This makes me exceedingly happy.

The world's largest tree house:

article here

Built (and continually being built) by Horace Burgess after God spoke to him in 1993 and told him to build a treehouse.  It's 10 stories, almost 10,000 square feet and is a church complete with chime tower on top.  I need to go here immediately. 

here

Frank Kehran

258,000 nails, give or take a few, he says.  I believe him.

here

 from Baking with Medusa

I can't find a good picture but the two ropes in the middle of the picture are tied to a folding lawn chair to make a 10 story rope swing.  Fuck.  Yeah.

Guess what?  It's only two hours away from the ModSauce ranch in Cumberland County, TN.  Why no one told me about this I don't know.  Let's pack up the  ZQX87000&@% Camera of Amazing Awesomeness and load up on gummi bears, Mountain Dew and Combos because I feel a road trip coming on.

Well played unoriginal and impulsive hipsters. Well played.

I was really bored inspired one day this past winter and drew this:

This whole post is just to show you my mad Photoshop skillz.

I only did it so I could make some lame 'bluffin with your muffin' joke that was really relevant at the time but the whole thing was so boring I fell asleep before I could fin...zzzzzzzzzz.  

And then I saw this today:

here

That tattoo is for like ever.  Suck on that mindless design groupies!  ahahahahahaha!!!

The Incredible Shrinking Madame

I spend my days slaving away on the computer, reading decor magazines and writing essays on 'zombie pit stain' green.  It's exhausting and I just hum the tune of "16 Tons" in my head all day long while my soul dies a little bit more each day.  But to counter these soul-crushing effects I traded my office chair for a giant champagne glass filled with bubbly (ok it's just Miller High Life but that's the champagne of beers so it's the same) to bring a bit of fabulosity to the work day.   It's just like Beyonce in this video except throw in a laptop...

Yeah.  There's a soundtrack to this post.  Usher also makes a cameo because he's from Chattavegas.

I just adore surrounding myself in overscaled items that make me feel tiny and delicate - just like Tinkerbell. But more ghetto fab like the Beyonce video and soaked in alcohol.  So when I leave the office I like to hop in my giant tube of lipstick with wheels and drive home to my giant disco ball that I live in.

I live here and this guy was nice enough to post pictures of it.

I like to collapse on my Heller Bocca couch...

here

And turn on my giant Anglepoise lamp,

from Lady Chameleon

...chillax and ponder what other grotesquely overscaled items I might want to purchase.  What I'd really like to do is chillax in a giant oversized bathtub of some kind because my skin is getting dehydrated from being away from my Miller High Life champagne bath that I soak in all day at work.  So you could imagine my surprise and delight when I stumbled across these beauties:

here

Barf SQUEEEEEE!!!

Normally I like to leave my giant shoe adventures for singing across Australia
 

or the stage

but now I can have it in the comfort of my own home! AND with bubbles! Double squee!!  Of course my life won't be complete until I'm completely surrounded in my bathroom by oversized items like one of my favorite movies of all time:

The Incredible Shrinking Woman via here

It's like being in Alice in Wonderland without the hallucinogenic drugs.  Or is it...?!

Did I mention it comes in pink?!

Forget the disco ball, I'd like to permanently live in this now.  I'd fill this tub up with Miller High Life champagne and continue the rest of my days as a booze-soaked (decidedly un-naughty) drag queen mermaid known as Madame Sunday.  


Can you hand me that giant oversized loofah?


[MS sidebar: make sure to visit the other blogs who participated in today's shoetub challenge; Cupboards Online (purveyor of shoetub fabulosity), Kitchen and Residential Design, Avente Tile, Ecomod, DogWalkBlog and Fun and Fit]

Zombies have never looked this good.

I might have a kitchen falling apart, doors that need painting and tree stumps that need removing but all I really want to do is paint rooms.  In fact, repaint rooms that are already painted and do not, in any way, need a new wall color.  I like to think of procrastination and poor prioritization as areas where I excel.  Also, alliteration.  

