baxter sez

hi. it's walter writing now. alison had said we changed the color in the hallway--well, here is the change. i like it, but i always worry about passing color fads, you know? how soon is that green gonna get tired?


some interesting stuff, history wise: we live in a house called a "charleston single." they're called that because they're a single room wide. those who have been to charleston have probably noticed all those front doors that simply open onto porches running alongside the house. actually, those are side doors that open onto porches that run along the front of the house. does that make sense? it's probably the way that our house was originally set up. so, the hallway in the photo used to be a porch. all the doors to each room are on the right side of the hall. back in the day, that porch would have had bamboo screens that would drop down for privacy. everyone would have just slept on the porch to avoid the indoor heat.

now, the reason for the sideways set up was to keep the street frontage down. the houses in alexandria, va are like this, too. the reason they did it there, i think, was because the property taxes were levied by how much street footage your house took up. in charleton, the purported reason was a civic design plan that kept the walking to a minimum. i.e., if the bank was 5 doors down, and each house was 25 feet wide, then one only had to walk 125 feet, right? on the other hand, our house is like 90 feet deep. so, if all those houses were turned the other way--so that their fronts were facing the street--one would have to walk...what? like, 400 feet, right? when it's 90 degrees and really humid, the shorter walk is obviously better.

speaking of walking: alison and i are now proud new urbanists. we've bought ourselves a pair of way-too-hip bicycles. alison's bike's design allows her to reclaim a little barbie crap in the name of feminism. here it is:








my bike perfectly represents my leit motif: flaming dice. in another words, i am baddass. and here i am:















anyway, it's a beautiful thing. we can simply ride just about anywhere. school is 10 minutes away for alison. you probably can't get there that fast in a car, even if you subtract the 20 minutes needed to find a parking spot. the park, complete with a dog water fountain, is a minute up the street. the neighborhood coffee shop is too close to ride to. the two grocery stores are maybe five minutes. salt water fishing is another five to the west. a great noon meeting is just down the street.



Okay, it's Alison again. I wanted to include a couple more pictures. Here's our incredible screened-in back porch, and me in my new favorite place: the kitchen counter, making use of our wireless internet. I think we're really going to like our house.