In my house there's this light switch that doesn't do anything. Every so often I would flick it on and off just to check. Yesterday, I got a call from a woman in Germany. she said, "cut it out."

--Steven Wright

Number of carpenters in U.S.: 1,764,000

-US Census

added on: 11/04/2009

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B-Rant

- submitted by s.levenstein on 09/14/2009

What Housing Developers Should've Learned From Mel Brooks

By Steve Levenstein

My wife and I were cruising through some of the new housing developments sprouting up north of town recently, and we noticed something common about them. Not only did they all look alike, they all looked unlike what they were, which was suburban tract housing. In what seems to be a widespread trend, new houses today are being built to resemble old houses of yesterday.

Frilly gingerbread and gabled roofs give the outward appearance of Victorian row houses while cosmetic Widow's Walks extend off upper level windows. What's all this then??

Do these builders even know what a Widow's Walk is? For those who don't, a Widow's Walk is a small upper balcony originally built for wives of sailors and sea captains who watched and waited for their men to return from the sea. Fine for their time, but now we have them on homes set hundreds of miles from any ocean and... the damned things can't even be walked upon -- unless the owner wants to climb through a window.

The house where I grew up was built in 1964 and it looks like a house of that era. No design cues from some other time clutter its clean, functional lines. It may not have signified Old World culture and creativity bursting out within but nothing of the sort was going on inside anyway -- and everyone knew it.

One wonders just who the builders (and owners) of today's neoclassical faux mansions think they're fooling. The only culture brewing in these homes lurks behind the refrigerator doors, in their yogurt.

This slavish suburban subversion reminds me of an iconic scene from the Mel Brooks film Blazing Saddles: Hedy ("it's Hedley") Lamarr plans on sending an army of drunken desperadoes into the town of Rock Ridge to terrorize the residents into fleeing their homes. Instead, the gang of galoots is diverted to an elaborately constructed imitation town consisting of two-dimensional plywood shop fronts... and streets filled with cardboard cut-out citizens. Rock Ridge v2.0, one might say, and Lamarr's legion of paleo-cons aren't fooled for long. The same goes for today's homebuyers, whatever their political persuasion or state of inebriation.

We can only hope the trend of retro home design peters out as time goes by. Either that, or we can wait for future builders to "update" their ersatz aesthetics so that the homes of 2064 take their visual cues from their then century-old forebears. At least the world will be spared the sight of painted plastic gargoyles leering out toward freshly paved William J. Le Petomane Thruways.
_____________________

Steve Levenstein was born & raised at the then-northern edge of metro Toronto, Canada. Looking through the prism of the suburbs has not only given him a slightly skewed view of society, but has also helped frame the wider world as a series of variations on a theme. Closer to home, Toronto's multicultural mix acts as a rich, vibrant tonic -- an essential elixer that, by putting people out of their place, highlights the common humanity which lies within.

After a 15-year dip in the corporate pool, Steve abandoned the daily commute to focus on his first love, writing, and spending time with his family. Steve's wife of 18 years hails from Tokyo, Japan, and provides a unique window into the delights and diversions of modern Japanese culture while his 2 sons (the younger an established tech blogger in his own right) help keep the house from getting too quiet. Steve writes for a number of respected blogs including InventorSpot, WebUrbanist, Dark Roasted Blend and The Thinking Blog....read more rants

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People are fools

- submitted by Someone who agrees on 09/26/2009

Personally I like a balcony[sp?](second or higher level porch), you get a better breeze up high. That would require a door, form with out function it at a loss. I have built houses before almost got blown off one putting the third floor in. People these days don't understand art in building and they have no idea of the history or point of form. They move people into neighborhoods that all look alike and wonder why the housing market is down(aside from stupid people making their credit bad). Wrap around porches and balconyies[defsp] went the way of the dinosaur with the advent of air conditioning though, but hey consumerisum(again bad spelling) is dying I hope. I may be to lazy to spell right but I am not aww... screw it nobody important reads this stuff anyway.