When I first bought the ModernSauce ranch I was paralyzed with fear when it came to picking out the paint color for the living areas.   I spent more money on paint swatches than purchasing the final paint color and countless hours just staring at walls squinting and imagining decorating with furniture I couldn't afford and candlelit dinner parties I probably wouldn't throw.  This is the problem when you work in the home decor industry.  My likes and dislikes change as frequently as Apartment Therapy posts "articles" in a day.  But I finally decided on something similar to this:

Seriously, I think I really got this picture from AT

This is the picture that inspired me.  It feels crisp but earthy with a mod flair and has a $2100 coat rack.  I'll take it!   I call it 'dirty pear' here at the ranch.  Sounds yummy, right? But after a few years it doesn't seem to have that crisp earthiness anymore...  it started to feel more 'dirty' than 'pear' and now it just feels more like 'zombie pit stain' green to me.   To make this shade work (because I still like it in this picture) I think you have to have beautiful ebony skin which I neglected to take into consideration at the time of paint selection. 

I would post a picture of my room but it's pretty ghetto right now in that I don't have a lot of furniture and not in a cool minimalism way more like an 'how are you this old and NOT have more than a couch and shitty coffee table?' kind of way.  Also the camera is waaay across the room.

So I've been daydreaming about colors.  Once I remembered that I'm not glamorously black I had to find another color I look good in so I took a quick peek at my avatar and thought 'Damn, I look good in dark green!"  Done.  Specifically a dark olive because dark rooms are super chic right now and why the hell not?  We'll call it 'dirty zombie camo green.'  

I can't remember where this came from.  Maybe I want to forget.

Despite the Art.com art and shitty styling that color is weirdly talkin to me...

Desire to Inspire

This is a floor but use your imagination.  Also use your imagination to erase those purpley tongue chairs.  But everything else is squee-worthy.  Okay maybe it's just the mirror...

AT

Not my style but that 'zombie camo library green' looks purty with the white trim...

Domino

Orange!

Miles Redd for Elle Decor (solely based on font)

Ok the gloss might end up being 'greasy zombie' after awhile...

Head Over Heels

I would really like to know the grandma that lives here.  She seems like a badass.  Unless a gay man lives here in which it totally changes everything and then we probably wouldn't get along.

apartment 412

Ooooh juju headdress AND 'African zombie camo' sponge painted(?)/stained paneling...

source?

Just the color...

pics via Automatism and Rolland Bello

I think this shade became stuck in my brain from this picture.  I searched far and wide for this apartment that I remembered from an old O at Home because I'm a total loser brainy smartiac who remembers magazine editorials from two years ago.  I don't know why but I think it had something to do with the green and this plaster-covered table...

I cannot tell you how happy that picture of the bathroom makes me.  

I don't think I could live in this place but I just like having 'African voodoo zombie greasy pit stain library green' fantasies.  I'll probably continue to avoid real projects around the house while I move on to fantasizing about just painting my walls a more practical neutral.  For the sake of the fantasy I'll totally name it 'dew drops on angel cheeks champagne supernova sunrise' when it'll really just be taupe.  The Madame always believes the backstory is way more important than results.

Ain't my type of hype.

Fun fact: Kid and the Madame have the same skin color. What's even weirder is that we have the same hairstyle. 

I don't know about y'all but this is exactly what I'm gonna be doing this weekend.  Charlemagne and the Madame are going to have a house party (we're not) and Ima put on my yellow halter-style catsuit that I save for special occasions and she already tightened up her fade.  Seriously she did:

Look at those little boots...  awww...

Don't laugh.  She's very sensitive.  She's also pretty raggedy because after about .5 seconds she was giving the "are you done yet?" stink eye to the tech.    I wanted to introduce her to the world but she told me 'not the face' so be thankful for what you can get.  

