As you may remember, I recently wrote a post inspired by the great Darren Rowse. Something he said inspired me to refine and restate my mission, or rather, the mission of this blog. Said mission turned out to be the telling of stories in all their different facets and mediums: written or told stories, stories in pictures, on film, and the stories that our lived-in spaces tell about us.
I left it at that. It was a nice long post in which I waxed poetic on how stories are at the basis of everything in our lives and how much we all enjoy telling them and hearing them (or reading or watching them unfold on stage or on a screen). A few days went by and I realized, Dammit, I forgot to mention another really important part of my mission! So, drum roll please, seat yourselves so as not to be taken by surprise. Here is part 2 of my mission statement:

To bring the untold stories I find into the world, disseminate them, give them light and air, allow them to be enjoyed by any and everyone.
This includes unpublished novels, such as Scarborough Baby, by Amanda Ackroyd, which I am publishing serially on a weekly basis, short stories that may have won awards but never been published, poems that have been hidden in shoe boxes in the bottom of closets… you get the idea.
So my desire is not merely to tell stories that belong to me or that are already well known but I think merit another word or two. No, I long to help orphaned stories find the light of day. Or help people who are a little timid bring forth their stories.
There, that is the other half of the mission.

This brings me to today’s mission. The great Darren Rowse has launched a project (he has done it twice before, but it’s slightly different every time) called the 31-Days to Build a Better Blog Challenge.The title of the challenge is self-explanatory. The way it unfolds is that the participants receive a daily email for 31 days, linked to a blog post on Problogger, with instructions for the day. The registered participants may receive a few odd tidbits that the regular readers of the blog do not, but on the whole you may follow along by reading the blog every day almost as well.

So I registered for the challenge, and today is Day 1! Today’s task is to write an Elevator Pitch for our blog. This too is fairly self-explanatory. Imagine you get onto an elevator and you bump into someone whom you’ve been trying to reach but who never gets back to you, or someone you have never had the courage to approach (we’re talking about networking here). Well, this person is now your captive audience, but only for as long as it takes to ride the elevator up to whichever floor he is going to (if your floor comes first, you will of course skip your floor, get off with him, and then find a way to slink down the emergency stairs back to your original destination floor).

It’s a great idea to have this pitch ready, so that at a moment’s notice you can regale your audience with a 30-second spiel which enlightens them while also tantalizing them. They should get off the elevator feeling that they get the general idea, but also intrigued, thinking, I’m going to log onto my computer and check this blog out, it sounds interesting.

The main and best reason to have an elevator pitch is, of course, for yourself. It will help you become laser focused on your mission, so that everything you do is guided by the Primary Objective (I know, I watch too many TV shows). Over time, and not even too much time, this practice will give a shape and direction to your blog which will make it immediately identifiable to your readers. And this is good, because it begins to establish your BRAND.

Darren says all this and more in his post, but I want to add just one little thing. Another great reason to have an elevator pitch is to increase your ability to believe in yourself and what you’re doing. Blogging is only a little less lonely than writing books. There is some interaction with readers and other bloggers, but when you are writing in your own little room, you are all alone, and having the elevator pitch that you can repeat to yourself when doubt starts creeping in helpt tremendously. It makes you think, oh, yes, this is real. I am doing a real thing for a real reason. Lastly, but not leastly (hee hee), the elevator pitch, though brief and to the point, is not usually actually delivered in an elevator. So if you learn to deliver your pitch in 30 seconds (and you should really practice saying it out loud, because it is meant to be spoken, like epic Greek poems, and not read), without requiring a paper bag to gasp into at the end, then when the time comes to say it to someone you have just met at a conference or party, the pitch will be able to breathe, will come to life, and will make perfect sense to the person you are speaking to.

After all this, would you like to hear my elevator pitch for turtle^haus? Well, hang on to your hats, here it is:

Nice to meet you, my name is Ilaria and I write a blog called turtle^haus (that’s H-A-U-S). It’s all about stories. I focus on three mediums of expression: writing and speaking, architecture and design, and film and theater. If you like to hear, watch, read stories and look at people’s houses to understand something about their lives, then you should become a reader. I also help un- or little known storytellers find an audience.

I can deliver it comfortably, with pauses for expression, in 24 seconds. Please let me know in the comments what you think! See you tomorrow!

