bohemian hellhole

How to fix a lamp with superglue and tape

Meet the worlds best finder of things that require parts that don't exist. Me. Yes, I get good deals sometimes, but the price I pay is in hunting and gathering the strange {sometimes unorthodox} pieces needed to make them fully functional. Even then, it's not uncommon for those items to only really work when I use them. {because they need crazy special treatment or carefully choreographed moves} All of that said, this lamp is no exception. While I was out antiquing with my brother in law a few years ago, I found this lamp. We kind of fought over it, but it was mine. It made me think of some strange east india trading company, Caribbean colonial, almost haunted house kind of lamp. It had no canopy, just the curved arch ending in the part shown above. That part has a corresponding other half which allows the socket to be adjusted. I hurriedly found a canopy for it, but didn't really bother to put it together right, there is a threaded end on that part that I figured would be easy to find a nut for later on, thus securing the canopy and preventing the shade from swinging around on the wiring alone. I was wrong.  During the move,{all my stories start this way:} the canopy that was held on by the lamp wire alone was bumped around and generally abused. When I went to set up our living room, the light didn't work at all. It was as good a time as any to fix the whole thing properly. First things first, I thought, find a nut for that socket holder part! Simple right? Nope.  That thread size and shape cannot be found. I have carried it in my bag for months, lurking in the plumbing aisles and electrical departments, testing and fitting, and failing.
The solution I came up with is less than glamorous, and most likely will not stand the ultimate test of time, but it should work until I hone my craft as a metal smith and make my own fittings for it. I chose to use a standard threaded rod, and then superglue it inside the hollow of the other threaded section. The glow of resolution only lasted until I realized that the threaded rod was slightly smaller in diameter than the diameter of the socket holder piece. Not close enough for superglue anyway. Normally in this case I would suggest JB Weld, because it's awesome for fixing anything. The superglue was already purchased however, so I went with plan B. Tape. I chose masking tape, purely because it was easy to find. The threaded rod only needed a few wraps around to make it a snug fit, and I gooped it up with Locktite as I went.

Once the glue had hardened, I was able to slip the canopy on, and thread the rod onto a standard light socket housing.


Lastly, I wired the socket with a pull chain, and pushed on the socket housing to enclose the electrical contacts.
Shade on, light in place! {on a side note, I feel that this chest may not be the right scale for this corner...any thoughts? Maybe a taller table of sorts? A bookcase?}

Turning up the heat, Alice

 

Recovering a Spring Cushion

This rocking chair cost me $20 on craigslist about 5 years ago. I loved it's mission look, and that it was clearly old, but I could never really find out much about it. The label on the inside of the frame is so worn that the manufacturer's name cannot be made out. Google has supplied me with similar, yet different chairs that only lead to guessing about the chairs' history, but no solid answers. It's a mystery. {there also seem to be missing slats from the sides, since there are two slots on the underside of each arm, but no indication of where the slats might have attached to the frame below...more intrigue.}

Since purchasing it, the seat {cough} upholstery has been something that I have wanted to change, but since it kind of functioned, it kept getting pushed to the bottom of the list. After a while, I stopped even noticing it. Then, after we moved, the corners of the springs started poking through, and I became fixated on how ridiculously awful that black rubbery seat looked. On my birthday {which was over a month ago} I went fabric shopping with my mom, and we found this amazing upholstery material. We gathered all the supplies together, bought them, and they have remained in their bag since then, stuffed in the hall closet.Last Sunday, I just decided to go for it. There was something daunting about the chairs weird springs, the way the metal bar across the bottom was loose and crooked inside, and oh, yes, not having any idea how to execute an 8 way hand tie. I did my research. I looked at hundreds of photos, read tutorials on spring tying, and saved them for easy reference while working. The standard string material is called 'Spring Twine', but I couldn't find any, so I bought this:
Not only is it from a thrift store {reused}, it was made in Seattle by Textured Yarns. {buying local} Double green points for me, even if it's not really spring twine.
I have saved these tacks for a couple years now, and they have come in handy on several upholstering repair projects, so I got them out too. The back of the rocker had started to tear along the edge, so I took the trim off and re-tacked the faux leather canvas stuff back into the wood. It ended up a little warped looking, due to the fact that it was molded into that shape over many years. If it tears again, replacing the back panel will be very easy. At least the burlap and straw is no longer leaking out.

