Well we had a pretty good day – my brother and I – got the outside frame of the floor done and put 4 out of 20 joists in place. The rest of the joists should be easy, might do a couple a day in the evening. When we put on the plywood subfloor (six sheets of plywood) the floor will be done, then we start on the walls, then roof. I’m not sure I want to go with the barn style per the plans I bought, as it seems limiting in terms of windows and skylight, but I don’t have to decide just yet. I think the hardest part was the foundation and floor. It should get a bit easier from now on, although the roof will be a challenge. Now, unfortunately, it’s back to work at the paying job, gearing up for trial.
My brother and I are like Gary Cooper in that movie about the architect – Ayn Rand’s fantasy The Fountainhead. We bow to no man, and follow the dream . . . of the perfect shed . . . as art … death before conformity! To Hell with the Building Code! The act of creation must be preserved, on film or in lumber!
So The Fountainhead was modeled after Frank Lloyd Wright? Yeah, as in Frank Lloyd Wrong! Nice ideas on paper, but horribly non-ergonomic buildings, chairs that hurt to sit in, doors where you have to step down and duck through simultaneously. Please, spare me FLW/R! Art belongs on a wall. A wall with a doorway fit for midgets is not art – sorry! Nor is a chair that is a hemorrhoid waiting to happen! Nor is a fork that won’t pick up a piece of rib-eye or a piece of lettuce. Patricia Neal can have the beamish S.O.B.!
Now, give me a nice piece of landscape architecture, and that’s a different story. A fountain, a waterfall, a barbecue pit. . . .
Here in the South, we’re concerned with space and ventilation, leg-room, gut-room, head-room, mind-room, mud-rooms, and cockroaches. We’re pragmatists who believe that form follows function, not ego, mushrooms, popularity, acid, adoration, publicity, sun-stroke, weirdness, funkiness, dementia, hero worship, or other flirt-ilizer, gim-crackery, crack, or general nonsense. We prefer horse-sense, barn style, barnyard, right angles, Anglican righteousness, righteous indignation, indignant outrage, and basic outrageous-ness, not to mention Elliot Ness, Lake Ness, lake effect, effective opposition, oppositional defiance, defiant self-righteousness, and generally being right (which brings us back to right-angles – which, frankly, Frank wrongly thinks are evil).
The ground in south Louisiana is nearly liquid, so it has the virtue of being flat in a way that Kansans can only dream about. Consequently, we naturally build our sheds at right angles to the ground and sky. The street lights on Bourbon Street are our plumb line, and when their angle to the ground appears too acute, or oblique, we know it’s time to go home and sleep it off. Somebody call Frank a cab.
July 24th, 2008
Posted by
The Strafer |
Film, Ranching |
no comments
If you can’t find it at Wal-Mart, you probably don’t need it. That’s what the locals here said when I moved from the city looking for greener pastures – or actually for pastures of any color (things don’t stay green here for long). Those trips back to the city that we made frequently at first are becoming more rare. Wal-Mart is the place to go for groceries, hoses, underwear, digital cameras and, yes, ammo.
Wal-Mart is also becoming a major player in the music business. The New York Times carried an article about the deals Wal-Mart is making directly with musicians.
The deals highlight the changing dynamics of the music industry as once-powerful labels decline because of the migration to digital downloads. To fill the gap, musicians are scrambling to connect with fans, and Wal-Mart is using these exclusive deals to assume a new role: hit maker.
Groups like the Eagles and Journey are selling CDs at $11.98 and pocketing about half of that amount. The consumer pays less and the musicians make more. Hmm. Maybe the Maryland legislature or the anti-Wal-Mart blogs could find some unfairness in that.
To those who cannot pronounce Wal-Mart without a sneer, this is the kind of thing that makes Wal-Mart a success. Traditional record retailers, a dying breed, are trying to play catch-up.
Yes, Wal-Mart opened its superstore on the edge of town, and there is some empty retail space on the main street, but many of those businesses were defunct before Wal-Mart arrived. And the retailers on Main Street as a rule never offered pay and benefits that could match Wal-Mart.
This is not to say that I don’t have occasional complaints about Wal-Mart, but the vitriol that Wal-Mart generates is irrational. Some people combat terrorism, or poverty, or ignorance, or injustice – and some have such frivolous priorities that devote their lives to combating a retail chain.
June 21st, 2008
Posted by
Fitzroy |
Music, Ranching |
no comments
Today I found a calf in my yard. It’s completely black, like its mother, and I’m not sure yet what gender it is. Its mother, Chloe, stood rather menacingly over it, not quite ready to permit a close inspection. It’s not her first calf, but it is mine.
Experiences like this make you think ranching is easy. A friend of ours delivered a bull last year. I came home from the office and the bull was in the pasture. A couple of months later, our friend retrieved his bull. I woke up this morning to find a calf. What could be easier?
I understand that the law of averages dictates that, sooner or later, I will be out in the pasture at 3 a.m. incompetently intervening in the birthing process of a 1300 lb. beast. Like Billy Crystal pulling a calf in “City Slickers,” that may be the cathartic event that turns me from a dilettante into a real rancher.
The other cow, Daphne (mugging for the camera below), is due any day now, and I’m hoping to remain a dilettante for at least another year.
June 20th, 2008
Posted by
Fitzroy |
Ranching |
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