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Dear Readers,

it is with great pleasure that I announce the opening of my very own aStore on turtle^haus. Having my own Amazon store will allow me to promote my own recommended products. It’s easier than going to Amazon directly, because it’s not overwhelming and you will see only the products I have either mentioned or reviewed here on the blog. Here are some advantages:

• If you are in the mood to buy a book or a gadget, rather than going to Amazon, you can click on the “swimturtle’s store” button in the upper right-hand corner of the screen and browse. If you trust my recommendations, then you will certainly find something you like;
• You don’t have to ever to go Amazon to finish your purchase, as there is a shopping cart right in m store;
• There is an additional and very nice benefit for me: not only will I get a commission on whatever you decide to purchase in my store, but if during the same session you stray from my store to anywhere else in the Amazon site and buy something, from a spoon to a high definition TV, I will get a commission on that too. Amazon’s reasoning is that if if had not been for me you would not have gone to Amazon that day, so since you came in to the site through my “portal,” as it were.

So by all means, step right up and make all your Amazon purchases at turtle^haus. You will be helping me and the economy!

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Dear readers,

the time has come for turtle^haus to have a newsletter. It will be biweekly, issued on the first and third Friday of every month (if there are five Fridays, I get one off). This is a momentous occasion, because it will help me to bring the blog to a new level of professionalism. Here’s what you can expect to find in the newsletter:

• A roundup of the blog’s activity for the two weeks prior to the newsletter issue. This is very useful for those of you who are too busy to read daily posts (daily? hahahahaha! — I know, I’ve been remiss of late, but that is only because I was cooking up all sorts of wonderful new things for you!). You will get the highlights and links in case you want to go back and read something cool you may have missed;
• Special content that is features only in the newsletter — this could take the form of an interview, a poem, an article, a review… you name it;
• Links and tips relating to things I have found interesting on the web — other blogs, websites, new programs, services, social networking tools, events, etc.
• I may also put in videos, pictures and other goodies from time to time.

You will find the subscription form in the header of the site, so come one, come all, subscribe to our wonderful new newsletter. And don’t worry about spam or any of that nonsense. I will use your email address exclusively to send you the newsletter and possibly at some point in the future to communicate with you about projects of mine you might be interested in. See you in the newsletter!

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When I first started blogging, I followed quite a few blogs, without much of a strategy. In other words, rather than following blogs that might help me become a professional blogger, I followed blogs I liked, for pure enjoyment, and from which I derived inspiration in the beginning for various posts. As my interests span Architecture, Design, Literature, Writing, Reading, Stories, People, Art, Film, etc., I followed a variety of blogs centered around these topics.

Then I became a little more serious, and realized that 1) I could not spend all day reading other people’s blogs — there would be no time left to write my own, and 2) I needed strategy, as well as content. It’s true that most blogging gurus will tell you that content is king, and it is, but I have so many interests and there are so many things I consider of vital importance, that for me the hardest thing was zeroing in on what I cared about most, or rather, what I wanted to share with others in a way they might find helpful, entertaining, inspiring, engaging and might want to subscribe to so they wouldn’t miss anything. In other words, I wanted to create something other people would care about as well.


So I became much more selective with the blogs I read. I unsubscribed to almost all the blogs I was following, and in a way started over. I chose blogs about blogging, about strategising, and about making your blog into a business. I don’t know whether my two blogs (this one and Life plus Web) will become full blown businesses, but I want them to be professional, to be set up as businesses. Whether they themselves generate income or lead to something that will generate income, in either case they are part of my online business presence. A big part of it.

In essence I did know that the overall “theme” of my blog was stories, and in a roundabout way, I did express this in my “About” page and in my initial posts.  Recently, however, I read a post by Darren Rowse, the author of Problogger, Twitip, Digital Photography School, and a founder of b5media, that made me stop and think. Darren is definitely one of my mentors and gurus.

In this post, which I admit I can’t seem to find right now, Darren spoke about being asked as a young man to write what he would like his obituary to say, many years from now. In other words, how he would like to be remembered. The implication for a blogger is not nearly as dramatic, but can be stated as: what is your blog really about and what would people say about it?

As my regular subscribers and more or less regular casual readers may have noticed, this is the first post in a while. I took a brief hiatus because I was deeply and furiously involved in the setup and organization of a joint online venture with my dear friend and business partner Mario Kluser, an author featured in this very blog, a blogger, and a discerning and clever internet marketer. During the time that he and I have been feverishly setting up our joint venture, and I have therefore not been blogging, I have been meditating and thinking about the blogs, about their importance to me, and their potential importance to my readers. So today I am restating my mission with this blog.

