Bill Bodden's Blog - Posts Tagged "stuff"

A self-help guru named Marie Kondo has come under fire for her philosophy regarding clutter and possessions. Basically, she's in favor of getting rid of everything you don't really need - the "need" part being the element with which people seem to take issue. The main idea of her theory is to get rid of things that don't bring you joy. Turns out, a LOT of things give me joy.

Bill adding another box to the piles in the basement...

I have WAAAYY too much stuff. Our basement more closely resembles the warehouse at the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark than anything else. A big part of my problem is that I'm extremely susceptible to the collecting bug. In my teens it was baseball cards, beer cans, and stamps; these days, the urge runs more toward board games and miniature figurines - none of which take up very little space. I'm not the only one in this house that falls prey to this same bug: the cats have more toys than they could use in a lifetime - if only they'd stop knocking things under the refrigerator!

To read the rest of this post, please visit: http://billbodden.com/2020/03/02/disp...

Well, we''re in it now, aren't we? It's been said for years that a global pandemic is only a matter of time, and this year thew clock ran out. Now that we've started washing our hands compulsively, what else do we do?

1. Don't panic. I saw people at my local Costco two weeks ago with three or more BALES of toilet paper in their carts (each "bale" is @30 rolls). Seriously, what the heck do you need THAT MUCH toilet paper for - are you cosplaying the mummy for your pets' enjoyment? I bought one bale, because A) we were running low, and B) that's the amount I always buy, because Costco doesn't have smaller quantities. 30 rolls should last us for AT LEAST three months, even with...

T read the rest of this post, please visit: http://billbodden.com/2020/03/16/apoc...

So the world's on fire, but you're tired of hearing about that, and so am I. Instead, I thought I might talk about things I'm doing to keep busy while stuck at home. I have a lot of hobbies, and rarely get the chance to indulge them, so here goes...


Miniatures I've worked on previously. That's a dime in the foreground, for scale...


First, I've been painting miniatures again. Mostly, I've been working on my Napoleonic (historical) miniatures, painting up some Austrians, French, and Russians. These are very small: 15 mm scale (meaning a figure of a 6' tall man would be 15mm tall). Surprisingly, they are slow to finish, and I get frustrated at the lack of progress and lose momentum. I've also been painting a few Warhammer Fantasy miniatures; I've just finished some goblins and wood elves. These are 28mm scale, so almost twice as big as the Napoleonics. Games Workshop's sculptors have a technique to make the details of the figure really pop - kind of like a caricature. This style makes highlighting the details easy, though I still have trouble...
To read the rest of this post, please visit: http://billbodden.com/2020/03/25/dist...

I used to be strictly a dog person. I grew up with dogs around the house, and their warm, unconditional love was a comfort. It wasn't until I moved away after high school that I first encountered house cats, and boy, my life has changed a lot since then. The most recent cats to enter my life are Monty and Mina, siblings adopted from a rescue org, that have completely...

Mina (left) and Monty, from November 2018 (and still kittens then!)


To read the rest of this post, please visit: http://billbodden.com/2020/03/30/unde...

We all know life is weird right now. Things are by necessity different, and we're all doing our best to cope. Some are coping better than others, but that's another tale for another time. I'm managing to keep it together, at least for now.

I do the grocery shopping for our household, and man, that is a scary proposition these days. I absolutely mask up for the trip, and spend as little time as possible in the store. At the big, warehouse grocery store, I use a self check-out aisle to minimize my contact with other humans. At the co-op, I do my best to maintain social distancing guidelines, and again, spend as little time inside as possible. I wash my hands thoroughly upon returning home, but so far we haven't taken the extraordinary step of quarantining our groceries when I get home. It's inconclusive how much this helps reduce the spread, but boy, I sure would be embarrassed if that's the vector that bring the virus to me or to T. I've kept my trips to once every two weeks. I had the good fortune to see what was coming and stock up a bit on canned goods, so we probably could go a bit longer if we needed to. In the two trips I've made since quarantine started, the number of people wearing masks has gone up substantially, but is still only around half.

To read the rest of this post, please visit: http://billbodden.com/2020/04/23/litt...

Things came to a head last week: our 17+ year-old clothes washing machine was acting up in ways that were worrisome. T, ever the consummate troubleshooter, looked up the problem online. "Oh no," she exclaimed. "It sounds like the main bearing is shot. We could replace it, but it would cost at least as much as buying new, and with no guarantee that anything else about that machine wouldn't catastrophically fail shortly after."

"Merde." I said wittily, and we hopped in the car, carefully enmasked, to see about buying a new machine. The process was relatively painless. As is her wont, T had already scoped out Consumer Reports for the most highly-rated machines, and as it happened they had the model we wanted in stock - if we were willing to take the floor model. Supply issues have hit the appliance industry hard. Nothing about them is considered essential, or so I gathered, so many factories are shut down with no end in sight to the supply drought for new machines. We bought the thing we'd just been kicking and leaning on and counted ourselves lucky. That was Wednesday. On Friday, our new machine would be delivered.

Once back in the car, we looked at each other and groaned. Our basement...

To read the rest of this post, please visit: http://billbodden.com/2020/05/11/an-e...

Protests have been in the news - protests by people demanding that the Stay-At-Home orders be lifted. Interestingly, these protests seem sponsored by big money; many of the protesters have been traveling the protest circuit, railing against state governments that don't ally themselves with our Cheetoh Dictator in Washington. Most of these protests have also featured...

To read the rest of this post, please visit: http://billbodden.com/2020/05/18/over...

Going through boxes of stuff, trying to cull the crapton of paper I've saved over the years. I've found some amazing things - receipts from my trip to the UK and Germany by myself in the 1980s, fanzines from the 1990s, and assorted oddball collectibles I somehow acquired and, more bafflingly, kept for years. I came across this photo some time ago, and it brought back a flood of memories:

Yes, I once owned a red suit-jacket...

As body modifications go, I've not been too adventurous. I have no tattoos and exactly this one piercing - in my left earlobe. I got the piercing done around 1989-1990 - that's at the tag end of the period of time when it was popular. Peter and I and our friend Spike went on a road trip to the Twin Cities, and our local friend Simba recommended a place to us for the deed to get done.

To read the rest of this post, please visit: http://billbodden.com/2020/06/15/a-li...

We all need an escape from real life- especially now - from time to time. Something to recharge the batteries, revitalize the spirit: something fun. With that in mind, here's my list of a few films/TV series to lift the spirits and bring a few laughs.

What We Do in the Shadows film cast


To read the rest of this post, please visit:
http://billbodden.com/2020/06/22/a-gr...

Our condo association had scheduled some routine maintenance for this week - repaving part of the shared driveway - and the small apron of same that leads up to each unit's single-car garage - with fresh blacktop. This year, the part they worked on was right outside my office window. They're done now, but for four days it was loud, dusty, and, finally, filled with intense heat and the piquant bouquet of petrochemicals. All that - plus...

To read the rest of this blog post, please visit:
http://billbodden.com/2020/08/07/wher...