Gimme Shelter!

Shelter magaines (and books) are popular ways to distract yourself in a dentist or doctor's waiting room if you're not a Demon Decorator in real life (and I got over that some 20 years ago.)

"Savannah Style" by Paula Deen and Brandon Branch Simon & Schuster 204 pages $29.99
Paula Dee is a doyenne of Southern cooking with seven books and I believe, a television show. This book is lavishly illustrated with photographs of bits of Deen's homes and those of other Savannah residents.

As readers of "Midnight and the Garden of Good and Evil" know, Svannah-ians are a quirky bunch. They put ceiling fans and four-poster beds out on their porches! Go on! Sleep out on your porch, jes' wear a nice nightgown, heah?

If a thing (piece of furniture, bric-a-brac, silver, lamp) is old and beat-up looking, put it out for all to see! One resident has a collection of loving cups -- bought at yard sales and pawn shops -- that he uses on the dining room table as little flower vases.

Collect shells and stick them on mirror frames, bathroom walls - use them as if they were wall paper or stuff them in big, old glass jars so everybody kin see'em.

In Savannah, old is gold!

Conversely, the magazine Dwell is all about New Ways To Be Green! Sustainable greenery for your yard! Rainwater collection! High-tech light bulbs! And, let me add, some extremely weird, off-center furniture styles. You can see them, too, at dwell.com.

One of their ads is for the Big Ass Fan Company (bigassfans.com) with the cutline, "You don't need a ceiling fan; you need a Big Ass Fan!" Based on the design for airplane wings, the fan shown has a total of 10 blades (I counted.)

New "green houses" often have a sod roof. Okay, they make it possible to exist without air conditioning, but they're not such a great idea for here in Earthquake Country as they weigh about 10 times what a regular roof does. How odd would it look to see an aerial view of your sod-roofed house? Big mound of green with cars, bicycles and kid's swing set near it? Soon enough, we're all going to get our own personal sod roof, so let's hold off on this for now.

Dwell's slogan is "At Home in the Modern World." I say, "Have at it."