There is no such thing as objective reality. When I was younger I used to fight this notion with all my might. After all, it was an objective reality that my childhood had been miserable, that I left home at a very young age, that I had to fend for myself in this cold, cruel world, and so on and so forth. Or was it? More importantly, does it matter if it was?

The Rashomon quality of life is what makes it so fascinating. For each of us, what we remember is real, our version of what happened is an objective reality, but as we have seen time and time again, no two people experience anything in the same way. This is why the same book can elicit so many different reactions. We each project onto it, interpret it, react to it according to our own personal bias. We see everything through our own personal filter. And yet, so many stories are universal, in the sense that many of us identify with them, see ourselves in the protagonists, recognize them as our own, or partially our own.

I have a quality that I can’t quite name, but something about me induces people to tell me their stories. People open up to me, mostly spontaneously. It’s true that I ask questions, but the key is, I am truly interested. I love people, young and old, rich and poor, of all creeds, colors and extractions. And I can’t get enough of their stories. I can empathize with almost anyone and anything (except extreme violence and hatred). I am keenly aware and convinced of the fact that as humans the things we share greatly outnumber those that separate us. These days everything makes me cry, a mother’s love, the loss of loved ones to war, a child’s gesture, heartstring-tugging commercials, and this is because I am immediately transported to the root of the matter: how much hard work goes into being a mother, the struggle of raising those children knowing they may be killed in warfare, the fragility of the child’s happiness and contentment.

So, stories — this is what this blog is about.

And there is another aspect to this core theme of story. The way, or the medium, through which these stories are told. Each human being is an artist. Whether or not we think of ourselves as artists, that is what we are. We are each the creator of our life’s story, and we each do it in our own way. Those of us who embrace the inner artist and choose to follow the artistic path, however, are the ones who grapple with the impossible task of expressing their unique and special story.

Another thing I am fascinated by is translation. I have been a professional translator my entire life and therefore have had a long time to think about this subject. The truth is that every single utterance, every expression, every telling, is a translation. Each artist chooses the medium in which he feels that what he sees inside his head is most accurately translated for other people to decipher.

So speaking is a translation of our unworded, unformed thoughts.

So is writing, drawing, painting, sculpting, music, theater, film, and so are the buildings we build, the gardens and landscapes we create, the cities, the interiors… everything is an attempt to translate what we see with our mind’s eye into something other people can see, hear, touch, taste with their physical senses.

The eternal struggle to bring out what we have inside and communicate it to others, this is what I find endlessly fascinating and what I want to share with you, my readers. At this very moment I am attempting to translate my own message so that you can understand it. How am I doing?

I hope you will come with me on my journey, while I explore the many ways in which I and the people I encounter along the way tell our stories, and the story of what it is to be human.

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I should perhaps have titled this post “Introducing our Good Reviews.” It’s not that I don’t believe in bad reviews. If there is something (a book, a movie) that offends me particularly (The Da Vinci Code, anyone? — did I say that out loud?) then I might write a bad or scathing review.
But the purpose of my reviews is to bring things I like and love to the attention of my readers and the world, to share my enjoyment of books, design, interiors, objects that aid in the enjoyment of life, and movies with as many people as possible. I feel it is our duty as members of the human community to remember and remind ourselves and others that art is important, beauty is important and living in a beautiful, comfortable environment is important.
Hence, the Reviews page.
That’s all I’m going to say in this brief introductory post, because I’m anxious to move on to the next post, the first real review. See you there, my friends!

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On Valentine’s day, while unbeknown to me Darren Rowse was publishing my guest post on Twitip and I broke all previous records of visitors in one day, I visited my friend Cristina’s house once again, to take some “after” photos. It was wonderful. Not much time has passed, of course, so the changes are not radical, but she has adopted some of the suggestions that came out of the analysis of her and Lisa’s tweets, and that is both flattering and validating as far as the reliability of this type of experiment and analysis. So, here are the pictures, with some commentary.

Hallway to kitchen, bath and bedroom

There is a new chest of drawers in the bedroom, which we can see from here.

Right side of kitchen

The refrigerator used to be on the right-hand side and now it is gone. In its place is the attachment for a washer/dryer, in my opinion the single greatest addition to any apartment.

Left side of kitchen

The refrigerator is now on the left, and the table is now next to the window, a new addition. Are you starting to see there is a *white* theme going on with the furniture?