Next, I removed the seat covering. It looked like rubber, or some kind of vinyl, and as you can see in figure 1, the pattern used was very precise. {not really. I think this was a scrap from the floor of some kind of garage.} Under that there were two really awesome dirty pillows, and under that...ancient burlap. Instead of an 8 way hand tied spring, there were the remains of some interesting metal 'ties' that had fatigued and broken. I took them all off.  The remaining support bars had long ago detached themselves from the frame, so I secured them with small nails.
This is what I took out of the spring system, and promptly threw away. The idea of sitting on one of those wire bits doesn't sound very nice.Here comes the hand tied spring part.  Basically the springs are tied to each other horizontally, vertically,  and diagonally. This results in 8 points around the spring that are tied together. Thus the name. The springs should be somewhat compressed, and the end result should be a flat, webbed surface that evenly distributes weight. The instructions I found all called for a clove hitch. This is how they are done, just in case you weren't a girl scout, or don't own a boat.

Since it was my first time, there are mistakes and imperfections in my webbing. There shouldn't be any slack between the springs, and you can clearly see slack in between spring 5 and 6. {counting left to right} But the goal was to get the thing done, and not to become obsessive compulsive about it.
I layered upholstery foam and batting under the top layer of heavyweight muslin, and tacked that on to the frame. Again, there are lots of imperfections. I let them slide because no one except you will ever see it like this.
Phase one, complete. Now on to the sewing of the fancy outer shell.

I used my favorite pink Brother 'Riviera'. {The mug holds my giant spool of thread, and says 'Beam me up, Lord', It might be the best mug I've ever found}
Having never sewn piping before,  it  took me a long time.  I probably used too many pins. My grandmother once described my method of sewing as 'Rip and Sew'. That works sometimes, but not when any sort of precision is required. I have learned that pins will save you from all kinds of mistakes, as will taking your time. The piping was sewn to the top panel first, then the sides were sewn on top of both.
Here is the outer upholstery shell, waiting to be tacked down to the frame.
These were a Christmas present, and though I wasn't planning on using them for this part of the project, I ran out of my other tacks. I was sure glad they were available! {at this point all the stores were closed, so buying more tacks wasn't an option, and not finishing the project might have made me lose my mind.}
The tacks are totally crooked. Thankfully, no one will ever see this part of the chair either.


In this picture the front piping looks really bad and wavy, but I promise it's not that way in real life. The piping is a bit floppy {since it was my first time} and it likes to flip up and down. Sitting in the chair a few times seemed to even the front out a bit. I am sure eventually it will look worn in and normal.

The final step was to screw the seat to the chair frame, something that had never been done before, so anytime you would try to move the chair, the seat would fall out. Not anymore! Now that all of this is done, the chair is actually much more comfortable to sit in. The seat is squishy and nice without feeling like you might fall out the other side, and the whole thing is sturdier {I tightened up a few screws while I was at it}. 

I might actually sit there and relax for a while...

Taking out the garbage, Alice

 

1946 Bathroom Renovation

Take a look at Amy Allsopp's amazing bathroom transformation!

Bath before

When we bought our 1946 home, one of the first things I wanted to do was rip out that nasty vanity in the bathroom. After enduring it for a few months it was finally time to start renovating the bath. (All this home project stuff was new to us, but we are scrappy and our budget necessitated that we do everything ourselves.) We learned that every project seems to come with a little surprise - there was a big hole in the wall behind that sorry looking mirror, so we had to patch that first. Interestingly it was drywall though the rest of the house is lath & plaster. Then: demo of the vanity! It was in pretty bad shape so it all went to the dump, except the sink, which is in the basement in case we ever add a half bath down there.

Vanity demo

I considered keeping the toilet since it looked to be original to the house but it creeped me out a bit, so that went to the basement too. We found a salvaged toilet and sink for cheap. Spent a little more on the faucet but I love it and it echoes the post-war era of the house. Found the sink legs online (also era appropriate). The most ambitious part of our plan was the floor. The existing flooring was ugly vinyl. We wanted tile. After much research we determined that we could leave the vinyl in place and tile over it. A friend helped install the backer board.

