A Man's Gotta Dream

Denise knows where to shop… when she heard there would be a flea market at a local Lutheran church, she charged right over there. “The churches with the older congregations have all the really cool stuff.” She came home with the most beautiful Christmas tree skirt I have ever seen, as well as some retro Christmas ornaments and… a little “special occasion tree” like my Grandma Louise used to have. Actually, it was a manzanita branch that looked like a tree, about a foot tall. She would decorate it for every season or special occasion. Now, we have one.

The biggest treat was this beautifully illustrated Barbecue Book by the publishers of Sunset Magazine.

For those of you who don’t know, I love to barbeque and I have always dreamed of building a real brick barbecue and smoker in the back yard. Well, now I have some great plans! I prefer the “barbecue as shrine” motif, designing the entire yard around the “sacred flame” on an elevated platform.The book is chock full of handyman projects and I recognized a number of them as fixtures on patios all over my childhood neighborhood. In fact, we had a couple of redwood lounges just like this one…

My Grandma, the one with the “special occasion tree,” had a barbecue almost identical to this one in her backyard in El Monte California.

4 Comments

  1. Rosalyn said:

    Sort of sad story about this yard sale.

    On the way home from work one wet Saturday afternoon I saw a yard sale sign. The reflexes instilled in me from my mother took over and I pulled into the parking lot.

    I LOVE these kind of yard sales. The king that are run by cute little old ladies . And everything cool and old is cheap. They always have a little corner labeled ” Collectibles” Or something like that, little do they know the whole sale is a collectible.

    Anyways , I’m not really sure why I thought this was a sad story, but I think it was cuz I got there in the the late afternoon , so there wasn’t much left. That was really sad.

    But there was some happy stuff too. Like , I got a really rad typewriter. I am slowly starting to collect them It’s not very smart of me cuz they are really heavy and take up a ton of room. But I just couldn’t resist this one. it was older that my others, but It’s Ink was new and really thick, The letters were really dark and they didn’t have the spotted look that the newer type writers have, plus to top it all off it came in its own little carrying case . It is so cool.

    Anyways . I like the illustrations in you book Bo.

    April 17, 2005
    Reply
  2. zachary said:

    wow, bo, how lucky you are to be married to a woman, who knows where to “shop”. anyways, i want you to post more, your site is really interesting, hope you’re doing well, and by the way, your message was great on tuesday! ~zach

    May 4, 2005
    Reply
  3. Anonymous said:

    Do we have to get on our collective knees and beg you? Post already! ~Michele

    May 5, 2005
    Reply

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