I have some sheets that are at least 40. My family has a saving problem.

See. I don't see this as a problem. Quite apart from the frugality thing, the older the fabric, the less skritchety, scratchety. I LOVE old, many-washed things.

In fact, my summer time sleep shirts are my exhusband's grey athletic ts that have been washed so many times, they are virtually transparent and more comfortable than skin. I can't sleep naked and these shirts are the next best thing.

Sue, the Danes call that grey "Isabella colored" since Isabella was known for not laundering her clothes until Ferdinand gave her the money to send Columbus across the ocean blue. I don't think it is a pejorative.

I have enormous bathsheets that I bought in 1995. They are still cream colored, but one has sprung a hole. So sad. I don't want new towels. These are just now broken in!

I have nothing to report on the sheet front.

However, I did go to North Beach this afternoon, where I...

1) Ate a most delicious roast pork sandwich at L'osteria; and

2) Browsed at City Lights for a good long time; and

3) Received a compliment on my pink Converse from a random teenage girl ("Dude! Those kicks are sweet!"); and

4) (most pleasant of all) Ran into Juliana!

Who promptly treated me to a drink at the Comstock Lode, and we chatted for 20 minutes and it was all delightfully serendipitous.

I have my grandmother's dishtowels.

Oh, yes. Me too. Plus, I have a set that I embroidered myself in the mid 70s. My choice of themes was less then sophisticated, but predictive none the less. You guessed it...puppies and kitties. I can't believe my step-mother allowed them in her kitchen.

I bought a new set of dish towels in the black and white theme of my kitchen. They were so thick and difficult to use, I now put them on the floor as thin little rugs and have gone back to the absolutely shameful linens of the last 60 odd years.

The virtues of old towels, I cannot sing highly enough. I have a stack next to the front door in the sort of neon colors that made the 70s notorious. They are disreputable and potentially seizure inducing, but they do the trick on the pooch's paws.

That's the great thing about stuff you don't care what happens too...it gets used the most!

The only sentimental linens I have are the remnants of the matching sheets and towels from when we got married, seventeen years ago. We were sleeping on a teeny tiny bed, and have never had that size bed again, but I still love them. I was thinking about repurposing the pillowcases or something.

I have a box full of linen hankies that were embroidered and tatted by various women in my family. Some of them are lovely, others are fairly pedestrian and I have no idea what to do with them.

I carried one during my wedding and I think that was the last one used.

Instead of sponges and paper towels, I use a set of dish clothes that have gone so grey I can't even remember their original color but they work great. Given my aversion to paper products, you'd think I'd use the hankies instead of tissues, but they scare me somehow.

I have one of the flat sheets I got for freshman year of college. I've long since upgraded to larger beds than a single, so I darned all the holes then stitched cheap flannel to one side, so voila! (not so) instant flannel sheet and/or light summer blanket.

I have a box full of linen hankies that were embroidered and tatted by various women in my family. Some of them are lovely, others are fairly pedestrian and I have no idea what to do with them.

Stitch 'em together and make pillows. Or a patchwork quilt.

I have considered that, and may ship them off to a quilter friend. My talent, I fear, would be insufficient to that particular task.

I have potholders crocheted by my grandmother and great-grandmother. That's about it for old linens.

My lots but not quite as many as msbelle sheet inventory was accumulated gradually over the past dozen years. At least one set has a hole in the corner but I keep using it because I can just put that corner at the foot and it's fine. I did have to retire one set because the fitted sheet shrank too much to fit on the bed, but I have the top sheet and it comes in handy for various things.

I don't know if my parents still have old sheets, but they definitely still have towels from when we were growing up. And dishes and glasses and cutlery that's about my age. Yet? I don't have any plates or glasses or dishes or sheets older than LA. I feel unrooted. No matter what country we went to, our fixings came.

My head hurts like a bitch. I did way too much today. But it was all either good or necessary, some both.