Tile design

I was super close to going with American Olean's Chloe tile, which is perfect for the era of the house. But I just love hex tile so much! I chose matte white and gloss black. Hex tile comes in square foot sections held together with webbing on the back. We made a full-scale replica of the floor in another room and created our pattern. (The black accent tiles were added one at a time after cutting out individual white tiles.) Laying tile is hard! But we got the hang of it. Added baseboards and a marble threshold and we were finally done.

Tiling the floor

I was pretty anxious about the whole toilet situation - wax rings and having to get it just right or risk a sewage problem... But the man of the house came through and it was fine. (I found the black toilet seat online - I think it makes a big difference in the overall look.) The sink installation went smoothly, I chose a period appropriate light from Schoolhouse Electric, and found a complementary shelf and towel rack at Restoration Hardware. The mirror is from Ikea. We also replaced the non-working fan with a new one (and ducted it to the roof instead of venting into the attic as it had been).

Bath now

I painted the walls the lightest-ever shade of pink called 'pale dogwood.' And phase 1 of the bath renovation is complete. Eventually we will re-tile the tub surround, and plan to tile halfway up the wall in the rest of the room as well. But for now we are content.

About the author: Amy Allsopp loves design and editing - whether it's for marketing communications materials, homes and indoor spaces, gardens and outdoor spaces, or food and drink! She writes about some of these things on her blog.

The William Morris Project, Week 3

"Have nothing in your house that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful." This is week three of the Pancakes & French Fries William Morris Project, happening every thursday in 2012.

 

Well, I finally made my list of things I would like to get done in 2012 during the William Morris Project. It seems like each time I cross something off, I add at least one more on. Some of the items may never get done, ever; and some of them I should be able to do in my sleep. Regardless, they are all mixed in together, and I am working through them in no particular order. So far I think I am up to 29 things crossed off the list that includes over 150 items.

This last week I managed to:

Fix a giant crack in the living room ceiling

Patch holes and paint the dining room

Fix a gap in the floorboard

Paint bedroom #2

Purge closet items and books in bedroom #2

Organize the closet shelves in bedroom #2

Replace the sink strainers {the ones that came with the house neither plugged nor drained...annoying}

Remove terrible built in shelves in the entrance to the kitchen

Trim out the archway into the kitchen from the dining room to match the rest of the house

Fix the cabinet above the refrigerator so that the bottom doesn't fall out

Remove one walls worth of wallpaper border in the kitchen.

Put up a kitchen towel hook

Repair a lamp that has been in pieces for like 9 years

{Perhaps the list helped? Maybe it made me neurotic.}

Most of these items were not documented.

This is what happened to the terrible kitchen shelves. Here they are as we found them while touring the house for the first time.

The day we moved in I took off the contact paper. Since then I have been glaring at them, cursing their ability to harbor junk. It was just so easy to put things on them that really belonged somewhere else. It wouldn't seem that bad until one day I would realize there was a huge pile of household cast offs hanging out in a very conspicuous spot. How can things like that go unnoticed? What is my problem? I still haven't figured it out. But I decided to take action against the shelves the second I got the 'OK'. This happened to be in the evening, while the kitchen was a complete disaster from a wallpaper removal project. I tend to take the same approach to all endeavours as I do when hanging wallpaper.  Whenever there are at least ten other things that need my attention more, I take on a messy project. The following photographs prove this with their un-biased counter top depiction.

One board at a time, I took them down. I had to break off the long nails that stuck out from the wall, and then counter sink them into the wood again. The top and wall pieces I left there, since they were part of my trim plan. I used all the wood I removed to trim the archway out. {this is a personal issue, I really hate un-trimmed doorways. They remind me of cheap construction, or bad apartments I've lived in. Maybe that's the same thing.} The goal was to make this opening to look like all the other door frames in the house. Using the wood that was removed in the process resulted in trim that looked like it had always been there.

The casing trim I found in the garage, and since there was a need for something along the wall, I cut a little piece of shoe molding to fit along the top trim and the linoleum backsplash. I had to whittle it with my Victorinox. {I didn't even cut my hand, which would have been normal}

After it was all said and done, there are still some things I would like to tweak, like for example, sand the whole thing down to bare wood and re-stain it so that the color isn't blotchy...but that's not on the list for this year. it is finished to this point, and I am so happy with how open and simple it is now. Before there was so much visual noise. {the wallpaper didn't help}

{pictures taken at night=dark and grainy photographs} These images really showcase the awful hardware in the kitchen, as well as the before/after wallpaper border look. The floors look amazing too! Wow, more to add to the list.

