Why it's important to get tile samples.

It's spring (it must be -- I finally remembered to swap the winter front door wreath with the spring one), and this old woman's fancy has turned to finishing the bathroom remodel.

Some people celebrate warmer weather by buying seeds and bedding plants; I celebrate by dreaming about ripping out my combo bathtub/shower and replacing it with just a shower. Alert hearth/myth readers will recall that I finished remodeling half of the bathroom (two-thirds, if you count the laundry closet makeover) last September. When I posted about it back then, I included copious photos; if you scroll down in that post to the pic of the vessel sink, you can see the tub/shower alcove in the mirror. The tiles are a tired beige. The grab bars are positioned weirdly and look like they belong in a nursing home. I'm pretty sure the tub had an apron front, but somebody covered it with a four-inch-deep extension in a tile that doesn't quite match the original tile color and that blocks the laundry door from opening all the way. Presumably the extension's purpose was to provide a wider seat for someone getting in and out of the tub. But then somebody later added glass shower doors, and the bottom track for the doors ruined the wider seat.

In a perfect world, I'd have a newly-tiled shower with a minimal threshold, a bench, and a nicho for shampoo and stuff. (In a perfectly perfect world, I'd make it a steam shower, but there is literally nowhere to put the steam unit.And then there's the installation cost and maintance and haha nope.) 

I could have one of those prefab acrylic things installed over the old shower tile. But I want a bench, and I can't add one until the tub is gone. And how, I ask you, would prefab acrylic shower walls look in the same room as my fabulous bespoke vanity? They would look stupid. It would look like I'd given up. And I am not giving up!

So I'm entertaining myself by haunting websites and ordering tile samples. The samples do pile up, but they're cheap as vices go, and supposedly you can do crafty things with them. And they are essential for planning a remodeling project over time. 

Take, for example, my kitchen countertops. When I first started looking online, I fell head-over-heels in love with a solid-surface product from Formica called Bottle Glass Quartz. (It's not actual quartz. That's just the name.)

Lynne Cantwell 2026

But no one would even sell me a sample, let alone make me kitchen countertops out of it. Okay, that's not strictly true; one local place said they would make me kitchen counters, but the price would have been astronomical. I realize now that most dealers were hesitant because they'd have to order a whole slab, and who else would want such busy countertops in a so-not-neutral? They'd be stuck with the remnant forever. So I sucked it up and ordered a different solid surface pattern from Lowe's.

Then last week, I was looking on websites for tile samples, and lo and behold, one place not only carried Formica Bottle Glass Quartz, but they had samples! I'm no longer in the market for countertops, but I ordered a sample for old times' sake.

Boy, did I dodge a bullet. Here's the sample of the love of my life, along with one of the Terrazzo Sea Glass I settled for: 

Lynne Cantwell 2026

The stuff I was dying to get would have been too gray and too dark for my windowless kitchen. The pattern I settled for brightens up the room and goes great with my oak cabinets.

The moral of the story: Don't fall in love with tile - or a countertop - until you see the sample.

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To be clear, I think grab bars in a shower are a splendid idea; I just don't like the nursing-home vibe of the ones in there now. So I ordered nicer ones this weekend.

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I did, in fact, find the perfect tile for my shower walls in this latest batch of samples. Somewhat unbelievably, the color matches my bespoke vanity. However, this is about the eighth perfect shower tile I've found over the years, which is another reason I just need to get the project done already.

And then I can figure out what to do with all those tile samples...

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* Nicho is the Spanish word for niche, and a common term around these parts, especially for folks who lean Southwesterny in their decor. 

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These moments of bloggy design fatigue have been brought to you, as a public service, by Lynne Cantwell. Happy spring!

Who owns Pedernal?

I took some time off work this past week -- a staycation that mostly involved cleaning the house, which I hadn't done in far too long. But I also visited the Georgia O'Keeffe Museum to tour an exhbit that I've been meaning to get to since last fall: Tewa Nangeh/Tewa Country. The museum worked with several Pueblo artists, whose ancestors have been here in New Mexico for thousands of years, to provide works that intersect with O'Keeffe's work.

The painting that the museum has been featuring in its advertising for the exhibit is one by Michael Namingha (Ohkay Owingeh, Hopi) that riffs on one of O'Keeffe's pelvis paintings. O'Keeffe used the hole in pelvis bones as a frame, usually to view the sky (I have a poster of one where she painted the moon framed in this way). But she also painted one where the bone is red and the sky is yellow. Namingha takes this colorway for his Disaster #8, converts it to values from the Air Quality Index, and uses it to depict a mushroom cloud rising above the 2022 Hermits Peak/Calf Canyon fire.