Bathroom

A nice white curtain in the bathroom already makes a difference.

New sink and vanity

The new sink makes a huge difference and it was very inexpensive.

Bedroom, view of closet

The closet has been organized and is already quite efficient.

Clothes and coat rack in bedroom

This rack brings back such childhood memories for me! When I was little I lived on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, and my parents at one point brought home a couple of these industrial looking racks from 7th Avenue, in the garment district. Back then you would see these clerks running along the sidewalk pushing or pulling a rack full or garments on wheels. It was great, one of those “real New York” things. From that day on, this kind of rack is called a “7th Avenue.” As in, “Where’s my sweater?” “It’s on the 7th Avenue.” So now Cristina has a 7th Avenue of her own.

New bureau in bedroom

Bed and shoe cupboard

Hallway from bedroom toward living/dining room

This is a great addition, the sofa bed in the living/dining room. It’s the single most important point on which Cristina and Lisa have decided to follow my recommendation. Cristina is from Bologna, in Italy, and she does not often have house guests, but when she does it is usually for a while. When her mother visits she might even stay a month or two. Since both Cristina and Lisa get up very early, often before 6 am, it is unreasonable to think they could not access the studio for several hours, if guests were in there sleeping. This way, they can tiptoe past the sleeping guests and close the double glass doors in the end room and work away to their hearts’ content.

New sofa bed from CB2 in living/dining room

This sofa bed is amazingly economical in terms of space usage. It’s comfortable to sit on and takes up very little room. And it’s a nice splash of color in an apartment with all white furniture.

New dining/work table from CB2

Cristina likes to really spread out when she is working. The table in the end room is reserved for computer and administrative work, whereas this one is perfect for brainstorming, mind mapping, research, and so on. Of course it’s also perfect for dining and entertaining.

View of the end room, the studio

Study/work table in all its glory with file "cabinet"

And here is her efficient office setup, with file drawers made of wire, much “lighter” than a regular cabinet.

Middle room seen from end room

As you can see, the apartment is starting to come together, and each room is settling into its intended function. This post brings this wonderful Twitter experiment to a close, but not forever. We have decided that a year from now I am going to visit the apartment again and take more pictures, to document the evolution of the space.

I want to publicly thank Cristina and Lisa for being such good sports. They were very disciplined in their tweeting, which was essential to the success of the experiment. One of the loveliest thing to come of this experience has been the unintended and unexpected fringe benefit of bringing a certain level of quotidian intimacy back into the relationship. These two women live in different cities and in these situations it is inevitable to lose sight of those little things that all summed up make a “life together” between two people. By following each other’s tweets they were each able to feel connected in those small ways that make all the difference.

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There is a perfect solution to every problem, some people say. The beauty of design, interior design, architecture, fashion, any kind of design really, is that there doesn’t have to be just one perfect solution. There can be, and probably are, as many solutions as there are people. And even for the same person, there can be different solutions at different times. We grow, we change, our taste and needs evolve.
And so we continue to read design magazines, blogs, go to exhibitions, to see if something new comes along that strikes us as “just the thing.”


Well, I have been rather sleep-deprived of late. So finally, the other morning I allowed myself to do something I rarely do — I took a nap. There I was, in a suspended state somewhere between sleep and wakefulness, and I thought to myself, This couch in the library is just not comfortable. The library in my house doubles as a guest bedroom, and the couch folds out into a queen-sized bed. Now, as a bed it’s not bad. During the first six months that we lived here, the downstairs where my bedroom is was not yet finished, and I slept on the sofa bed in the library. As a bed it’s fine. But it’s not at all comfortable as a couch, and the result is that I never sit on it. I do, on occasion, take a nap on it and it’s fairly comfortable for napping. But I don’t like sitting there to read (and remember, it’s in the library) or to watch TV, and there is a lovely flat-screen 42-inch TV on the opposite wall. It should be the perfect room. But it’s not.

The couch

The couch and the bookcase

The bookcase and the TV

Occasionally I think about it and ask myself what kind of couch I would like to put in there, bearing in mind that it must double as a bed, and accommodate two people.
Well, during my nap in this strange semi-conscious state, the design for the perfect sofa bed came to me. In my previous life I went to architecture school and discovered a passion for interiors and single-family houses. In particular I am enthralled by the concept of “form follows function.” I derive great satisfaction from an object that looks like what it’s for: it’s like physical onomatopoeia. At the same time, just as I hugely enjoy playing with words, where meaning and form interweave and depths and layers peek out from between the letters, I also enjoy playful forms, that reveal and hide at the same time, that look like their function, or that hide some of their function.
All this to say that I have conceived a design that looks like a day bed taken from a ship’s cabin but in reality hides a very simple mechanism to transform itself into a double bed. Here are some rough sketches.

