Daryl’s Brain

My wife and I recently moved from Victoria to Langley where I encountered, for the first time, the modern, suburbian garage.  To understand the evolution of the garage, we must first understand where it has come from.  Basically, a suburban garage’s purpose was to either to park a vehicle to keep it protected from the elements, or to park a bunch of junk to keep it protected from an over-enthusiastic, garbage-throwing-away spouse.  With the advent of modern suburbia, this role has changed.

The difference between classic suburbia and modern suburbia is such an important factor here, that I must highlight the differences before going on.  Classic suburbia can be thought of as a large area divided into parcels of land called yards, on which houses (and the odd park) were built.  Modern suburbia, however, can be thought of as half the “large area” divided into houses that have a thin border of a yard in name only.  If you were to stand between two houses in modern suburbia and stretch out your arms, there’s a good chance you would be able to reach the exterior walls of both houses.

The concept of cramming as much house as possible onto a yard has not, however, increased the number of rooms in any given house, or, rather, it hasn’t increased the number of usable rooms.  Now you have things like a “great” room that is really just a living room, but used less so it looks nicer.  The same thing applies to the “formal dining area.”  You also have the basement suite, which would be usable if anyone could afford the house they just bought, but they can’t so it gets rented out.

In fact, apart from the common oversight of the chapel, there are several rooms completely *missing* from a modern suburbian home:

• The unfinished basement.

  No one seems to have an unfinished basement anymore where they can set up the kid’s toys to keep them busy until dinner.

• The workshop.

  While not really a missing room of the house itself, classic suburban homes have always had enough yard to accommodate this should the occupants desire it.  Now, however, there are little plastic buildings, slightly larger then a dog house, that accommodate the mower, weed-whacker, and sprinkler.

• The entryway.

  This former room has been completely assimilated by the rest of the house and now just opens up into whatever area of the house the front door happens to be attached to.

• A games room.

  Okay, this may not be missing, per say, but I am very surprised that houses this large do not accommodate this.

These missing rooms, combined with the absence of a real yard, are the main contributing factors to the evolution of the modern, suburbian garage.

Think about it.  What is a garage on a home like this if not just a smaller unfinished basement that happens to be on ground level and has a really big door and poor lighting?  But really, it’s so much more.

No one in modern suburbia uses their garage to park their car, that’s what the driveway is for.  (Well, there are a few.)  No one even uses their garage to store their junk.  (Again, a few exceptions do exist.)  No one uses their garage for what it was intended for.  So, what do they use it for?

1. Workshop.

   Many people use their suburbian garage as a workshop.  This can be a workshop where you build things (due to the lack of an actual workshop), or a workshop where you work on your special vehicle/project (due to the lack of space available in the driveway ‘cause that’s where the car goes…not to mention the lack of parking that’s a result from the proximity of all the houses).

2. Lounge for the grownups.

   With the garage door open parents are able to keep track of their kids more easily who are playing on the streets and sidewalks due to the lack of a real yard.  This has resulted in the advent of the modern suburbian lounge garage.

3. Storage of non-junk items.

   Due to keeping the garage door open all the time, and the proximity of all the houses, everyone can see into everyone else’s modern suburbian garage.  As a result, what is stored in the garage is usually nothing near junk…that’s in your walk in closet or spare bedroom closet.

4. Entryway.

   Yes, in some cases the garage has evolved into the main (not the “great”) entryway.  This is due to keeping the garage door open all the time, and some (though, not many) places to put things when you walk in through that area.

5. Games room.

   As a result of not having an unfinished basement for the kids, the kids get actual living room.  (We wouldn’t want them playing in the great room and a garage is no place for a kid to play.)  With the kid’s toys in the living room, where do the grownups go to play?  Heh…the modern suburbian garage, of course.

If you think any of this isn’t true, feel free to stop by our place for a visit.  Preferably between 5 and 8 PM so that more people will be home at the same time.

In an attempt to distract my mind so it won’t blubber like a little girl at how much it misses Stella, I will put forth another question to everyone:

What is the most important room in a house for you and why?

For me, it is the private study that is accessed by that secret passage way behind the library’s bookshelf. It is important to me because it is a place where I can read without being disturbed.

Much sweat and many tears later, I had the top floor of my house drawn out on graph paper. Between the time that the original file was corrupted and the time I buckled down to re-draw this thing of beauty I discovered a document of international building codes. (I think they mean North American, not necessarily international…but that is what the document says.) I was please to realize that the ground floor to my house met the required standards. My top floor, however, had a bit of work that needed to be done. Here were the two codes that I needed to address:

1. The minimum horizontal dimension of any habitable room (except the kitchen) is 7 ft.
2. The minimum square foot area for any habitable room (except the kitchen) is 70 sq. ft.