It's striking, and it speaks to climate change. But a more prevalent message was the Pueblo artists' reactions to O'Keeffe's love of Cerro Pedernal, the mesa she painted almost 30 times over her years in New Mexico. Here's a work from Marita Swazo Hinds (Tesuque Pueblo) that doesn't look like much: a pot, broken pottery pieces, and some brown dirt: 

Photo: Lynne Cantwell 2026

It's called Did Georgia Pray? The exhibit card explains the significance of the work:

Photo: Lynne Cantwell 2026

Hopefully you can click on the photo to make it big enough to read. The artist talks about how she produces her work in a sacred manner, praying for the land at each step of the way. She wonders whether O'Keeffe did the same. And about Pedernal, she says: 

Georgia once said, "It's my private mountain. It belongs to me. God told me if I painted it enough, I could have it."

But this is Tewa Nangeh -- our land! We do not own it. We pray for it. 

So, I ask again: Did Georgia pray?

Did O'Keeffe hold the land sacred, or was she a clueless white person? Some of the artists in the exhibit make the point that O'Keeffe almost never paints people; as a sort of proto-Modernist, shapes and contrasts were her jam. But these Puebloans wonder whether leaving people out of her art diminishes the importance of their people and themselves -- to the point of erasure.

It's not like white folks haven't been trying for more than a century to erase Indigenous folks from the West.

It gave me a lot to think about.

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Speaking of prayers, though, my favorite piece is this one by Elisa Naranjo Morse (Kha'p'o Owingeh, aka Santa Clara Pueblo), called A Prayer Making Its Way. 

Photo: Lynne Cantwell 2026

That's a badger, one of the six directional guardians of Pueblo spirituality. I hesitate to say much more because I couldn't find info specific to Kha'p'o Owingeh spirituality on the internet (and that's probably by design). I did find a fair amount of info on the Zuni guardian animals because that pueblo sells figurines of them as artworks, and it's possible that Kha'p'o Owingeh beliefs are similar. 

With that disclaimer out of the way: For the Zuni, there are six sacred directions: east, south, west, north, the earth deep below us and the sky above us. The badger is their guardian of the south; he is known as a healer, but can also be tenacious and aggressive.

I liked this one for the colors. But now that I'm looking at it again, I see that Badger is carrying the prayers of his people away from a disaster. I'm sure it's no accident that this is hanging close to Namingha's Air Quality Index-coded mushroom cloud and right across from Hinds's pottery.

That I didn't understand all that to start with might put me in the same clueless-white-person category as O'Keeffe. But I hope not.

The exhibit runs through November 1, 2026.

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Some of y'all may be wondering about Zuni Pueblo's guardian animals. Here you go, from a shop here in Santa Fe that sells fetishes:

• East is the white wolf;
• South is the badger, as I said above; 
• West is the blue bear;
• North is the mountain lion;
• under the Earth is the black mole; and
• the sky above is the eagle.

And the people of the pueblo are at the center.

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These moments of thought-provoking blogginess have been brought to you, as a public service, by Lynne Cantwell. Stay safe!

Re "dying art forms".

I knew there was a reason that I wasn't crazy about Timothée Chalamet. And that was before he caused a stir by making disparaging remarks about opera and ballet.

It turns out I've seen Chalamet in a bunch of movies: Little Women in 2019, the first part of Dune in 2021, the ill-advised (the film itself, not the role for Chalamet) Wonka in 2023, and A Complete Unknown (the Bob Dylan biopic) in 2024. I liked him as Laurie in Little Women. I thought he was okay in Wonka despite the dismal film concept (nobody needed Willy Wonka's origin story). And I didn't like him much as Dylan, although that may have been because I find the real Dylan annoying. As for Dune, Chalamet was decent, but I didn't like the film overall; I thought it moved too slowly and was overly impressed with itself. (I admit I was never a fan of the novels and only watched the first movie for the sandworms, which pissed me off by showing up really late in the proceedings. Haven't seen the second one yet. Might not ever.)

Anyway, in short, Chalamet is a big star. And he has caused a ruckus by claiming in an interview that "no one cares about" opera and ballet. It's not the first time he's dissed the classical arts; back in 2019, he was quoted as calling opera and ballet dying art forms. I'm not linking to his comments because they're easy enough to find with a web search; they've been reported widely, as has the blowback he's received from other famous people.

I am not famous, and I'm not even sure I want to criticize him. Everybody's entitled to an opinion (even if it's wrong, heh). Plus he's only 30. I don't mean to imply that he's too young to know what he's talking about -- he has ballet performers in his family, after all. But this situation puts me in mind of a conversation I overheard probably 30 years ago in which some tweens were dissing the Beatles, saying their music was terrible. I was tempted to explain to them that their favorite music wouldn't exist without the Beatles breaking new ground in the '60s. And I'm somewhat tempted to explain to Chalamet that his own art form wouldn't exist if the classical arts hadn't paved the way.

But those kids wouldn't have cared, and Chalamet wouldn't care. So I'll just say this: I like opera. I even like it well enough to get the t-shirt. 

Left to right: 2023, 2025, and 2021.
Lynne Cantwell 2026

As I have said before, the Santa Fe Opera is here in town, and it seems like it would be a shame to miss seeing world-class performances because some people think opera is a dying art or whatever. I try to see a show every year; this year it'll be The Magic Flute.