Sofa bed, sketch 1

Sofa bed, sketch 2

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Cristina and Lisa’s social experiment with Twitter has come to an end, and I am thrilled to present the final analysis of their tweets. First, let’s review their basic situation and the purposes of this experiment.

1. Cristina and Lisa share a life, two houses and a main area of interest in their profession, but they spend most of the time in two different cities: Cristina in New York, in the new apartment they have just purchased, and Lisa in North Carolina, in the “old” house they bought together several years ago and shared until a professional engagement brought Cristina to New York.
2. The house in North Carolina, having been lived in by the couple for quite some time, is already set up to accommodate their lifestyle, but the new apartment in New York presented a white canvas, as it were, to be customized as much as space and finances allowed. Our goal was to make Lisa’s visits as seamless and convenient as possible, by allowing her to travel light and to have the “perfect” setup waiting for her on her arrival. All this while accommodating Cristina’s needs on a daily basis.

By analyzing the hourly tweets of Cristina and Lisa over a two-week period, we set out to:

1. Capture their “life flow,” the rhythm of their daily lives, their routines and habits;
2. Gain insight into their relationship with their home and work spaces (they often overlap);
3. Understand what is important to them in their relationship with their space.

At the end of the first week, I printed out and analyzed their tweets, and reached a fair number of preliminary conclusions and tentative recommendations. Now the second week has ended, and I am curious to find out whether one week might have been enough to get a fairly good picture of their situation, or whether this second week has given us some deeper glimpses that we might have missed had we stopped the experiment after the first seven days. So, here goes.

First, some statistics:

Cristina:

• Total number of tweets in the second week: 205
• from computer: 205 (almost all from Twitterfox, a small number from Twitter.com)
• from iPhone: none

Lisa:

• Total number of tweets in the second week: 66
• from computer: 42 (Twitter.com)
• from iPhone: 24 (Twitterific)

They both did a great job again. The discrepancy in numbers is due not to the fact that Lisa’s commitment is lacking, but to the fact that her semester had already begun while Cristina’s was still gearing up.

New Insights into Cristina’s Life Flow

• Now that some more furniture has arrived, Cristina has been able to add to her morning ritual the reading of the paper in the kitchen. The best thing about this apartment is the light. The quantity and the quality. She can also read the paper in the dining room, where there is a new very large table from CB2.
• This week was very busy, between furniture deliveries and preparations for the new semester at school, so Cristina was even worse about her eating habits than usual: she neglected her shopping, cooking and eating, frequently skipping lunch and/or snacks or highly necessary cups of espresso!
• I can confirm that morning is the most important time in Cristina’s day, in terms not only of the ritual of awakening, breakfast, radio, communication with family, paper reading, etc. but also as far as setting the tone for the day. This week, in anticipation of the new semester and experiencing a mixture of anxiety and excitement about all the furniture deliveries and assembly, as well as managing and coordinating the various helpers, Cristina woke up very early several times, but I never detected a feeling of unease, which is comforting. She reads in bed, almost always on her Kindle ***an interesting detail vis-a-vis gadgets***.
• The home office seems to be gearing up nicely. Cristina is able to communicate with family via Skype, use Google Docs to collaborate with her Graduate Assistants (GAs), and of course do her own research and writing, and let’s not forget Twitter!
• Her days at work have been more intense but similar in pattern to those of the previous week.
• An important new development of this week has been that Cristina has begun to familiarize herself not only with her apartment but also with her building and her neighborhood. She is definitely a city girl, loves the fact that she can walk everywhere in very little time and that almost everything she needs is located conveniently nearby. There is a gym, so the next thing that is going to be included in her daily routine is some kind of exercise, like yoga perhaps. ***apartment vs. house — my outlook vs. hers, see below in the conclusion***
• I can foresee that evenings will begin to rival mornings in terms of rituals.  The slow, languid teeth brushing in front of the tv, the Kindle reading in bed, the takeout dinner with a friend in front of a movie… it all sounds lovely.

