Thursday Open Thread 02-26-15
Good morning 99percenters!
Ever wonder how much living space you really need? How small could you go? 270 square feet? 350 square feet?
This NYTimes article caught my eye yesterday about tiny pre-fabricated units. Yes, they’re that small and intended for single occupancy. My Micro NY are modular units currently being built at the Brooklyn Navy Yard. Later the modules will be assembled at East 27th Street, not far from Bellevue Hospital in the Chelsea section of Manhattan.
The articles don’t mention specific dimensions so I did a little pencil pushing to help me put it in perspective.
- living room 10 X 10
- bedroom 10 X 10
- kitchen 8 X 8
- bathroom 8 X 8
- closet 3 X 8
That would total 352 square feet.
Food for thought anyway especially when you compare it to the average house built in the US in 2013, which was 2598 square feet, up from 1725 square feet in in 1983.
This is an open thread so it’s a place to share a link, get something off your chest, or even ask a question. Of course, you’re welcome to post a diary of your own.
Comments
Breaking.
Jeffrey Dahmer destroys Ted Bundy in interview on MSNBC.
I would need a serious yard sale to
... get under 1000 square feet. We have been talking about down sizing. I need kids to set up households and take away some furniture.
The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself. - Friedrich Nietzsche -
I would love to down size
I have way too much junk. My favorite house we ever had was slightly over 1,000 square feet and it was more than big enough. I think I could down size much smaller. However, my husband (the pack rat) is an avid do it yourselfer who seems to be constantly expanding everything. I am a firm believer that you fill the space available. If you have less space, it makes it easier to decide what is really important.
The main thing I glean from following the tiny/small house movement is learning how we all can live more efficiently. We do not have to move into a tiny house to learn how to do so.
Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?
“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy
I've filled the space
Things that need to go.
Kids bedroom furniture
bicycles
sports equipment
a motorcycle
several guitars
tools and gizmos
~1000 record albums
...
The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself. - Friedrich Nietzsche -
U got vinyl?
yum....
FDR 9-23-33, "If we cannot do this one way, we will do it another way. But do it we will.
Lots
Although, I mostly listen to the iPod. I like having 15,000 tracks a few clicks away. I have the iTunes library rated 1-5 stars and a play list that uses a six sigma curve on rating and last played. I just play that list on random.
The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself. - Friedrich Nietzsche -
!000 albums
Keep your vinyl it's coming back. We got rid of most of our record collection as we didn't have a turntable and had a lot of CD's. We found a brand new retro portable Crosley turntable at a thrift store for 40.00$. It's sounds great and it's cute. I had forgotten how good vinyl sounds. So were back to buying and browsing records old and new. Now we have to figure out what to do about the 4 drawers of tapes in the dining room. Hard to find a tape deck and the tapes seem to be literally coming undone. If you do decide to jettison your 1000 albums you might find them worth a lot as our city neighborhood now has several stores that are reverting to vinyl only.
I have a Technics direct drive TT
... and a couple of cartridges that have been in the box since 2000 (the year we migrated from Pittsburgh to NC).
The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself. - Friedrich Nietzsche -
1971 Dual belt drive
FDR 9-23-33, "If we cannot do this one way, we will do it another way. But do it we will.
Vinyl sales bottomed out at under a million
now up over 5 million. Zepplins Physical Graffiti is now available as a reissue vinyl set with live tracks. CDs use a 44khz or 48 khz sample rate, even the 96khz sample rate only approaches the sound of vinyl.
Analog recording to press vinyl allows for a larger sounding room. Little Feats "Waiting for Columbus" is a great example, lead singer up front, backup singers sound like theyre in the back, drum kit miked into the board left to right.
CDs are like watching U tube videos on dial up. Yuk.
FDR 9-23-33, "If we cannot do this one way, we will do it another way. But do it we will.
Digital
Definitely has artifacts and odd mixes. Things like the cymbal from hell, or no more cow bell.
CDs give me listener fatigue. The analog formats sound fades to infinity making them much smoother and more listenable.
I wonder if JtC has an opinion on this topic?
The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself. - Friedrich Nietzsche -
I was typing...
as you published that comment.
Agreed 100% Roger...
digital cannot and will not ever duplicate analog music. We had a good discussion at Evening Blues about this a while back. When sound is recorded on a record the needle stays in contact with the recording media for the full duration picking up the sound wave in it's fullest, everything that happens during the recording gets picked up and transferred to the media. When played back you get a true reproduction of what was recorded. Digital is done by sampling the sound wave, a sample being just one point in time, which causes gaps in the sound between the samples. The higher the bit rate the more of the sound wave is included and the better it sounds, but because of the sample-no sample, sample-no sample, sample-no sample nature of the digital recording technique, it can never give a full reproduction of the sound, no matter how high the bit rate. Think of the difference between analog and digital like tapping your finger on the table, analog would be like holding down and dragging it across the table, whereas digital would be like tapping your finger, each tap a sample and the faster you tap would be a higher bit rate, but there will always be gaps between the taps.
