The Hippie House: The Things We do for (Peace,) Love (, and Understanding.)

(I knew somebody who would mumble "D*mned Hippies" every time he passed this house, and the title of this post is dedicated to him.)

Pasadena has its famed craftsman bungalows, Brooklyn has its brownstones, New Mexico has its adobe houses, Cape Cod has its Cape Cods, Aspen has its gingerbread-colored Victorians, and here, in Eugene, we have this:

Front View

Side View

Angle View

In these times when housing wonks (such as myself) are trying to figure out if we have hit the bottom of the housing market, a prospective buyer has an immense amount of very attractive options. All of a home's features and amenities are considered and called into question, such as: "Is there a bathroom remodel?" "Is there a kitchen remodel?," "Is there an en suite bathroom?," "Is there RV parking?," "Is there a pool?," "Is there forced air heating?," "Is there asbestos?," "Is there lead paint?," "Does it have a popcorn acoustical ceiling?", and so on and so forth.

Somewhere toward the middle of this long list, there is the uncommonly asked yet exceedingly important question, "Does the home's exterior appear as if it was painted by a group of hippies who just returned from frolicking naked in the mud at Woodstock (like a bunch of very happy pigs)?," to which any previously interested and glowing prospective buyer must sheepishly and quietly answer "yes."

I have done my share of painting, and this is indeed a masterpiece. Painting a house one color is enough of a pain in the *ss, but it must be WAY easier than painting a pattern such as this through the different planes of each individual piece of siding. In other words, this paint job, unlike the peeling paint on the south side of my house (on which I'm still struggling to find the semblance of the Blessed Virgin Mary), is no accident nor was it the result of neglect or slothfulness. This is as intentional as it is impressive.

In my limited life experience, I can think of the following reasons one may choose to paint their home in this manner:

1. The owner lost a bet.
2. The owner came home drunk, thought this would be a good idea, started painting, passed out, then woke up the next morning and said to themselves "What the hell, let's just keep on goin'!"
3. Rainbow Brite is a deep and dominant aesthetic influence on the owner.
4. The owner lives in Eugene.

Considering the times we are now in, and all of the calls for regulation to mitigate the unforeseen negative consequences of myriad forms of "irrational exuberance," I feel the need to suggest to some higher authority a few safeguards to avoid something like this from occurring in the future:

1. Mandate that licensed and bonded painters be older than nine years old.
2. Encourage owners to "imagine you're looking at the outside when you are actually on the inside!"
3. Slip a "owner shall not paint their house like the back drop of a 'Care Bears Very Special Easter Special Episode'" clause into neighborhood association bylaws.
4. Require a pee test for purchases from the paint department of the Home Depot.

Winnebacycle

Eugenians really dig alternative transportation. When I first moved here, I wondered about that french fry smell every time a Mercedes Benz diesel drove by and I much later learned about the whole BioFuel thing. Eugene seemed to be a couple of decades in front of that trend.

Eugenians also really like bicycles. Most of my neighbors bike to work and the street next to mine is actually closed off to cars--it's a dedicated bike "lane" (city street). There is an extensive system of bike trails that will take you anywhere in town and people don't look at you funny if you show up to work all sweaty and with a big line of mud that runs up the back of your pants ("Dude, I should have known that tofu was bad!"). In fact, they kind of look at you funny if you don't.

So I was driving today and I bump into the most interesting and rarefied of vehicles. I had seen this around town but had taken no notice previously. I assumed it was some sort of food kiosk or something of that sort. Well, I was wrong. This is no less than a solely man-powered fully mobile RV (you've heard of the "horseless carriage," but have you heard of the "manful 1 br"?). If Mr. Winnebago and Ms. Recumbent Bicycle had offspring, it very well may resemble this. I would apologize for the substandard quality of these photos, but since it's now illegal to use your phone while driving, I'll just say you are lucky to be seeing this at all, if you haven't already.

They say the RV industry has crashed, but for the industry of this man, who got a remarkable amount of life out of aluminum tape and reflectors, he is able to cruise in style.

Approaching the Winnebacycle:

(Note: parked car=no blur, moving van = blur, Winnebacycle = no blur)

The curtains are drawn, so somebody must be home.

"I'm bad ass enough that I made a skull design out of plexiglass and aluminum tape. Woe unto thee who sees The Skull in their rear view mirror going 3 miles per hour."

Yippie!!! Have fun falling on your *ss! Yippie!!!

I am fairly ambivalent on putting this up. If only people from the East Coast could read this, it would probably be more successful.

So, last winter we actually had a lot of snow here in Oregon. So for a place that basically gets no snow that sticks, I don't mean a little snow, what I mean is a lot of snow. Like, this much snow:

Car-Shaped Snow Sculpture

So, when it does snow, we respond appropriately, being the West Coasters that we are: we act really stupid. We crash our cars into things by applying the accelerator or brakes at less-than-ideal times, we fall on our *sses on sidewalks while wearing flip-flops, we crash our bicycles, our hopes for imminent world peace are rekindled, etc. Here's some photographic evidence of at least one of these things:

Evidence: (Note: 1. California plates. 2. This is an all-wheel drive vehicle. 3. The road is not sloped. [Though the camera angle is, perhaps b/c I was in flip-flops.])

We also respond by writing signs like this: (Apparently the person in charge of public safely in this store is not from the Bronx, or maybe he/she just gets all giddy when they imagine lawsuits arising from fractured tail bones.)