Wishing it was warm, Alice

 

Week 1	Week 2	Week 3
Week 4	Week 5	Week 6
Week 7

Ask Alice: What am I doing wrong?

Dear Alice, Every time I hang curtain rods using wall anchors, they still wiggle loose in the drywall after a while. What am I doing wrong? Sincerely, Joanne

via De Le Cuona

Dear Joanne, There is a simple fix to your problem: use different anchors. When you buy curtain rods, or towel bars, or about a bazillion other kinds of things that you have to attach to the walls, they come with screws and anchors already in the packaging. I suspect that there is some awful factory somewhere churning out undersized inadequate plastic anchors just for the purpose of making people cry.

via Alibaba

Throw them away. The whole baggie of fasteners. Garbage. Yes, even the screws. Next, take yourself to an actual hardware store, in other words, not Fred Meyer, or Kmart, or Target. Go to Ace, or True Value or even Home Depot. There you will find a whole aisle of fasteners that will actually work.

via D&L Grain and Pro Hardware

I usually buy my fasteners on the paranoid side, I would like each one to support me hanging on said curtain rod or towel bar. Most recently I hung a large mirror in our hallway. It had four little tabs for fasteners. I bought a package of six, {which was good since two of them had to be re-done. Long story. Buy extra.} and each one was weight rated at 80 pounds.

No, the mirror didn't weigh 320 pounds, but the anchors were only about $4, and I know it's not falling down anytime soon. Plus, they worked well, which is more than I can say for those little plastic pluggie things. The anchors will most likely come with machine screws, and they will most likely be silver. If this is unacceptable color wise, and you need black or brown or something like that, go buy some nail polish that corresponds to your metal finish and just paint the head after the whole thing is up and anchored in the wall.

via She Knows

You will never ever notice once you are more than 6 inches away. I promise. Don't get silly and pick red nail polish either. You will regret contrasting screw heads, believe me.  There are a few things I need to point out. First, If you are the proud owner of a stud finder and can install your curtain rods into a stud, this method is much preferred. You will still need to throw away the fastener baggie that came with your product, and you will still need to go to a hardware store and buy proper screws. My favorite is the 'gold screw', in 2" or 2.5".

via Tool King {this link is for 3", but I just wanted you to see what they looked like, in case you go shopping}

Then, you can proceed to the nail polish step. Second, if you are installing your curtain rods into sheetrock, or some other kind of hollow wall, you will need to get the kind of anchor that toggles behind the wall, creating kind of a 'fastener sandwich'.

Via Home Depot

Like this.

via Buildex

DON'T buy these spring toggle ones:

via Toggler
The expanding anchors are ok, but really won't hold up to the strain of a set of curtains.

via ITW Proline

Are you totally thrilled about all these images of screws and anchors? It's beyond interesting.

Buy the most heavy duty ones you can find, within reason, basically each one should be able to hold up double the weight of the whole shebang.  Like, if your curtain rods, with curtains on will weigh around 20 pounds, get a package of anchors where each one can hold 40 pounds, and so on. It will save you heartache later. 

Also, I should mention that most of this should not be done without an awesome drill. The E-Z Anchor Toggle  can be installed with only a screwdriver, which is really nice, but if you are installing anything into a stud, you're going to want one. I have a Milwaukee impact driver, and I don't know how I would do anything without it. It's like having super drill power.

Have a friend make sure you are installing your curtain rod at a good height*, and that it is level. Mark your holes and check them several times before you actually start anchoring. The last thing you want is a solidly installed crooked curtain rod.

via Honey and Fitz

Have fun!

Taking a walk, Alice

*Height is a personal choice, and my two cents is to split the difference between the top of the window and the ceiling. Many people will tell you to go as high as you can, but sometimes it just looks silly. Use your best judgement, and keep your curtain length in mind. I don't recommend placing your curtain rod right down on the top of you window, unless you have a really good reason. Which you might. I don't know. That's a different question, and can usually only be answered on a case by case basis. Whew.

