cellini's Diaryland Diary ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Forgiving of the Wine Drinkers The Pope is visiting the US right now. In fact, he might even be in this state at the moment. In his honor, I will buy a 6 pack of Franziskaner weiss beer. Not only is it Ratzinger's favorite beer, it's got a monk on the label with a glass of beer in his hand. My friend Dennis, a divinity major, used to say that his favorite religion was Catholicism on account of Catholics being "the most forgiving of the wine drinkers." Dennis used to get real drunk at our weekly parties when we lived in a funky Victorian shit hole of an apartment in Richmond. One evening he stood up on a table and spontaneously broke into a solo performance of Tom Waits' song 'Jesus Gonna Be Here.' It was magnificent. Dennis really knew how to drink. He was very much an alcoholic. I've never since met anyone who so purely reveled in alcohol. It was a beautiful thing. Except for the time he puked on my couch. ____________________________________ Stupid building codes and permits. That shit sucks all the fun right out of building your own structures. All of the things I've had to pass on doing out of fear of getting too big to dodge the code and permits would have added up to a much cooler little building. Like taking those extra 5 feet of beams at the end and making it into a 50 sq. ft. bathroom with a shed roof over it, coming off of the gable end of the main roof. Now I'm wishing that I could just keep going with a second story. It would be so easy. Also cost effective in the sense that it's the same quantity of materials for the foundation and roof with a 2 story framed building versus a 1 story. Yet you get double the total square footage. I'd do a 4 foot knee wall up there, with a rafter-built gabled roof over it. It would be such a fun little space. A ship's ladder to get up. I'd have the ridge board extend several feet out on one gable-end with a hook or pulley permanently attached to the end. Then an extra large window on that gable end. The idea would be to be able to hoist up large pieces of furniture through the window rather than try to get them up the ladder. I want to build fun, unpredictable spaces. Narrow staircases and steep ladders and odd little corners. Rooms that you enter and feel like you are hiding in them. The sort of places that people write children's books about. A tiny, sunken living room that feels like a nest. Yesterday I found an article online by a guy who was also using doubled up 3/4 plywood to make curved framing, but instead of a Japanese half-moon bridge, he used the technique to make bottom and top plates for round walls. It is a very clever thing that he does. He cuts out the shapes for the plates with a jigsaw and then spaces ordinary 2x4s (or whatever the studs are) much closer than normal in order to more precisely define a curve. Then the extra-clever thing is how he finishes it, which is that he skips drywall and staples a fine wire mesh tightly to the framing. Like old-fashioned plaster and lathe. Then he takes a type of drywall mud and builds it up over the mesh, layer by layer. Towards the end, he uses a specially made wooden screed board to ensure that the surface is perfectly round and smooth. I suppose that this screed could be made at the same time as one cuts out the plywood for the plates. Just use a very slightly larger radius than for the plates and cut it out of plywood with a jigsaw. I'm intrigued by the potential. I would like to build a small round room like this one day. Ooh! I have a nice thought. Ok: build a smallish living room. Say, 150 square feet. A rectangle. Then lay out an oval within that rectangle which touches all 4 sides. Build a 3 or 4 foot high wall in that oval shape. The extra space over the voids would be covered over and enclosed. You could put sculptures or bookshelves or whatever over those spaces in the corner. It would be a terribly cozy room. Nest-like. 16:41 - 2008-04-16 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
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