I've gotta go practice my hot dance skillz and prepare tons of mediocrity fabulosity for next week.  Ok, really I'm going to grease myself up with bacon fat to fit into the double layer of spanx necessary for the cut-off catsuit.  Fortunately the atomic bomb-sized mushroom cloud spillage from the spanx will be covered by that black patent leather belt.  A true lady never reveals her secrets. 

This makes me exceedingly happy.

here

Peace, love and shimmies

A few years ago I tapped into my inner hippie goddess (it's actually a lot closer to the surface than the glamorous Madame but don't tell anybody) and took belly dance classes.  Best thing I ever did.  I bought a bunch of exotic accessories, listened to groovy music and smelled like patchouli twice a week.  Oh and did some badass dancing.  Every lady person should do it.  Seriously.  It doesn't matter your dance ability or hip/waist ratio just go do it.  Ok you might need rhythm...  I can't remember why I stopped (it was money) but I'm going to do it again.  My coin belts are collecting dust and that is a travesty akin to punching my inner Earth Goddess in the balls!!!  I should be ashamed.

all from here

here

I really squee for these historical references - these dancers are from the Ouled Nail tribe of Algeria.  I could probably wikipedia it but, meh...  so could you.

Egyptian Ghawazee dancers from here

People commonly think that belly dancing is the old-timey version of strippers/prostitutes but that's not true.  There was no sex in the champagne room even then.  Mostly...  Do these ladies look like whores I ask you??!!  Salome ruined it for everyone!  Word on the street is that it was a social dance that had the added benefit of developing muscles to ease childbirth.  The cutest thing I've ever seen is a girl about 6 months pregnant taking class.  Awwww...  Until I saw her do a belly roll and it was the most freakishly disturbing thing I've ever witnessed because I thought an alien was going to burst from her belly!!  Wait, I mean it was pretty awesome... no judgment.  I can roll my belly both ways but it looks like a slightly mushy glamorous albino anaconda trying to swallow an entire goat and then regurgitating it.  Sexy.

 I forgot the source so he's going to give me the evil eye.

here

Even dudes can belly dance!  At least I think that last one is a dude...  

here

Famous turn-of-the-century "belly dancer" and slut Mata Hari.  I just like the headdress really...

Claudette Colbert as Cleopatra.  Ok so no belly dancing in that I don't think.

And then Middle Eastern culture came west and went Hollywood!!!  

here

But of course I like belly dance when it went mod - all retro and polyester and sequins and smarmy lounge feel.  There's something so wrong and so right about belly dancing in a bouffant.  

I'm pretty sure this is the title of a current rap album but it also made a particularly awesome (and  nasty-looking) belly dance cover.

WTF?

 Weeeeeeee!!!  I'm in orange!!

all from here

She'll cut a bitch with those eyelashes.

source? Heaven.

There was a time when belly dance went glittertastic in the 70's and 80's in the Cabaret style.  Normally glittertastic really rocks my world but somehow this just ain't workin for me.  But I can't say that because if you are a belly dancer then you give mad props to every lady belly dancer regardless of skill, taste, stretch marks, muffin tops, age, tan or size.  It's part of the Code of Shimmies.  So as a matter of fact I ADORE this lady - FUCK YOU for thinking otherwise!!!   I once saw two glamazons in tube tops and broomstick skirts belly dance/mosh to a Korn song at a hafla and get a standing ovation.  True story.  (no seriously, it really happened.)

Zoe Jakes from here

But I prefer my style more like this.   Other than Cabaret the current trend is called American Tribal Style or Tribal Fusion.  It's gritty, little bit goth, largely improvisational and involves lots of eyeliner and accessories.  I love it.  

here

Fuck yeah feathers.

Zils or finger cymbals

both from here

 Rachel Brice from here

here

Um... serious girl crush.

here for bigger

Here's a video showing EXACTLY what Madame Sunday looks like dancing as demonstrated by Rachel Brice.  

here for bigger

A slightly more bootleg feel but equally badass.

Better go dust off my coin belts...