Replies

1. 
   andyfew322 | Apr 04, 2008 06:18am | #1

   weird.....

   View Image

    

   There's enough youth in this world, how 'bout a fountain of SMART??!!

   
   

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   Edited 4/3/2008 11:19 pm ET by andyfew322

1. 
   MFournier | Apr 04, 2008 04:24pm | #7

   Well you can throw out the first two rules of carpenty. For those who don't know them:
   1. Make it level, plumb and square
   2. Make it flush

2. 
   Biff_Loman | Apr 04, 2008 08:39am | #2

   That is some serious b.s.

1. 
   shywoodlandcreature | Apr 04, 2008 09:21am | #3

   No kidding!

   "lucky in love; unlucky in metabolism"

   unknown

3. 
   DougU | Apr 04, 2008 01:47pm | #4

   Thats going to be a tough sell!

4. 
   woody1777 | Apr 04, 2008 02:25pm | #5

   ROFLMAO !!! What a joke !

   "Practicing how not to die"   ????? WTH could that even mean ?  Wasn't all that long ago and somenone spouting about "reducing the life to the generative state of tentativeness" would have been regarded as crazy........

   Naive but refreshing !

1. 
   McDesign | Apr 04, 2008 03:07pm | #6

   But . . .

   One of my favorite books - Graham Greene's Travels with my Aunt - a retired, widowered English bank executive, wanting nothing more than to stay home and tend his garden - gets caught up with his octegenarian aunt, and they wind up living in Paraguay smuggling cigarettes and liquor.

   Every day they aren't caught and executed feels like a victory.

   He's living more every day than he was in a year back in the Cotswalds.

   Forrest - a romantic

   http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Travels_with_My_Aunt

5. 
   DavidxDoud | Apr 04, 2008 04:35pm | #8

   'Not for Mere Mortals House' vs Doud Hovel -

   "floor, which rises and falls like the surface of a vast, bumpy chocolate chip cookie." - check -

   “If Neil Armstrong were here, he would say, ‘This is even better!’ ”- no -

   "Its architecture makes people use their bodies in unexpected ways to maintain equilibrium," - check -

   "will stimulate their immune systems." - check -

   "the design features walls painted, somewhat disorientingly, in about 40 colors;" - hmmm - maybe not 40, but quite a few...

   "multiple levels meant to induce the sensation of being in two spaces at once;" - ya - to some extent - and there are drugs to take it to a higher level -

   "oddly angled light switches and outlets; and an open flow of traffic," - check -

   "All of it is meant to keep the occupants on guard" - we have all that and several animals too - 'look out for the cat vomit!'

   "the house is meant to lead its users into a perpetually “tentative” relationship with their surroundings" - double check -

   “It has to do with the idea that you’re only as old as you think you are,” - ya - right - tell that to my #### -

   "in some cases by moving “like a snake” across the floor" - we have real snakes -

   “I was deeply alienated from society, which I didn’t see as having any answers.” - OK, we agree on something -

   "hey produced a body of work that includes poetry, philosophy, paintings and conceptual art." - me too - and apples and kids -

   Her daughters had “thought she was insane for working with us,” - check -

   “You make your own privacy,” - ain't that the truth?

   "here are hooks in the ceiling" - ummm...ya...a couple...

   "and someday the house could be festooned with curtains" - we've been thinking about that for several years too -

   "persuaded companies to donate what they said were hundreds of thousands of dollars’ worth of materials and products to the house." - well, people who felt sorry for us gave us some old appliances....

   They have the enthusiasm of 10-year-olds at a birthday party,” - I prefer to drink -

   " whose heavy accent is sometimes hard to decipher" - ya - particularly when I've been drinking -

   "they have educated physicists about physics, doctors about medicine and painters about art." - I'll do that too, if I've been drinking enough....

   "determined to conquer architecture" - at least as likely as victory in Iraq -

   “We should win a Nobel Prize for this,” - well, GWB being nominated should give them hope -

   yes - all this and more on display at Peachfest - cheap entertainment - c'mon down -
   D"there's enough for everyone"

   
   

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   Edited 4/4/2008 9:39 am ET by DavidxDoud

1. 
   Huck | Apr 05, 2008 05:19am | #13

   ROFLMAO!View Image “Good work costs much more than poor imitation or factory product” – Charles GreeneCaliforniaRemodelingContractor.com

6. 
   Jim_Allen | Apr 04, 2008 05:53pm | #9

   I can relate to their thought process. I have often thought that we, as a culture, are hellbent on creating living spaces that ultimately lead us to a diminished lifestyle.