I like classical music, too, which I'm sure Chalamet would also have dissed had he thought of it. I went to hear the Assad Brothers, who are Brazilian classical guitarists, when they were at the Lensic here in town a couple of weeks ago. (Scroll down at the link to the video to hear them perform.)

I'm not a huge fan of dance in general, but I appreciate the training and discipline that goes into the art, and I would sit through a ballet without complaining.

But as I said above, everybody's entitled to an opinion. I'm sure some folks would be aghast at me complaining about Dune (fans tend to be gobsmacked when I tell them Frank Herbert struck me as a misogynist*) or saying that I think Bob Dylan is annoying.

The thing is, the classical arts have been reported to be at death's door pretty much all of my adult life. Furthermore, radio was supposed to die when television came in. CDs were going to kill off live music, not to mention vinyl records. COVID endangered the continued existence of movie theaters.

The arts are expensive. But every artistic discipline seems to be amazingly fluid, and their deaths have been, time and again, greatly exaggerated. No matter what Timothée Chalamet says.

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We might discuss A.I. another time.

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* "But what makes you think Frank Herbert was a misogynist, Lynne? What about the Bene Gesserit?" So yeah, about them: They are certainly powerful, and they exert tremendous influence on both politics and society. But they are also manipulative, and they operate in the shadows. Do they wield overt power? No. Are any of them sympathetic characters? Also no. Could one of them become, say, emperor? Not a chance -- the Bene Gesserit's place is behind the throne. 

The first Dune novel appeared in 1965. The Bene Gesserit might have seemed an enlightened view of womanhood back then, but c'mon. You can't continue to argue that today. You couldn't even argue it when I first read Dune in the '80s.

But this is -- all together now -- just my opinion.

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These moments of opinionated blogginess have been brought to you, as a public service, by Lynne Cantwell. 

Time for food stuff and things.

PantherMediaSeller | Deposit Photos

It's the day after the time change here in the US; Americans lost an hour of sleep overnight. Our European friends are being sensible (as they are in so many other ways these days) and waiting until the end of the month, but the US government has seen fit to start this nonsense three weeks earlier than them. (Mama Google says DST always starts on the second Sunday in March here, but I am skeptical. It seems like there used to be only a week between us changing our clocks and folks across the pond doing the same.)

Then again, if Standard Time starts earlier and earlier and ends later and later, maybe eventually it'll just go away entirely, and we'll have Daylight Time all year long. Not that I'm a particular fan of Daylight Time. I just wish we'd pick one.

Anyway, I am muzzy-headed today. And as usual when I'm muzzy-headed, my thoughts turn to food.

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Work has been slow since session ended, so people have been bringing in occasional treats, some of which I've never heard of. One thing a friend made is a Japanese fruit cake. Has anyone ever heard of such a thing? It is not Japanese, nor does it contain much fruit. It is apparently a Southern dessert that folks would make for Christmas: alternating layers of spice cake and yellow cake, with a filling, as opposed to a frosting, containing lemon juice, coconut, and puh-lenty of sugar. Raisins are also involved. It was insanely sweet. The co-worker she made it for proclaimed it was just like her mama used to make. Here's a recipe, although not the one my friend used; try it if you dare.

The other thing that turned up at the office was billed as shrimp cocktail. We were told that the staffer making it was cooking it in the break room. Puzzled, I envisioned her boiling up the shrimp on a hot plate, but no; it turned out to be Mexican shrimp cocktail, which I had never heard of but was delicious. Think gazpacho -- a chilled tomato-based vegetable soup -- with cooked shrimp mixed in. Here's a recipe I found online. I am 100 percent making this myself this summer.

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I did not run across this one at work. Instead, it turned up in the recipe section of Apple News recently. It's called Buttery Irish Cabbage. 

I have never been a cabbage fan, unless it's shredded and mixed with coleslaw dressing. (When I was a kid, I didn't even want the dressing; Mom would grind the cabbage and carrots into tiny shreds for the coleslaw, and I'd eat that plain.) I will also eat cabbage in Chinese food, although there needs to be enough soy sauce and other veggies involved that the cabbage is more or less an afterthought. 

But I have occasionally wondered if my problem isn't that my mother would boil the cabbage 'til it was limp and flavorless. I haven't wondered about it enough to make it some other way. But this recipe that I saw this week intrigued me. I figured that given enough butter and garlic, anything could be made edible -- even cabbage. I made it for supper tonight. Turns out I was right.

I don't know if I love it enough to throw it into a regular rotation. But I'll likely make it again at some point, probably for St. Patrick's Day -- which is, OMG, next week. Where has the year gone?

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The glucose tracking device I mentioned last week came unstuck and fell off my arm last night. I'm not too fussed -- it was due for replacement tomorrow anyway, and a new one is on the way and should be here tomorrow -- but I will try to secure the new one better so it will last the full two weeks. The process is definitely helping me focus on eating low carb.

But now I know the answer to the question that was lurking in the back of my mind about how hard it would be to uninstall the device: Not hard at all!

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These moments of muzzy-headed blogginess have been brought to you, as a public service, by Lynne Cantwell.