Every house has its story. What's yours?

We've lived in this house for 16 years.  Of those 16 years, this is the first where a room wasn't lying with its guts hanging out.  There's no drywall dust in the air, no trim to miter, no dry rot rotting our bank account away.    All the rooms have been finished.  The plumbing, sewer and electrical have been brought up to code.  There's flooring in all of the rooms.  We officially finished the kitchen last April.  I think I'm facing the existential equivalent of ennui.  What else does life have to offer now?  I've accomplished it all - a 1952 rambler has been brought up to code.

Instead of looking for Jesus, or losing fifty pounds by taking up exercise, I've decided to fill this spiritual void with redecorating the office.  Not remodel.  Redecorate.  There's a difference.  In redecorating, your studs aren't exposed.   I went back to the design / build firm I worked with for the kitchen.  Their initial quote for the 12x15 room was $40K in cabinetry.  Helllooooooooo????!!!!!  This is a crappy home office in a 1952 rambler, not a 16th century palazzo on a canal in Venice. 

When I got that quote, it put the pricing I'd been seeing at other places into perspective.  It also got me thinking - hard - about the office, family, design, and pricing.  Currently, the office is a cheery combination of Ikea's IVAR shelving units painted a high-gloss white, yellow walls, a birch kitchen table, and various little rolling trolly table tops (mobile kitchen "islands"?).   The open shelving keeps the space visually cluttered.  I've boxed & bindered my paperwork for years, but you can really only have so many matchy, matchy boxes for your stuff before it costs more than new cabinetry.  Drawers and doors.  That's my motto these days, "Drawers and doors."

Besides the visual clutter of the open shelving, there's also the issue of using a dining table as a desk.  I've used this one for 15, 16 years.  I don't really know how long.  It's served its purpose and the finish is worn down to the wood, the wood grain has been stained black with years of ink and coffee spills.  Well used table, but...  Its 36" depth is part of the whole office clutter problem.  Its depth prevents me from reaching stuff shifted to the back 12".   I can't reach my books without standing up & reaching over if I put them back there.  If it's not immediately used, that space becomes a Strange Attractor.  This issue of too much depth is the single reason why this table is going on to a better home.  My next desk will not be as deep.   

Then there was The Queen's Chair.  The Queen's chair was a barrel back library style chair I used as my desk chair for years.  The problem with the very big Queen's chair is that it doesn't roll around.  Over the years, I'd tried a variety of "solutions" to get that honkin' (but very, very cozy) chair to move into and away from the desk.  I'd had it on rollers, slidey-thingies, nothing.  I've broken chair legs and torn up the pine plank flooring in the office.  I finally decided this chair had to go.  It was too large for the room (okay, for my house.  We're talking this was a really big, comfortable chair) and I needed it to swivel and slide.  It was a Valkyrie of a chair and I needed it to be Mary Lou Retton.  The Valkyrie moved out yesterday.  Sheesh, this room is large.