I can now imagine living in a transparent box. Standing inside Philip Johnson's Glass House I felt as if I was part of the landscape -- a feeling I would guess is even more acute if it is raining or snowing. The property holds several buildings, but the glass house is the most welcoming.

My work area is at the end of the bar where the laptop is. From this position, I can see into the living area and into the kitchen.

Here is my space. All fancy and stuff. Enjoy. (Couple of other picts after the jump.)

The best thing about my workspace is that I have a big white wall above my desk where I post things that catch my eye.

View from outskirts of Prairie de Rocher, southern Illinois

I really need to get off this island (that, being Long Island). I can’t say that this morning’s attempt to get caffeinated cemented my decision to move to the city in the Fall, but I’m now fairly certain that my mental health is too precariously balanced to survive another year in the white-flight strip mall, I mean suburb, that stretches almost unbroken from the edge of Queens to the Hamptons.

Thanks to Rebar for the image.

Rebar, a creative collective based in San Franciso has completed their first PARK(ing) intervention: an experiment in "reprogramming a typical unit of private vehicular space by leasing a metered parking spot for public recreational activity." Basically, they load up a truck, find an empty parking space, roll out some sod and a bench and "rent" a sunny spot in downtown San Francisco for two hours and $1.50.

Like my fellow Americans, I've been watching the news footage of Hurricane Katrina's destruction with sadness. The losses in the beautiful city of New Orleans (and the rest of the Gulf Coast) are devasting. Let's hope our country is able to help rebuild a city with as much charm and grace as it had before the storm. Here is what I loved about New Orleans on my first and only visit.

Every now and then I face the unwelcome task of retrieving an item from the back of the closet. The good news is that I often find something that I wasn't looking for, but am glad that I saved -- like a stack of my travel journals. I thought I'd share a few entries on GUTSY as part of a series.

While my photos tend to remind me of a beautiful, optimistic trip, the journals remind me of the hard details, costs, and discomforts encountered. I'm glad I have both.

This is not a beach in New York City.

After a stressful week in NYC, I was happy to hop a plane to my home state of Minnesota for a weekend camping trip. After a two-hour drive from Minneapolis, I was transported to a land of tall pines, rushing rivers and a star-filled night sky. While these natural phenomena put me at ease, nothing says "vacation" like seeing the brown wooden signs in the Minnesota State Park system.

This is how I refer to the dark, narrow hallway that leads to the bedrooms in the house my parents are about to move out of.

This is where we finally found my keys after spending all day looking for them and thinking about whether we should change out the locks on the house and wondering if our car was going to get stolen.

If it was still just my husband and I in the house, we would've found the keys fairly quickly. But since we have a 13-month-old who likes to play with our stuff and leave it in weird places, we had to search the entire house...the spice cabinet, behind the radiators, in the pantry, etc. I had given up hope... and my back and knees were sore from bending over to look into every crevice I could find. Then around 10:30 tonight, my husband walks downstairs holding the keys. My son had dropped them into the spine of one of the binders (that rarely gets used) in my husband's office.

My son is now asleep and I'm drinking a beer to celebrate.

The first time I shopped in a Super Walmart (one that has a grocery store included) was like a dream. I don't mean that it was great or anything, though. Just that going from the clothing area to the produce section directly across the aisle was like one of those dreams where you suddenly find yourself in a different place but can't explain how you got there and can't make sense of it. This happened several years ago, but it sticks in my mind as one of those surreal experiences that I can't forget...sort of like the Duplin Winery "Tour 'n' Tastin'."

All homes come with a quirk that takes a little getting used to. A noisy refrigerator, an amorous neighbor, an overhead flight path, a door that never seems to stay closed are all little annoyances that over time become part of routine and may even be missed when staying elsewhere. Only visiting friends and family point out what used to be obvious but are no longer a conscious part of being home.