Observations on Cristina’s Experience of Her New Apartment

• The washer/dryer cannot be installed soon enough, as far as I can tell. This week Cristina has repeatedly tweeted about her procrastination with the laundry, and I’m sure it’s due to the fact that it’s not fun to go down to the basement. Once she installs the appliance in her kitchen the quality of her daily life will improve tremendously.
• The kitchen has already improved quite a bit with the simple addition of a table, and Cristina’s gladness is apparent from her tweets about her morning ritual. She might benefit from having a tiny tv in the kitchen.

Lisa’s Life Flow

• This week Lisa’s semester has really picked up, and therefore she has had even less time to tweet. But her routine seems to be much the same as last week’s. Much of her day is taken up by work, whether she is at home or at school. When at home, as always, work is conducted on the floor with a laptop.
• Lisa’s habits have overall been confirmed. I find it wonderful how in sync these two people are! Lisa too barely speaks of cooking, preparing food or eating (both Lisa and Cristina are miniscule women. They each weigh about four ounces.)

Conclusions and Recommendations

• First of all, I don’t think that the second week of tweeting yielded any very deep insights that I had not already intuited after the first week, but something very interesting did happen. The tweets became at the same time more self-conscious and more relaxed and meditative, like musings. Cristina and Lisa started to become accustomed to Twitter, and began to breathe into their tweets. Not to sound too new-agey, but that is what tends to happen. After the first week I was already impressed by how much the lives of these two very different people were in harmony. Through two very different routes, somehow they have arrived at the same place. Both appreciate simplicity, modern lines, organization. Neither of them wants to have to devote too much time to housework, but both need their space to be clean, in order and efficient. They are in the same field of work, are very devoted to their work, mix their work with their play. Lisa, after reading my analysis of the first week of tweets, commented that their lives are pathetic, probably in reference to the fact that they both work so much. I, on the other hand, find their lives to be very Zen. They have intertwined their professional and personal interests in a way that seamlessly weaves their “real” life into their “work” life and each component feeds and enriches the other.
• For the apartment in New York I recommend taking the maximum advantage of the storage space in the basement, freeing up as much of the space as possible in the apartment, so that both Cristina and Lisa can allow their minds to open to all the light and white surfaces that the apartment is now filling up with. Cristina repeatedly mentioned that she spends very little time in the kitchen preparing food because while she is doing it she can’t really “relax,” but her hints at the lack of a tv in there make me think that she equates relaxing and watching tv to a high degree. So I definitely recommend a small television in the kitchen. Lisa would like a microwave, and I think it would be a good addition, since cooking is not high on the agenda. A microwave is also useful to heat up leftovers that have been frozen, and since these two eat like sparrows, I think it highly likely that there will be plenty of leftovers.
• The dining room now has the lovely white table from CB2, but I think it should also house the sofabed for guests. It might seem, at first glance, that the best room for guests would be the study at the end of the apartment, but I don’t think that would be a good idea. Cristina’s mother from Italy comes to visit once a year or so, and naturally, having come so far she tends to stay for a while. Both Cristina and Lisa are early risers and immediately sit down at their computers to check emails and flex their brain muscles. If there were a guest in the study they could not do this, and in the long run it might make the hosting experience stressful, when it doesn’t need to be. If the guest were sleeping in the dining room, they could just slip by, move into the study, and everyone would be happy.
• The bathroom has acquired some new fixtures and seems to be very functional already. One day there will be money to redo the tiles and things like that, but for the time being I would say it’s fine as it is.
• Storage has been added to the bedroom, as we had all reached the conclusion that this is the room in the house that receives the least amount of “love” from the two women. They sleep in the bedroom and read in bed, but no significant amount of daytime is spent there and it is not a focus of their domestic attention.
• I would definitely invest in a radio wiring or wireless (even better) system throughout the house, so that NPR can follow them around during their morning routine.

As a final note, I would just like to speak about my friendship with Cristina for a moment. We have been friends for over a year now, I think, and I have been able to follow the acquisition of this apartment from the first glimmer in her eye to the furnishing and inhabiting phase. When she first started talking about buying a place I encouraged her to buy a house rather than an apartment. For nearly the same amount of money she could have much more space for herself and perhaps also a tenant, like I have. But she stuck to her guns and said that since she spends most of her time alone, a house would make her feel lonely. That an apartment building is a small community, where you can hear other people around you. I must say that now that it’s all over, I think she did the right thing. Both women care about the shape of the house, but neither wants to spend too much time taking care of it (they have too many much more interesting things to do) and I couldn’t agree more. This way, they have the best of all worlds. A house in North Carolina, an apartment in New York, two spaces perfectly in sync with their respective environments.

