Vee, here's my other story.Winters in Iowa can be hellish, with ice and wind storms that often knock out power utilities nowadays, though it was even more common in the early 1960s when the incident I am about to relate happened. My grandfather (Opa) worked for the rural county electric cooperative. He was almost at the end of his career, and though he no longer did manual work, with his experience he supervised crews and told them what to do. Therefore, he was on call for any problems that came up. My mother and I were visiting her parents who, by this time, had moved to town. We had intended to drive home that evening after supper, but the weather was so threatening that we decided to spend another night. The wind was howling and the snow was coming down so thick we couldn't see the streetlight directly across the way while looking out the front door. As he could have predicted and dreaded, Opa got a call to go out to repair some downed power lines. He bundled up and left in his company truck. Mother, Oma, and I finished with the dishes and decided to go to bed early. Now, the physical layout of the house has some importance, so I'll describe it. The large living room was at the front of the house; and its focal point in the winter was the gas heater, around which several chairs were arranged. Opa's armchair was the closest because he liked to take off his shoes and put his sock feet on the fender -- his circulation wasn't very good and his feet were always cold. In the wall directly across from the heater was the door to the long hallway that led to the bedrooms. The bathroom (toilet) was located off this hall, too. Some hours after going to bed, I woke up and sprinted to the bathroom because the floor was so darned cold. Passing the door to the living room, I glanced in to see the blue flames of the heater giving off just enough light to see Opa in silhouette sleeping, as he often did, with his feet propped on the fender. I finished in the bathroom and sprinted back past the living room door. I noticed this time that Opa had changed positions and was hunched over and seemed to be fumbling with his shoes. When I got back into the bed I was sharing with my mother, she was awake and said to me, "Next!" She got up to make her own excursion to the bathroom. After that I apparently went to sleep and didn't even know when mother returned to bed. The next thing I knew it was morning and my Oma was making breakfast. The weather was still nasty, but the kitchen was heaven. As we were setting the table, the kitchen door off the back porch opened and Opa came in, knocking snow off his hat and making puddles on Oma's linoleum. She swatted at him to quit, but asked him, "How did things go?" He said he was just about frozen through; and if she didn't mind, he wanted his breakfast on a tray so that he could eat it in front of the heater. Oma was obliging. As she was arranging things, Opa called to...

Vee, I think what you're suggesting is true. Just as in Wales, there is now nothing whatsoever remaining of the old coalmines and coalfields - it's as if the whole industrial revolution had never taken place: 'Nothing beside remains: boundless and bare, The lone and level sands stretch far away' as Shelley said. Halifax for instance, a bowl set amongst hills, was once almost invisible from above for the smoke and fumes of the factories etc. which functioned there. Now the old buildings, cleaned up and turned into things like Art Galeries and Craft Centres and Boutiques, it is really rather a chic place. Dear old Bradford - Priestley's Bradford - he would hardly recognise were he to come back for the immigrant population, as you say, and the curry houses at every corner - you get some of the best curries in UK there. And then there's the tourist industry...... 'Last of the Summer Wine country (Holmfirth) and 'Emmerdale country (around Leeds). and in the early '60s, when I first visited Haworth to pay my respects to the Brontes, the Black Bull (where Branwell bought the gin for Anne......) was just like any other pub and buses ran up and down Main Street. Later, I lived there for 17 years and when I left it was almost totally overrun with tourists to such an extent that it was better known as 'Bronte Village' than as Haworth. Purists and locals threatened to deface the 'Bronte Village' signs, in fact - especially since most of the tourists were bus trippers who'd been taken for a day's outing and had never even heard of the Brontes. But they loved the cobbled streets and the quaint little pubs and probably thought us residents were pretty cute too! Stan Barstow gives us this picture of a changing Yorkshire, too, in his later books - touristy Haworth appears in A BROTHER'S TALE(1978). But in his Ella trilogy (1990s), he turns right back to WW2 to tell his story Dido

We have a long narrow living space and went with a sectional, but one custom made to fit the space just right. I'm only 5'0 and didn't want a big bulky one that would swallow me up or make my legs dangle when sitting upright on it, so the seating is deliberately designed to be low and not too wide. As someone with short legs and stature, I am never all that comfortable even in most chairs due to dangly leg issues and distance from back of my knee to rear, which is shorter than most chairs these days. I'm more comfortable when I can pull my feet up under me, and that tends to work better on a sofa. So custom made was the way for us to go, as-- for once in my life-- I wanted furniture that was comfortable for me to sit in!! Our kids are grown and gone though they do visit. And we entertain a lot. No t.v. in our house. When it's just us, we do spread out and lounge on it/ take naps in front of the fireplace. When we have company, there's plenty of space to sit upright and converse without it being awkward. As you can see, we also have a pair of chairs, and an ottoman that can be used for additional seating. Not shown is the kitchen -- sorry the lighting isn't that great in this photo -- you can just barely see in the foreground one of the four chairs at the kitchen island. These are counter height and provide additional seating. Because of the position of the island we thought this arrangement flowed a lot better than having a sofa acting as a barrier between kitchen and LR, which is what we had before (sofa and loveseat -- brought from our previous home). Also not shown is that the living space extends beyond the pair of chairs. That's where my home office is, so there's an additional two chairs there as well. If we want to watch a movie, we use my computer monitor to stream netflix, hubby turns around one of the chocolate brown chairs to face the screen, and I sit in my comfy office chair (a DWR recliner). When entertaining there's tons of separate conversational areas, even though the space is not enormous. People on the far sectional end / people perched on the near end conversing with those in the chairs / ottoman can be moved around closer to the sectional / people on the island stools, which can be optionally turned around towards the LR and the view / people in the office / people in the DR which has a table and 6 DR chairs / people out on the deck. Lots of flexibility. We figured someday when we sell future owners will probably want a flat screen t.v., so we did wire for that in multiple places. Future owner could put the t.v. above the fireplace, or on the back wall near the sliders where we have the art now. I could see a future owner flip-flopping this arrangement with a t.v. and console on that far wall. For us that was less than ideal as the best views are from the sectional, and we'd rather have the views than a t.v.

Horrible Sofa.. I bought the Sven Leather sofa and the back cusions got flat in 8 months, we put it in front of the TV qnd use it daily. ARTICLE sent me the back cusions replacements, but they leather color is lighter, faded and it seems very stiff (maybe storred incorrectly). I instered couple od dawn pillows in the back cusions which bought me around a year. Now it looks horrible and deformed. Now installing the replacements which would probaby last 8 motnhs as well, then will add the dawn pillows to buy another year. will end up getting 4 years out of this thing!! The side round pillows sagged after a year, they sell them for $180! My 12 years old Ikea leather sofa which I moved to the basement has 0 sag what sp ever! Very comfortable, no sag what so ever, the leather peeled off little at some placese, corners but thats about it (after 12 years). Do yourself a favor and buy from Ikea, they have some high end leather sofas, prices are close to Article and quality is much better!