Digital music has improved greatly in the last few years, going from the 44khz or 48 khz CD quality sample rate that Roger mentions which usually has a bit rate of around 700-1000 kbps and a size of around 200-500 MB, now it's getting more common to see music issued in SACD or super CD that clocks in at 192 khz and takes a DVD to hold the data (3 or 4 GB) with bit rates of 4,000 to 6,000 kbps, that's a huge improvement and the next step will be albums issued on blueray that will have astronomical bit rates but can never truly match analog because of the sampling aspect.
That's why in a nutshell records sound so much warmer and fuller and richer, you're getting all the
sound as it was recorded, whereas digital sound will always be lacking, mostly in the highs and lows. Artists such as Neil Young recognize the short comings of digital music, i recently saw an interview with Neil and he called CD quality "crap, what do you get, about 15% of the sound" and is going out of his way to move the industry in the direction of higher bit rate issues. his company exclusively puts out media in the 24-192 khz format. A good ear can really tell the difference between analog and digital. I greatly prefer vinyl because of the richness, but am not a purist in that respect since I own thousands of CDs and many SACDs, it's a trade off between great sound and portability.
Neil Young was the first artist I was aware
that sold 96khz CDs on his website. Artists like Young & Springsteen also make vinyl available for fans. Digital music has also brought about smaller bands, and DJ type production.
I think most people can hear the difference, if you play both. About 10 years ago I was listening to the FM radio, a track from the Allmans at the Fillmore came on, about half way thru I switched to my vinyl copy, and it was like the aural room I was in just expanded.
Yes, U R right, digital highs and lows are lacking. The amount of energy it takes to reproduce the bottom note on a bass guitar, or the bottom note on a Hammond B-3 organ is exponentially higher than middle C on a piano or guitar. And this is reflected in todays production values, producers will avoid instrumentation that is low bass or treble. They also tend to not record the lower harmonics of a bass line. Just the center frequency and the upper harmonics.
Sigh.
FDR 9-23-33, "If we cannot do this one way, we will do it another way. But do it we will.
And then they...
try to make up for it by increasing the audio levels (loudness wars), brick wall mastering, clipping the highs due to compression, etc. I agree, sigh.
It seems I remember hearing or reading
some time back that Classical music fans preferred vinyl and when nearly everyone else was recording on CDs, most classical music continued to be recorded and sold on vinyl.
Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?
“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy
Yep...
I've got a pretty good collection of classical music and always try to get the highest bitrate possible when going digital. Did you ever listen to a CD that you're very familiar with from listening to an album and think to yourself, "that just doesn't sound right"? The human ear hears in analog, it's not made for digital sounds.
Big Al, ????????? (n/t)
Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?
“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy
Sorry. That was a play on the constant back and forth
between the repubs and Dems, or others like Kerry and Netanyahoo.
I saw a diary on DK yesterday lauding Kerry for getting on Netanyahoo's case, like Kerry should be lauded.
The old pot calling the kettle black thing.
Today it was Al Franken calling out somebody.
Actually 352 square feet
seems fairly large for NYC. I have been long interested in the tiny house movement in which people are living in even smaller spaces, usually under 150 square feet. Most of these are built on trailers to avoid the minimum requirements of most building codes. However, there are a few very small homes that are starting to pop up that are site built. One such 240 square foot home was built in Asheville, NC and is completely compliant with the building code. The owner, who is an engineer, wrote about it
in this article.
Here is the video of this tiny house. In it, he talks about the process by which he decided what he needed and how to design his house.
Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?
“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy
NYC building code is 600 feet minimum
They created an exception for this project. The 600 feet typically has two or three tiny bedrooms which has led people to share quarters in order to afford the rent, which has in turn created other problems such fire hazards since people are putting deadbolts on bedroom doors.
"Never separate the life you live from the words you speak." --Paul Wellstone
Very interesting & instructive video, Nancy. Thanks! N/T
Everyone thinks they have the best dog, and none of them are wrong.
Grand Theft House
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2015/02/straight-out-of-portlandia-someone-st...