I am going to be visiting the apartment again very soon and taking a new set of pictures, so stay tuned for the completion of this wonderful and inspiring experiment. Thank you, Cristina and Lisa, for allowing me and the world into your wonderful lives. I wish you joy and serenity in your new place, and I think you’re off to a great start!

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Hello, dear readers! I would like to introduce you to a new feature of turtle^haus. I added a feature to the blog that allows you to ask me questions directly. If you click on the button in this post you will be taken directly to the Contact Form (which of course can be accessed also by clicking on the Contact tab at the top — but where websites are concerned redundancy is the name of the game). Just fill it out and ask away.

I will be happy to answer questions relative to the following subjects:

• advice on how to deal with household or workspace organization, decoration, renovation, etc.;
• advice on buying and selling apartments or houses — in the sense of finding the right space for you, or figuring out that the space you have now is not suited to you and deciding to let go of it;
• advice on reading, writing, authors, etc.
• advice on films (even though I have not yet launched the third thread of this blog, it will be coming soon), directors, screenwriting, playwrighting, etc.
• advice on how to integrate the use of Web 2.0 tools with “real life.”
• Anything else you can think of that might fall within my sphere of interests…

If there are specific things you would like to see discussed in the blog, people you would like to see interviewed… ask away. I am here to serve and share! Much love to all my readers… S.

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Cristina and Lisa have been tweeting (or Twittering, or using Twitter) for a whole week, and they have been fantastic. The regularity and quality of their tweets have been exceptional, so I think I can already glean some juicy information on their lifestyle, the flow of their day, as it were.

First off, some stats:

Cristina:

• total updates: 193
• from computer: 192 (either from Twitter.com or Twitterfox)
• from iPhone: 1 (Twitterific)

Lisa:

• total updates: 101
• from computer: 81 (either from Twitter.com or Twitterfox)
• from iPhone: 20 (Twitterific)

As you can see, they both did a great job!

Cristina’s Life Flow

• The morning ritual seems well fixed and harmonious with her usual tendencies. In other words, she is not expressing a need to adjust to the new environment. The order of the rooms works well for her morning routine. Up from bed, quick bathroom stop, kitchen for coffee and frugal breakfast, paper.
• The radio is a very important component of Cristina’s home life. ***Perhaps a radio system throughout the house*** [She mentions that she would like the radio to follow her from room to room].
• When she doesn’t have to go to school, she settles in her study after breakfast and takes care of email and Skype calls to her family in Italy — This ritual is performed with high regularity every morning. Her desk is against the far wall of the room, with the windows to her right, but she finds her body turning toward the light and says she feels like a sunflower. ***Suggestion for week 2: Experiment by putting the desk between the two windows, so she can see the sky (which she has mentioned has a meditative, soothing effect on her) and avoid glare on her computer screen.***
• Food is not a focus for Cristina, or should I say cooking. She likes to eat very healthy food, preferably a vegetarian diet, but prefers frequent small snacks to fewer larger meals. Her cooking is reduced to a minimum but she takes great pleasure in cleaning and organizing the kitchen. By the end of the first week she has set the kitchen up quite to her satisfaction. ***Note: the kitchen needs to be entirely redone, but now is not the time. This is perhaps the best that can be done in the short term.***
• It is clear to me that breakfast is the most important meal of the day for Cristina. She has tweeted more and in much more detail about her entire morning ritual, from the moment of awakening to the espresso coffee on the stove and the healthy slice of toasted bread, to the reading of the paper and listening to the radio, on to emails and Skype calls home. Her morning ritual is very important to her and it seems that this apartment is well suited to her rhythm.
• Lunch is a quick affair: if at work, takeout or a quick lunch place with colleagues, on which not much emphasis has been put. If at home, also a quick and light meal with very little fuss in the kitchen, and then back to work.
• After work hours are over, in the evening there is some relaxed computer work with perhaps the accompaniment of the television or radio, and reading in bed before sleeping.

