’s only companions are a life
  form who evolved from his cat, and Arnold Rimmer, a hologram simulation
  of one of the dead crew.”

– Holly, Ship’s Computer

So begins the saga, then, of Dave Lister, the last human being alive, and his quest to get back to earth. The rest is comedy history that is, thankfully, still in the making. It’s history I never tire of repeating, and that I rarely, if ever, shut up about, which is why this blog is here. It’s not the only thing that will be here, but it’ll be here an awful lot.

I hope there are a few fellow Dwarf devotees out there who won’t mind coming along for the ride, and if not, well … smeg off, you’re strapped in anyway.

… message ends.

Ο διαγωνισμος διοργανωνεται απο την Kraft για το προϊον Philadelphia

Δηλωστε συμμετοχη στο διαγωνισμο και μπειτε στην κληρωση για ενα  μοντέρνο ψυγείο SMEG (σε κόκκινο, ασημί ή μπλε χρώμα) !

Για να παρετε μερος πατηστε εδω

Ο διαγωνισμος ληγει στις 30/6/2009

I know this is common complaint amongst most people who drive, but I think it still needs to be said.  OLD PEOPLE SHOULD NOT BE ALLOWED BEHIND THE FUCKING WHEEL.  Period, end of story.  No exceptions what-so-ever.  I’m getting so damn irritated with being on the road having to drive behind these old people in their ugly ass Buicks and Oldesmobiles.  A few weeks ago I actually saw a car sitting at a stop light facing THE WRONG FUCKING WAY!  I was trying to make a left turn on to a street and she was in my way, with her bumper facing me.  I struggled to even understand how she could have POSSIBLY ended up in that position.  And of course when I got close enough I realized she was fucking old.  I’m sorry, I have no sympathy for old people who can’t drive.  Either get someone to take you to the store when you need to reup on your adult pampers or stay the fuck home.

Do you love anything pink? If so, then the new website www.pink4fun.com is for you. It’s a shopping directory for all things rosy in fashion and homes, which you can buy online if you click through the site to the manufacturer’s website. Here are a few of our favourites:

Jamie Dream Ottoman, Graham and Green

Pink Mother Of Pearl Inlay Chest Of Drawers, Graham and Green

Pink 15" LCD Digital TV with Freeview, Toys R Us

Dark pink Egyptian cotton towels, Debenhams

Travel tags, Aspinals of London

Smeg fridge freezer, Next

If this is all a bit too much pink (!) then click on the Ideal Home website for style and gift inspiration in every colour – Emily 

http://www.smeguk.com/

A colorful oven designed by Marc Newsom for SMEG.

Om jag var rik skulle jag köpa ett hus, eller iallafall ett fritidshus och då skulle jag inreda köket antingen i lantlig stil eller cool retrostil.

Någon av dessa skulle matcha min fina köksassistent finfint:

Eller kanske gå wild and crazy med ett sånt här härligt kylskåp:

Självklart finns det diskmaskiner i samma stil som man bara MÅSTE ha:

Kylskåpen och diskmaskinerna kommer från Smeg och är helt ljuvliga!

STYLE
Glitchy down tempo electronica with an air of melancholy serenity. The music of Maps and Diagrams wanders between wistful beauty and pensive solemnity. There are some passages of intense bliss; flickering, static infected zones where swells of luminous tone rise and fall, underplayed harmonious touches and liquid synths release tantalising snatches of touching melody and streamers of effected noise flutter and flash.

Beats for the most part are not strongly regular, rather they are scatty, fragmented affairs strewn with electronic detritus. In fact, the percussive aspects are among the most engrossing – incredible multi layered arrangements where deep kicks fluctuate and pulse beneath an array of lighter sounds made up of both structured clicks, crunches and crackle as well as seemingly random hiss, disturbance and interference. At times these elements disperse into beatless clouds like dust motes in sunlight. I’m especially drawn to the warmer tracks on this album – the lazy effected electric piano phrases and nodding groove of Walnut Creek, the delicate vibes and deliciously morphing rhythm of Henna, the raindrop-like echoing, chaotic percussives and moody bass of Kuahaa. As is often the case, these attractive pieces are all the more poignant for being set among the other slightly harsher, darker compositions.

ARTWORK
Since this is a download album artwork consists only of the main image seen above. This appears to be a mixed media design where line drawings of amoebic cell forms curl across a blotchy red, green, beige ground – grunge effects and careful damage forming lush textures. A single line of text delivers the album title and the Maps and Diagrams moniker.

OVERALL
Maps and Diagrams has been in action since around 2002 and is the project of U.K. artist Tim Martin. The project now has an extensive discography released via such labels as pause_2, static caravan, arable records, smallfish, moamoo and (as with this current album) Cactus Island. The Cactus Island label has actually just awakened from a semi-dormant state and redesigned its website – Smeg being the first fresh delivery. Smeg is released in FLAC and mp3 formats, contains twelve tracks and includes cover art by Malota. If you haven’t already heard Maps and Diagrams – this is digital glitch of the highest order; very inspiring, very cutting edge, absorbing headphone listening.

www.cactusisland.net
www.myspace.com/cactusisland

Review by Morheus Music
www.electronicmusicmall.com