The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself. - Friedrich Nietzsche -
Hey don't mock us
Portlander's. I really find Portlandia really obnoxious. The show seems to be drawing masses of yuppie 'hipsters' from across the country to move to my SE neighborhood and they are rabidly destroying what made it a great funky, liveable, affordable urban community. We now have a 'steam punk' barber shop on the corner that is full of whiskery Victorian looking guys in skinny jeans and a sports, a macho whiskey bar with a black shoeshine person.. Last summer they filmed a episode of Portlandia there. I'm all for keeping Portland weird but not this brand of faux hip weird. I'm glad there is a head shop and a hippie float place on the same block to counteract the Portlandia demographic. Listen to me lol, get off my nonlawn you freaking newbie hipsters from hell.
I am not laughing at you
I am laughing with you.
The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself. - Friedrich Nietzsche -
Check out the Democratic National Committee
http://my.democrats.org/page/s/tell-the-gop-obamacare-is-here-to-stay
Tell the GOP that Obamacare is here to Stay!
Wait a minute DNC, I thot you were supposed to be working toward Single Payer. Wasn't Obamacare sold
to the Dems as a start toward Single Payer?
Ya, thot so.
Remember ACA being analogized to a "starter home"?
I laughed out loud when I heard that line of B.S. After the ACA debacle, Democrats aren't going to touch health-care reform with a 10-foot syringe for years to come. And that's especially true if Hillary the Inevitable gets elected because she's still smarting from GOP attacks on "Hillarycare" more than 20 years ago.
I downsized back when I got divorced
(she got the house I got the shaft thing). Fortunately I had my VA loan so I was able to get into another house
pretty cheaply. It's 1100 sq ft but has a very large fenced yard which is what I like. I did remodel the garage so
it's actually about 1400 sq ft with that. I have a 25 x25 veg and fruit garden in the back yard.
Getting ready to start some seeds indoors any day now. I grow the veg and fruit starts in the same room as
the other plants I grow (hint, they're legal now).
I live in a suburb neighborhood built in the late sixties/early seventies. All the houses are in the 1100-1400 sq ft
range with wide streets and big yards (10K plus). That was more common back then. Seems people just kept wanting
bigger and better from then on.
My sister lives in a low income senior apartment building in a 350 sq ft space. She's got stuff piled to the ceilings.
We are looking at down sizing to pull out equity
And encourage baby birds to fly.
The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself. - Friedrich Nietzsche -
We lived in San Fransico
in an approximately 600 sq foot apt. in an old Victorian house, on the 3rd floor, for seven years. Here were three of us, one a rowdy teenager. I worked at home as a freelancer in the 'front room' for 3 years of this time. It was tight. You could not stand in front of the oven to open it or take out you food. The tiny size was redeemed by the floor plan which featured two bedrooms and a long curved hall with a really cool bathroom at the end near the front door.
We stayed there so long because it was owned by a Chinese man who kept the rent low because it wasn't fair to charge the new tenants too much more then those that had been living there since the 60's. I liked it it was like living in a redwood tree house. I did crave privacy and space so when we moved to Oregon in the 90's we bought a big old 1914 house. After SF prices it seemed like it was almost free the 1400+ square footage was a dream come true.
Could we live in a tiny space like this again? Nah, we both need work space as artist and musician's do and it would be too expensive to rent outside office and studio space. We moved our living space downstairs and the two large rooms upstairs, with a tiny bathroom (a toilet and sink in a closet) is where we work. At this point our house payments are cheaper then anything we could rent and house prices are insane, so I'm staying put.
Some of my neighbors drive SUVs bigger than that home
Houses have gotten bigger
and so have garages. Another part of our race to the bottom.
I remember when Cadillac came up with their first monster SUV the advertising had a disclaimer "fits in most garages."
"Never separate the life you live from the words you speak." --Paul Wellstone
I hate SUVs
I suspect that maybe some of us (not shaz and I!) have one or two of these monsters. I hate them because
1. visibility #1. I can't see what's happening up ahead because the SUV is blocking my view. This means I can't react. What if the SUV is tailgating and the car ahead of it stops suddenly? So I have to assume all SUVs are doing that and I have to keep far enough behind them that some dope coming from a side street is going to pull out in between and then I have to fall far enough behind *that* vehicle!
2. visibility #2. When I come to a corner I can't see what's coming from the left because the SUV parked right there looks about as big as a high-rise. If I pull out to see then I make it really difficult for pedestrians to cross the street. They have to go behind me. I hate that!
3. attitude. They come barreling down our narrow street. The polite thing to do when two cars are approaching each other from different directions is for the first one to find a small opening among the parked cars, to pull in slightly and let the other car, the one that can't pull over, go by. But not SUVs. They're big! They own the road! They have kids on board so look out! They'll keep coming at their high speed and good luck to you!
4. parking
They take so damn much space that it's impossible to park between a pair in a lot. (Notice how they don't give a damn about staying between the lines.)
"Never separate the life you live from the words you speak." --Paul Wellstone