July 15, 2007

A partial list of things in my new house that are built in.

Unstarred items are awesome but predictable. Starred items make my head hurt to think about. Keep in mind that 90% of these are made of heavily lacquered wood.

  • Closets all over the damn place
  • A fuckload of kitchen cabinets
  • Flush-with-wall fold-out ironing board
  • *Flush-with-wall spice cupboard
  • Corner knicknack shelves
  • Liquor cabinets across one whole dining room wall
  • Medicine cabinet
  • *In-shower wooden toiletries cabinet
  • Flush-with-wall linen cupboards
  • Random flush-with-wall cabinet in stairwell leading to basement
  • *Separate utility closets for water heater, old defunct oil heater, and furnace. This is starred because they are full-height doors concealed along the basement hallway.
  • *Compressed-air line in garage
  • *Some kind of sunk-into-concrete-floor bolt anchors, also in the garage
  • Wet bar in basement den
  • *Keg tap in wall behind wet bar in basement den
  • *Walk-in refrigerator behind keg tap in wall behind wet bar in basement den
  • *Walk-in freezer inside walk-in refrigerator behind keg tap in wall behind wet bar in basement den
  • Flush-with-wall cabinet in basement bathroom
  • *In-wall toilet paper roll holder set into swinging door of flush-with-wall cabinet in basement bathroom

    I'm starting to suspect that there's a power tool to blame for all of this. Someone got a tool that made sticking stuff in walls really easy, and suddenly every wall in the house looked like it needed something stuck in it. I've never heard of an Automatic Countersunker before, but I think I've now seen all the evidence I need to believe in its existence.

    Posted by dianna at July 15, 2007 08:53 PM
Comments

But does it have highly suggestive food pictures on the refrigerators?

All of this countersunkery makes me want to wreak some environmental design on various places, but I feel like I never have the time/money/expertise. Did the dude explain the process by which he accomplishes all of these things? Does he do it himself, or just pay a lot?

Glad everything sounds peachy over there. Or medium pumpkiny, as it were.

Posted by: Elliot at July 16, 2007 01:50 AM

Actually, I don't think my owning roommate did, or even contracted for, any of the countersunkering. The house is pretty old -- built in the 1920s and redecorated at least once in the 1970s -- and I'm pretty sure that the crazy built-ins were either original to the house or installed in the redecoration. I can see how they would appeal to my owning roommate, as he likes things to be tucked away out of sight, but I suspect that he merely got lucky to jump on the coattails of someone else's tuck-away-mania.

I like the idea of a mania that you can simply tuck away when you need to.

Sadly, though, there are no suggestive pictures on the fridge. No fridge named Cotati. No fridge named Cha-Cha. No fridge named Poonani-Nani. No, this house is old and strange and lovely, but it is no Kingman.

Posted by: Dianna at July 16, 2007 07:14 PM

Does it have a built-in KitchenAid stand mixer? Because I'm buying myself a Cuisinart.

Posted by: katie at July 17, 2007 04:21 PM

You understand, of course, how these things are related.

Posted by: katie at July 17, 2007 04:22 PM

I do understand, and it does not have a built-in KitchenAid stand mixer. The KitchenAid stand mixer which it does not have built in is not, in fact, celery green.

Shipping from California to Oregon by FedEx is not cheap and convenient. But I don't think that information helps you any.

Posted by: Dianna at July 17, 2007 07:23 PM

How about shipping from California to Oregon by Southwest, if you get my drift? Also: it is not celery green. The color is officially called "lemongrass," and when installed in a house with a light pumpkin bedroom, will make your house in Oregon a satellite campus of my apartment here. In color terms only, of course.

Posted by: katie at July 17, 2007 08:48 PM

I always forget that. If you ask me, though, it's closer to the color that an avocado actually is (as opposed to the darker green which is usually called avocado). Mmm. Avocado.

I have a sort of pale green picture molding in my room, of which my owning housemate is inordinately fond, and I have taken to deliberately selecting green things for my room on its behalf. Perhaps I could talk my owning roommate into agreeing to a built-in stand mixer cabinet in my room, provided that the stand mixer which comes to the house by accident is some sort of foody shade of green.

Posted by: Dianna at July 17, 2007 11:15 PM

Right. I skipped the most important part: I get your drift. I see which way the wind is blowing. I can read the writing on the orangey wall. I like the cut of your jib. And if this helps to expedite your shipping yourself to Oregon, since arriving here I have encountered an amazing number of adorable tattooed butchy girls and to my knowledge none of them are named, you know, that thing with an M.

Posted by: Dianna at July 17, 2007 11:19 PM
Cementhorizon