General Observations on Cristina’s experience of her new apartment

• It is no coincidence that Cristina has chosen the top floor of her building. The light is extremely important to her. She notes that she and Lisa disagree on the color of the paint on the walls of the study, but during this week has had a revelation. Having for the first time had the opportunity to spend some time in the room, she has noted that when the sky is overcast the color of the walls merges, almost melds with the color of the sky outside, giving her a wonderful feeling of peace. ***I recommend that before any changes are made to the colors of the walls both Cristina and Lisa should experience the various feelings that different weather conditions create, with changing light and shades of sky.***
• The kitchen, while small and antiquated, is for the moment adequate. It has been fitted for a washer/dryer, which will improve the quality of their lives immensely. Cristina has quickly outfitted and configured the kitchen to fit her regimen, and she has repeatedly expressed satisfaction with the current layout. ***I recommend that when the time comes to redo some parts of the apartment, care should be taken to consider the morning flow, in particular, as that is the most important moment of the day for Cristina.***
• Not many tweets focus on the bedroom. I deduce from this that Cristina mainly uses the bedroom for sleeping, reading in bed and storing clothing, but that her emotional attachment to the room is not great. ***Since storage space is very scarce in the apartment and the bedroom seems to be used really only at night, I recommend making the most of the space in terms of storage potential, with perhaps a wardrobe and drawer or shelving combination.***

Lisa’s Life Flow

• I deduce from the tweets that the house in North Carolina is on two levels, because she tweets about “back upstairs” at one point. So, here’s how I see her morning routine: Wake up, go downstairs to make coffee, back up with coffee in hand, shower upstairs where the bedroom and master bath is, back downstairs for breakfast, and then out to work.
• During the day Lisa is very busy and had many meetings.  She doesn’t really talk about lunch, so I assume she has a quick bite while she works. Lunch is always referred to as “going to grab some lunch,” so it must be on the go.
• At the end of the work day she almost always bring work home with her. She often complains of clutter in her work space, on her desk, in her office and about needing a better filing system for her various projects and assignments. ***I suggest moving as much of her work online as possible, something like Google Docs, so she can work anywhere at all, at home and also in New York (wink, wink, nudge, nudge).***
• A very interesting characteristic of Lisa is that when she is at home in the evening or on the weekend and she is working (which she seems to be doing non-stop, seven days a week, she always sits on the floor. She speaks of leaning against the couch with a couple of cushions and mentions that more back support would be a good thing. ***Accommodations must be made in the study in New York for her work habits on the floor. There are floor cushions made for sitting, with back support, like the BackJack Chair, which folds away flat and is easy to store in between visits.***
• When at home, Lisa too listens to the radio, and in the evening likes to watch a little television.

Tentative Conclusions

1. Cristina and Lisa seem to have very compatible lifestyles, preferences and habits. Having spent only one morning with the two of them together, I had a great feeling of ease and comfort, a very nice vibe.
2. They both listen to the radio and both can have the tv in the background when they work at night.
3. Neither of them seems to spend a lot of time cooking, so the small kitchen is not too much of a drawback. And their kitchen habits seem complementary, because from what I understand when they are together Lisa does the cooking and Cristina does the cleaning up, which we already know she enjoys greatly [I love to clean the kitchen too, so I understand the feeling].
4. Neither of them spent any significant time talking about the bedroom as an important space to inhabit, so I am confirmed in my intuition that it is a good room in which to store things (storage space is very scarce in the apartment, but they do have a storage room in the basement of the building).

Tentative Recommendations

• Right after the purchase of a new home there is not a lot of money to spend on fixing the place up or renovating, so it’s important to be able to focus on what is really important.
• I would give top priority to the study, where Cristina spends most of her time and the two of them would probably spend most of their time when together. It is important for this room to have Cristina’s desk (which I have suggested she move to the wall between the two windows, experimentally, to see if she likes that position better. It should also have a rug and a few cushions and some kind of seating arrangement on the floor for Lisa. I would also put a couch in this room, perhaps a loveseat.
• I would recommend moving the television, which is currently in the position where I would put the desk, in the corner, to the left of the double glass door, so that it can be seen from the desk and also from the floor where Lisa would sit, and also from the couch, which I would put on the wall opposite the windows. I would definitely put at least one bookcase in the room, on the wall where Cristina’s desk is currently situated.
• Cristina bought a table for the dining room, and it is quite large but I think it will work out. When work overflows Cristina likes a large surface to spread out on.

For now, these are my recommendations. At the end of the two weeks I will analyze the remainder of their tweets and give room-by-room recommendations. Stay tuned for the final installment of this exciting experiment!

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