Ask Alice: What am I doing wrong?	Ask Alice: How do I put up wallpaper?	Ask Alice: Is it hard to re-wire a Lamp?
Ask Alice: What's your Secret?	Ask Alice: Open Shelves or Cabinets?	Ask Alice: Spray Paint or Brush?

Ask Alice: How should I clean wood floors?

The William Morris Project, Week 1

Jules of Pancakes & French Fries is doing a William Morris Project every Thursday during 2012. She did this last October and I got really excited after reading through all her posts to start purging and 'projecting' based on the same standard: "Have nothing in your house that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful." Naturally when she announced a weekly challenge in 2012, and invited others to join her, I started planning. There are so many things to do, it can seem overwhelming sometimes, so I just started somewhere. Anywhere. It ended up being my bedroom.

{Before images are supposed to be messy right?}

The first thing I did was paint. I do not believe dirty beige paint covered with other peoples fingerprints to be beautiful, nor do I know it to be useful. I also believe that having a bedroom that is restful and a place of retreat is very handy. {Especially when it's looks good!} So, armed with paint chips and a Lowe's gift card, I went paint shopping. The color ended up being an off the shelf Valspar color called Blue Sea Salt, not what I was planning, but it turned out great. It almost looks like nothing happened at all, but the whole room feels calm and clean, and the color is neutral without being totally sterile.

{Those teeth are actually earrings I got for Christmas, purchased at Reading Frenzy. Just in case you were wondering if I normally keep molars on my dresser.}

I used a brush, and ended up only going through about a third of a gallon when the whole room was done. Granted, it's not a huge room, but still...

Next up, dealing with the dresser top, which ends up a cesspool of household castoffs, and the tangled mess of wires hanging down from my cracked TV. Oh, and something in the windows {which are difficult right? Small, high on the wall, floor length curtains would look funny, plus they might just get in the way...still pondering ideas}.

 Researching re-upholstery techniques, Alice

Week 1	Week 2	Week 3
Week 4	Week 5	Week 6
Week 7

The Hall light is up!

{I still need to paint...a fact made clearer by the ghost of the old fixture}

This is the old fixture, just in case you're interested. It is rusty {how does that happen inside?} and full of blackened crispy insulation. It's not the worst, but definitely makes me think of an 'old camper in the woods full of moldy cushions' kind of light.

After a harrowing trip to Home Depot, where I spent nearly an hour wandering through aisles of items that were 'almost right, but not quite', I went home with a bag of assorted metal things.

The base for this light was a challenge, it was small, irregular and since it was without electrical components of any kind, I was on a mission to figure it out, because I had become very attached to the idea of that particular light hanging in the hallway.

What I ended up doing was making a sort of crossbar mess, with a universal mounting plate, a threaded rod, a 4 inch crossbar, lots of washers and nuts and a ceramic socket with a threaded rod adapter on the end. The only thing I didn't use was the package of 'steel nipples' a name I will probably never get over seeing in the electrical department.

The whole contraption was wired and fastened together, then mounted to the electrical box in the cieling. The base for the fixture came next, fitting the keyhole  mounting holes onto the 8/32 machine screws hanging out of my universal mounting plate.

If anyone finds this interesting, call me, I need a friend.  Most people get a glazed look in their eyes a few seconds in to me describing anything like this, but if I am just writing about it, I don't see it, so it doesn't count, right?


In the end, it worked out well, and unlike many of my projects, you can change a light bulb without a long list of special instructions from me. Next up? The bathroom lights.

{On a side note, I couldn't very well replace the light in the hall without changing the switch plate as well. While it is a beauty, I feel it would be better suited somewhere else, like a country feed store, or any home in Purdy.}

The new one is staying on a trial basis, I haven't decided if it is quite right yet. It was the best Home Depot had to offer, and it was only $5. The picture is terrible.

On to greater things, like lunch, Alice

 

Pin It

One resolution I can make confidently.

