Mimi's Kitchen

We spent Saturday night sleeping over at a friend's in Acton. I love their house and always look forward to staying there when we need to. I love the living room, the dining room, the patio, the garden at the back, the guest room where we stay, but most of all, I love the kitchen.

Mimi's kitchen is full of gadgets and labour-saving devices, and while I have gotten quite a few tips on cooking and housekeeping just by watching her work, it's the walls that always draw my attention.

Yes, that wasn't a typo. The Walls.

On one side is mounted a variety of decorative plaques and printed wall decor bearing words of kitchen wisdom and feminine wit lovingly accumulated through her years of wifehood, motherhood and grandmotherhood.

Let me give you a sample:

"I may have my faults, but being wrong is not one of them."

"When I married Mr Right, I didn't know his first name was Always."

"My husband says he'll leave me if I don't stop shopping... Lord, I'll miss that man."

"If you want breakfast in bed, sleep in the kitchen."

And our personal favourite-- "Insanity is hereditary-- you get it from your children."

And as if to confirm my nagging suspicion that the kitchen is actually a poorly-disguised command centre trying desperately to look as if it's just an innocent food-production room, there is a wall phone and two enormous corkboards covering most of what's left of the wall.

The corkboards are huge, but are so completely covered with notes, charts, schedules, telephone numbers, messages and other information that it is impossible to know what colour the cork really is.

On top of this mammoth message centre are three identical clocks, each for a different time zone. Clocks for all the places where Mimi's children and grandkids live. How cool is that?

Under the first is a sign that says "Sydney," where a juvenile scrawl has added, "The best place in the world to live in," to which a different-coloured pencil scribble has jotted down the tart rejoinder, "If you're a prisoner" Ha, ha, ha! I guess the Brit got the better of his Aussie cousin that time.

The second clock is labelled "London" while the third is marked "Ann Arbor."

With us here in England, and with O's sisters in the US and in the Philippines, and with my brother's family moving to NZ this year, the clocks sort of give me an idea of what to give my Mom and my in-laws next chance I get.