# Bad home improvements, or, what were they thinking? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [February 28, 2005, 6:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-home-improvements-or-what-were-they-thinking/292256 "2005-02-28T06:03:49Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![MissGypsy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/8491ac/32.png) [@MissGypsy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MissGypsy)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2005, 3:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-home-improvements-or-what-were-they-thinking/292256/21 "2005-03-01T15:10:26Z")
My old house had a bathtub built out of flagstone and concrete. Sharp flagstone. There’s no way you could bathe in it, let alone clean it. We had to jackhammer it out. It also has a semi-circular stairway where the bottom half was built from the same flagstone, but they didn’t level the tops of the steps. One was guaranteed a sprained ankle every time one ventured into the basement. There was a wraparound second-floor deck supported only by 2x4s, sunk right into the ground. So the wood rotted, of course, and the deck listed at about a 20-degree angle. The storage shed was a little brick building, where someone had set glass beer bottles into concrete all the way around the doorframe. Of course, they were all broken, so the door was framed by jagged glass. 😕 I would have loved to have met the people who did all this to that poor house. ---
**Author:** ![Montgomery\_Burns](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/db5fbb/32.png) [@Montgomery\_Burns](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Montgomery_Burns)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2005, 3:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-home-improvements-or-what-were-they-thinking/292256/22 "2005-03-01T15:46:59Z")
> [@Boyo Jim](#): > > I’m relieved to hear that the drywall might not be damaged enough to need replacement, though I suppose there’s no way to know for sure until I tear off the bricks. Since I never, ever cook, I’m not worried anout grease on the wall. I’m thinking about replacing the stove with a small fountain. 🙂 My friends tell me it will destroy the resale value, but I plan to live here till I have a stroke or die outright. Yes, you’ll probably have to knock a few bricks off the wall to figure out your next step. After removing the bricks it took me almost 3 years to get around to installing the tile. We looked at flakey drywall paper every day for a long time. It all worked out fine in the end though. As to that fountain thing, you’re on your own there. I have no insight into that project. As an aside, I didn’t realize you live in the Madison area until I started recognizing the names of some of your art sources. I live in the first town west of Madison. ---
**Author:** ![Boyo\_Jim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/87869e/32.png) [@Boyo\_Jim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boyo_Jim)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2005, 1:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-home-improvements-or-what-were-they-thinking/292256/23 "2005-03-02T01:26:11Z")
> [@NinetyWt](#): > > No, no, I mean [this](http://pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/yojimboguy/detail?.dir=2d97&.dnm=84ff.jpg&.src=ph). I think I have the matching bulbous table lamp. 😉 Oh. That’s in the common hallway outside my condo. Unfortunately, I have no control over it. > [@Starving Artist](#): > > Thank you very much for the excellent information, **Boyo Jim**. I’m looking forward to seeing what they have. > > I like all the art you have very much. I would have a hard time picking out a favorite, but the piece you bought last Saturday is stunning. > > I think it’s great that you are furnishing your house around your art. It bespeaks an appreciation of and reverence for art that is quite exceptional. It speaks very highly of you, IMO, that you would choose to furnish your home in that way. > > (I like your couch, by the way.) 🙂 > > Many regards, > **SA** Thank you for your kind words. I have developed this aesthetic sense rather late in life – I’m in my mid 40s. My friends are really quite stunned that I’m doing this at all, let alone without help. Art is not something I would have paid any attention to, even as little as 5 years ago. Now I’m spending so much on cool-looking art and furniture that I won’t be able to afford a vacation this year. > [@Montgomery Burns](#): > > Yes, you’ll probably have to knock a few bricks off the wall to figure out your next step. After removing the bricks it took me almost 3 years to get around to installing the tile. We looked at flakey drywall paper every day for a long time. It all worked out fine in the end though. > > As to that fountain thing, you’re on your own there. I have no insight into that project. > > As an aside, I didn’t realize you live in the Madison area until I started recognizing the names of some of your art sources. I live in the first town west of Madison. Yeah, I’m kind of afraid to get started on this as I’m not sure where it will end, As an aside, I once started a thread about a Madison Dopefest and got no response at all. ---
**Author:** ![racinchikki](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/eada6e/32.png) [@racinchikki](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/racinchikki)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2005, 2:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-home-improvements-or-what-were-they-thinking/292256/24 "2005-03-02T02:49:20Z")
I like the bulbous '70s lamp. My serious taste in decorating is a personal amalgam of mission, Nouveau, and mid-century modern, but my taste for the sublimely ridiculous leads me to embrace horrid '70s crap as the crap that it is. My apartment is scattered with plant hooks in the ceiling, and I’ve been trying to find a set of bulbous green- or gold-glass bulbous 1970s hanging lamps to pend from them, for under $10. The problem is that the antiques stores around here are jammed with such '70s crap, but are under the mistaken impression that they are _worth money_. ---
**Author:** ![Miss\_Violaceous](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/2bfe46/32.png) [@Miss\_Violaceous](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miss_Violaceous)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2005, 3:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-home-improvements-or-what-were-they-thinking/292256/25 "2005-03-02T03:27:51Z")
I really dig your [kal-toh](http://www.memory-alpha.org/en/wiki/Kal-toh) set. 😉 . . . [This thing.](http://pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/yojimboguy/detail?.dir=/2d97&.dnm=d965.jpg&.src=ph) ---
**Author:** ![Starving\_Artist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/aeb1de/32.png) [@Starving\_Artist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Starving_Artist)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2005, 3:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-home-improvements-or-what-were-they-thinking/292256/26 "2005-03-02T03:54:11Z")
> [@Boyo Jim](#): > > Thank you for your kind words. I have developed this aesthetic sense rather late in life – I’m in my mid 40s. My friends are really quite stunned that I’m doing this at all, let alone without help. Art is not something I would have paid any attention to, even as little as 5 years ago. Now I’m spending so much on cool-looking art and furniture that I won’t be able to afford a vacation this year. How ironic. I never cared about art or other objects of beauty either in my younger years. They say every age has its compensations. Perhaps appreciation for beauty is one of the compensations of middle-age. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Montgomery\_Burns](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/db5fbb/32.png) [@Montgomery\_Burns](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Montgomery_Burns)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2005, 3:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-home-improvements-or-what-were-they-thinking/292256/27 "2005-03-02T15:15:40Z")
> [@Boyo Jim](#): > > As an aside, I once started a thread about a Madison Dopefest and got no response at all. Well, I don’t get here much (see 109 posts in almost 5 years) but I jump in occasionally. I could see sitting out on the Union terrace drinking beers with some local folks sometime if that would qualify as a Dopefest. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bad-home-improvements-or-what-were-they-thinking/292256.md?page=1)