April 22, 2007

  • The Difference is Texas

    Matt and I have been really frustrated about buying a home in Texas.  Realtors keep showing us 4-bedroom houses with itty-bitty yards, and/or houses whose entire backyard is taken up by a useless pool.  Pools are a liability.  I don't want one.  Not only that, they're a big pain in the @$$ to clean.  I'd rather go swimming at the YMCA, and let someone else clean the pool I peed in.

    But I saw this interesting story on the Web about an eco-friendly house.  Snopes.com investigated the story, and they also give the name of the engineer.  I wonder
    if he'd be willing to make a house for us!  (Matt would be happy
    because if we have underground heating, I could never turn up the
    thermostat above 67 F.  I'd be just as happy because he could never turn it
    below 67 F.)

    One of my biggest peeves in this house-hunt is that houses are getting bigger, and yards are getting smaller.  I want a yard.  If I wanted a "garden home," I'd move to Newport Beach.

    As it is, I've been xeroscaping our lawn for some time now.  We've kind of let the weeds overtake it, because they use up so much less water, and the lawn stays green with weeds!  Bermuda grass just shrivels up and dies here, unless we water daily, which we are both too busy to do!  So now, our backyard is full of purple daisies, yellow primroses, and I even found a wild onion!  I also saved some seeds from last year's wild greenthread.  Maybe I'll have my own homemade greenthread tea this year.

    On the other side of things, I passed the Texas Jurisprudence exam yesterday.  So now, I know that if I don't report elderly abuse, I'll be convicted of a Class A Misdemeanor, whereas if I don't report child abuse, I'll get a Class B Misdemeanor.  Frankly, I don't care what the hell I'll be charged with.  I'm not a judge or a lawyer.  Just tell me what you want me to report, so I don't have to memorize what I'll be charged with!!!!  I have enough to deal with re-memorizing the latest changes they've made in ACLS and PALS.

    Politicians.

    Meanwhile, I don't feel too badly that I've had no time to sail.  50-60 mph winds and some tornados whipped through here last night.


    TWO HOUSES IN AMERICA. . . .

    HOUSE # 1: A 20-room mansion (not including 8 bathrooms) heated by natural gas. Add on a pool (and a pool house) and a separate guest house all heated
    by gas. In ONE MONTH ALONE this mansion consumes more energy than the average American household in an ENTIRE YEAR. The average bill for electricity and natural gas runs over $2,400.00 per month. In natural gas alone (which last time we checked was a fossil fuel), this property consumes more than 20 times the national average for an American home. This house is not in a northern or Midwestern "snow belt," either. It's in the South.

    HOUSE # 2: Designed by an architecture professor at a leading national university, this house incorporates every "green" feature current home construction can provide. The house contains only 4,000 square feet (4 bedrooms) and is nestled on arid high prairie in the American southwest. A central closet in the house holds geothermal heat pumps drawing ground water through pipes sunk 300 feet into the ground. The water (usually 67 degrees F.) heats the
    house in winter and cools it in summer. The system uses no fossil fuels such as oil or natural gas, and it consumes 25% of the electricity required for a conventional heating/cooling system. Rainwater from the roof is collected and funneled into a 25,000 gallon underground cistern. Wastewater from showers, sinks and toilets goes into underground purifying tanks and then into the cistern. The collected water then irrigates the land surrounding the house. Flowers and shrubs native to the area blend the property into the surrounding rural landscape.

    HOUSE #1 (20 room energy guzzling mansion) is outside of Nashville, Tennessee. It is the abode of that renowned environmentalist (and film maker) Al Gore.

    HOUSE #2 (model eco-friendly house) is on a ranch near Crawford, Texas. Also known as "the Texas White House," it is the private residence of the President of the United States, George W.
    Bush.

    ---------------------------------------

    References:
    1.  http://www.xanga.com/TXMom2Jami/584920438/can-anyone-confirm-this-is-true--if-it-is-its-very-interesting---.html
    2.  http://www.snopes.com/politics/bush/house.asp
    3.  http://www.snopes.com/politics/business/gorehome.asp

Devich

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