Who would have known from it's plain exterior that this particular 50's ranch where we now reside would hold such a wonderful formica surprise? I keep trying to capture the intensity of that yellow in photos, but nothing matches seeing it in person, at 7am. The list goes on from there, the sink rings are rusted, the water is sometimes brown, the knobs on all the drawers fall off when you pull them {and they are grossly permanently sticky}, the exhaust fan is leaking insulation from the attic, and the drywall around the shower enclosure is, well, failing. Oh, and did you miss out on the light? Amazing. The chain is rusted and coated with some sort of dusty greasy bathroom scum, and the canopy is part YELLOW PLASTIC. I can't believe it. The light ball things hang right in your face almost, and look like grapes. The towel bar is firmly installed at an angle, and the mirror is growing things behind it. I don't even have anything to say about the floor. Our old bathroom had no such base cabinets, just one medicine cabinet above the sink. It also had a tiny towel closet at the end of the tub. After 7 years of tweaking it, we had everything in it's perfectly tailored place. The result here? There is nothing even in those base cabinets. {Ok, there are toothbrushes in one drawer, and the medicine cabinet contents in another, but that's it. really.}

My resolution? Make it work. It will be super tough, since I think replacing the cabinets and counter are off limits. I am restrained to: a.) treating the walls with paint or wallpaper or something other than a hammer, b.) finding new knobs or pulls for the cabinets, c.) making or searching out a shower curtain that can balance out the counter, d.) a new mirror or two, and e.) of course, lighting. The floor is on the maybe list. Maybe I can replace it. {the faucets & sinks are on my own special secret list, the don't ask, don't tell list.}

Here are some solutions I am currently contemplating:

For the knobs, Rejuvenation makes a wonderful Whale Tail pull, for the bathroom I think polished chrome is the way to go.

For mirrors, either a pair of round ones like this, but with different finish options, or perhaps just two built in medicine cabinets, to add weight to my case against the base cabinets!

from here

Better yet, and less trendy is this polished chrome medicine cabinet from Restoration Hardware:

I love it's slightly industrial look.

I figure if everything else looks amazing, the counter will look worse and worse, until I finally get my way.

For lights? I have no idea. The soffit makes for a strange installation issue, not very much clearance. I can't take the soffit out either.  I would love to find something like this but in polished chrome rather than brass...

Man, Nautical Brass is fantastic.

For a while I was eyeing a yellow chevron shower curtain on Etsy, until I came to my senses and realized everyone has chevron stuff right now. Forget it. Plus, I went to Fabric Depot to look at the material in person and realized it is a nice shade of sunflower yellow, not quite the match for our acid eyeball burning yellow counter. Still on the hunt.

Baking cookies, Alice

Stripping paint from a vintage fixture

I picked up this light fixture from the Ballard Re-Store when I was in Seattle a couple of weeks ago, even though it was painted a horrible peach color. The shade is quite wonderful and since I have been on a hunt for clear shaded lights lately, this fit the bill {even though it is open, and in my mind I wanted a closed shade, the geometric ribbing totally makes up for it}. The plan is to install it in the hall, with a mirrored bulb in it. I just have to find some guts to fit in it, since there isn't a socket or anything in it right now. First things first, I needed to get the ugly paint off. After moving you realize that you are out of{or just can't find} all sorts of things-Worcestershire sauce, dryer sheets, stud-finders, wall fasteners, hard drives, books, vacuum cleaners, and in this case, paint stripper. I decided to try the hot water bath.

After boiling the metal parts in clean water for about 5 minutes I let it cool enough to touch, and holding it under hot tap water the paint peeled right off. 

The boiling separated the paint from the metal enough to loosen the bond, little bubbles appeared all over the paint when this happened. I suspect that really old deadly paints might not come off this easy, but latex would for sure. Since this was a salvaged light, there is no telling what kind of paint was on it, but it did come off perfectly. {the screws will need a little touching up, but I almost don't care}

The best part of it all was the shiny chrome finish that was hiding under the paint, no repainting needed! The inside was kind of a brushed aluminum and I was a little worried that the whole thing would look like the inside of a pop can, but it turned out great. And free.

Taking out the Christmas tree, Alice

A question about doors...

So I have been scouring the internet with yet another mid century question. What door options do I have besides horrible hollow core doors in a 50's ranch while still remaining true to the feel and look of that period? I have found nothing about doors. Not one post, just a sad question or two on a forum. Is everyone content with those peely veneery doors that have ghosts of stickers on them and the occasional hole or dent from some accidental impact? This article about a portland house features some five panel doors, but the whole house has been 'updated' so it's not really about being mid century anymore, its about having money to redo your house.

No, I am not interested in some kind of paint and applied molding technique, which always looks less than desirable.

Thoughts? Ideas? Inspiration photos?

Still looking, Alice