"Austin had a little bit of ice and two flakes of snow..."

"The local news, they showed an icicle hanging off the roof to a fella's house, and that was news here in Austin, Texas!" - Gladys Hardy, Austinite

Watch this whole five minutes, its worth it! I half-wonder if Gladys is a real person. She reminds me of the impressions that Larry the Cable Guy does... Either way, she's funny. Thanks to the JB and Sandy Morning Show guys for playing that last week!

Looks like someone took the video off of youtube. Oh well.

"Repping the Lone Star State, Homey"

This commercial's been running for months. Go to the title link to see more from TX DOT.

Yo dog. Got a new bling-bling in the corner... Off the hook, dog.

McMansion - n. -

"McMansion" is a pejorative term for a particular style of housing that, as its name suggests, is both large like a mansion and while superficially a good value, possessing standards of quality (within a developer) and ubiquitous like McDonald's fast food restaurants, lacks "nutritional" value (in the sense that a house nurtures its occupants)... - Wikipedia

Earlier I went to my first OU basketball game, and watched the Sooners lose to Texas away at Austin. I'll let Chris or Daniel explain what happened, since I really don't know what I'm talking about when it comes to basketball. While I was there, someone mentioned they'd read the post I wrote last night before my poker game, and that I'd described a "McMansion." I realized then that I really don't need a 2,200 square foot house just for me, and my stuff, even if it does look impressive. :-) We'll see what I end up with, I suppose.

House Hunting!

I'm in search of a new home in Austin. The apartment, while nice, is getting old. My financial planner's OK'd my plan for financing the property, so now I need a property. I'm slowly reconciling "what I want," "what I can pay," and "what I should pay."
My dream home:

• Two-story
• Stone or brick facade (no / minimal siding)
• Single "den" -- separate living room / family rooms are kind of a joke
• Vaulted ceilings to the 2nd floor roof line in the den
• "Drama" in the floor plan, i.e. high ceilings, large windows, open areas with lots of sight lines
• Faces West (the Feng Shui book I read says that's most compatible with my "get up late, stay up late" living habits)
• Large kitchen
• No formal dining area (if possible), or a space that could be used for another purpose instead
• Game room (optional -- not sure if I want a pool table or a poker table just quite yet :-) )
• Master upstairs
• Corner lot, or cove if possible (cul de sac, whatever)
• No "poison arrow" chi from surrounding roads or landscaping, (e.g. can't be at the T-bone of an intersection)
• Built after 1995 (arbitrary, I'd consider an older home that meets my other requirements)
• Greenbelt view

If anyone's selling something like the above, or knows someone that is, email me (I'd use the blink tag if it wasn't deprecated).

Since I'm still not sure about a pre-owned vs. new home, I'm looking at the Austin MLS service, which consolidates multiple lists into a defacto central database for realtors in the area. This reminded me of an article Wired ran about two years ago, discussing, among other things, the "code words" that realtors use in listing a home. I'm looking through the Austin MLS listings now -- I've seen lots of homes that are in "quiet neighborhoods," or described as "cozy," "family-friendly," or as having "room to move."

An analysis of the language used in real estate ads shows that certain words are powerfully correlated with the final sale price of a house. This doesn't necessarily mean that labeling a house "well maintained" causes it to sell for less than an equivalent house. It does, however, indicate that when an agent labels a house "well maintained," she is subtly encouraging a buyer to bid low.

So consider the terms in the box on the previous page: A "fantastic" house is surely fantastic enough to warrant a high price, right? What about a "charming" and "spacious" home in a "great neighborhood!"? No, no, no, no, and no.

- Wired 13.05

And don't laugh about the Feng Shui stuff -- its actually rather useful. :-) Its a great system that I could use to judge the aspects of floor plans, and design features in a home. I'm pretty sure that if I picked up a recent book on contemporary home design I'd find the same things with a different phrasing.