   One time, specialist (Doctor of Internal Medicice) walked up to me while I was framing a house and told me "you have the best job in the world: exercising vigorously every day out in the fresh air...".

   Bob's next test date: 12/10/07

1. 
   DougU | Apr 05, 2008 01:27am | #10

   I can relate to their thought process.

   So Jim, can we assume you'll be building one of these places down there in Austin?

   A house like this one(the one reinvent linked) would fit in well out there in the Westlake area!

   Doug

1. 
   Jim_Allen | Apr 05, 2008 03:06am | #11

   I'll build it on contract. Are you interested in one, or two? Bob's next test date: 12/10/07

1. 
   DougU | Apr 05, 2008 03:51am | #12

   As much as I'd like to do it I'm going to have to decline, as PonyT's grandpa used to say, "all my money is tied up in cash right now"  I cant swing!

   Doug

2. 
   sisyphus | Apr 05, 2008 09:22pm | #14

   I don't think that I would want to live in a house like that but I also think that there is some merit in the concept. It obviously forces people to try new ways and use their bodies more than in a conventional structure. People who don't face physical and/or mental challenges in their normal day could benefit. Maybe just one room in a house could be like this (not the bathroom).

1. 
   Jim_Allen | Apr 05, 2008 11:10pm | #15

   I agree, it's extreme thinking but I think we have evolved in our house comfort levels to unhealthy extremes and just don't recognize it. I've always wondered why they don't build gymnasiums for kids. Why not build a 5000 sf home that includes 3000 sf of usuable play space instead of large volume living rooms that no one can do anything in but sit? Bob's next test date: 12/10/07

1. 
   fingersandtoes | Apr 07, 2008 07:40am | #16

   Forget the kids. Wouldn't it do us all good to have a large room you could play ball hockey in when it was raining? When I was a kid most houses had unfinished basements that we were turned loose in to burn off energy. Now they are all carpeted and have in home theaters to keep the little angels quiet.

1. 
   Jim_Allen | Apr 07, 2008 06:25pm | #17

   Exactly! My boy was on a soccer team. The coach was a successful builder and had a large house with a large unfinished basement. The smallest of his bunch was only 4 at the time and spent considerable time in the basment banging a soccer ball off the wall. He wore out many a hides. A year or so later the builder finished the basement exactly as you described. We were over there for a team function and I asked the little guy if he liked his new basement. "No" he replied..."I'm not allowed to kick the ball down here anymore". It would be much smarter for all wealthy americans to design their finished living spaces to be no more than 5 or 600 sf and their recreation spaces to be 3 or 4000 sf! Imagine having a 50 x 80 gymnasium to hang out with the kids in every day?! I know I'd be much healthier! Bob's next test date: 12/10/07

7. 
   TonySD | Apr 07, 2008 07:07pm | #18

   I always liked the idea Kramer, from Jerry Stienfeld, had : just divide the rooms hrozontally; ie two 4' high rooms instead of one 8' high room- he called it "tunnels"!!

   ....I saw it done on T.V. that way...

1. 
   wallyo | Apr 08, 2008 03:56am | #19

   Com' on people it must break some building code?On the lines of the soccer story my sister had a friend that purchased a hillside house, part of the crawl space was so tall , they put a stairway in, a poured a floor , and made a basketball court.Yes they wind up with foundations like that, start to build hit clay, they dig till they pass the clay, two choices fill and compact to the desired height then set the foundation or just pour foundation walls 10 more feet down then first planned result 14-16 foot crawl space for part of the house. stopping to resubmit plans and to engineer a basement for egress etc costs too much. So they have a basketball court and indoor soccer practice area.Wallyo

1. 
   fingersandtoes | Apr 08, 2008 04:34am | #20

   I went through a Mcmansion that had an open house on Sunday. It was around 4000sf and was listed for 1.2 million. Granite, bathrooms for everyone and their friends - all the usual stuff. But what struck me was that unless you were into watching a lot of tv you were in trouble. The house didn't in any way support you doing any other activity. Not  hobbies, not anything involving movement or games, and the  trophy kitchen wasn't really for cooking in. 1.2 million and I could only imagine spending time in the garage. It was crying out for a basement basketball court.