There were other codes mentioned as well, but I had met all the others by default. So I sat down and tried to figure out how to meet these requirements and still include everything I wanted. After battling my two dimensional opponent I came out victorious. I quickly drew up the design in my broken software and took a screen shot. Here is the finished top floor.

It’s 2:20 AM and I can’t sleep. Stella is sleeping just fine, but me, not so much. You see, I just realized that, after taking into account the width of the streets, if I were to use that house that I had designed as a template model for the houses on the whole block, then I could line them up 14 side by side by 8 end to end and still have room for sidewalks in the city I am planning out. This is a bit of a dilemma because there are 7 usable blocks to a square and the city has 8 squares for housing and small businesses. The businesses are all on the ground floor, like Manhattan or an ancient Roman city, and the housing is all above that. I figure I can fit at least two of these houses on top of each other and they hold a family of four quite easily.

This means that there would be a total of 14 x 8 x 2 houses x 7 blocks x 8 squares for a total of 50,176 people. And that’s without skyscrapers. But my city is only 1 square kilometre!!! (Well, 0.996 square km actually.)

While I may know how to feed them, this number is much too high for the low density of the buildings. I had thought that I would only get a number like that by using skyscrapers. It’s bugging me so much I just can’t sleep. I don’t know what I’m going to do.

A while back I purchased some software that allows you to create floor plans and 3D models of houses. It’s called 3D Home Architect, aka Broderbund Home Design 5.1. I waited quite a while before trying it out, my mistake.

I tested out a few different designs I had in mind for a house, and eventually figured that I should start small. I always start too big, and I enjoy working with limitations so this made sense. My house was 20 feet wide and 35 feet deep, with two levels. I was designing it for Stella and me, taking into account our lifestyles. Here were the basic features:

1st floor:

• Large living room area (keeping in mind the size of the house) to host friends and family
• Kitchen with lots of counter space and a pantry
• Half bathroom on this floor so guests don’t have to go upstairs
• Dining area large enough for six
• Lots of windows

2nd floor:

• Master bedroom large enough for a King size bed
• En-suite included a stand-up shower and an elevated jet tub, and the toilet was in a small, separate room to contain the smell.
• Walk in closet off of master bedroom
• Private, covered balcony off of master bedroom
• Two separate offices to facilitate our different interior design “philosophies”
• Offices could easily be used as bedrooms should the need arise
• A full bathroom accessible from the hallway
• Lots of windows

Shown here is a screen shot of the first floor. It was a good design. I liked it. It was a little tight in places due to my self-imposed space restriction, but it had everything I wanted. I even designed it with the addition of a garage in mind. (Look at where the stairs start, there’s a place along that side of the wall where I could fit a side entry door that comes in from the garage.) All in all I was a little proud of it. The saved file is corrupted.

All I have left of the design is a screen shot of the ground floor plan. I can no longer access the saved file because the software simply doesn’t work right. Prior to this I noticed that the program had been freezing on a regular basis. I looked online for help, but the company only supports their software for a year, maybe two. When I found the Encore forum I told everyone what I thought about this. I wasn’t happy. They tried to help, but none of the suggestions worked.

So now I sit at my computer debating whether to engage in the painstakingly long time it would take to re-do the upper floor using paint.

*sigh*

I hate job hunting. Hate it hate it hate it. In fact, I despise it. A pox on this searching for work!

Now that I have that out of the way, this morning was especially bad for me. I came across many opportunities that I would be perfect for, but which didn’t offer a remoting position, and many more that were US companies advertising for people to come to them from Canada, but couldn’t apply to due to visa restrictions. This is an incredibly frustrating experience.

When we decided to move here we looked at all the remoting possibilities and thought that this was something that everyone did. There are a lot of them out there. Unfortunately, what these job postings mean is that if you live in the same city (or near) they don’t mind you working from home. What they don’t mean is it’s ok if you live in another country.

I’m still looking and still applying (I’ve had a couple bites, one of which looked like it was going to work but then it ended up that I couldn’t read the contractor’s mind to know what he wanted so he cancelled it), but it’s just getting discouraging. And, of course, I just came across a plethora of game developers today that I soooooo would love to work for. I browsed their company’s sites and pined. No remoting positions available, however.

I know something will work out soon. (I have at least one project that may pan out.) It’s just that much more difficult when you don’t live in the place that you are looking for work.

*sigh*

On a brighter note, I was sent this article: If Architects Had To Work Like Web Designers…
Link opens a new window.