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liberty bell

And ACfA, feel free to revive fun old threads anytime you like! I for one am surprised and very confused to see Attract any woman now alchemist back on the first page again. I just don't get it!

Jul 11, 06 9:32 pm  · 
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vado retro

im diggin toto these days...http://www.archinect.com/forum/threads.php?id=P19731_0_42_0_C

Jul 11, 06 9:37 pm  · 
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AP

significant expection? :)
nice.

Jul 11, 06 9:58 pm  · 
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in the mean time nevermore and other archinect people from mumbai are struggling to deal with a real tragedy upon their beloved india.
i hope they are ok.

i rarely use first person swears in archinect but this guy jefferson took the words out of my mouth without a second thought. i think he is enjoying the attention he is getting. he is a very inarticulate person imo. and a borderline race hog. or just a kid who doesn't know any better and have no respect for a 'subtle' advice, nevermind the humor.
i wonder if he was around during 9/11? if he was, i'd feel sad for him. an innocent secondary victim of a terrorist act. probably gone untreated for a long time.
this is very true, many people in new york, vicinity, and, to a greater extent in the world, were and are demaged by the intensity of that terror. i for one never really wanted to go back to city i love since seeing the towers coming down on 9/11. same with tina. we were to fly to cleveland later that day and than to new york a few days later.

anyway, i didn't wanted to say anything regarding his remark to lb. knowing that, upon discovery, she'd fold him nicely herself, and throw like a freesbee, back into the black smoke that he lives in. sometimes we spend too much time on people here who doesn't deserve it.

Jul 11, 06 9:58 pm  · 
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AP

a very zizou response of you, orhan - "without a second thought"

;-)

Jul 11, 06 10:02 pm  · 
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liberty bell

Shit, significant expection? Sorry vado dear, you know what I meant.

Right on, Orhan, as usual. (I actually thought all of your coments were funny, even the GFY,A comment.)

Apropos of nothing, Dolly Parton is awesome. I adore her.

Jul 11, 06 10:05 pm  · 
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they just use your mind
and they never give you credit

it's enough to drive you crazy
if you let it.

Jul 11, 06 10:08 pm  · 
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liberty bell

OK, not THAT song, Steven! I mean Dolly the persona, she's hilarious. Snappy and funny.

Has anyone ever stained a pressed wood insulated garage door? That's what I'm supposed to be figuring out tonight, not posting on TC!

Jul 11, 06 10:12 pm  · 
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vado retro

what a way to make a living...sigh...

Jul 11, 06 10:13 pm  · 
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WonderK

I don't even know what happened on that thread or why. It went from 0 to name calling in about 5 minutes. I just stayed away. I think I just thought that there's so many other things going on....I'm just sick of all the death. There's been 100 deaths in Iraq in the past 3 days. Plus the Israel-Gaza strip thing, which makes very little sense to me. And the train explosions in India. What's the point of bombing India? What can be gained from that? Ugh.

Speaking of sick, I need coffee....

Jul 12, 06 8:35 am  · 
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AP

in the spirit of using words like "visualize" on a job site:

we're having a keyless entry system (card scanner thing) put in, so there have been workers installing it for the last few days (we have 3 entries)...as i walked into the office this morning I hear one seated super-visor say an installer; "....but for aesthetical reasons..." with a thick drawl...

...reminded me of lb's previous "visualize" story...

Jul 12, 06 8:56 am  · 
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e

i hear you K. it sucks. take a deep breathe and try to find something happy and pleasant to focus on for a little while. balance is always key in life.

Jul 12, 06 11:49 am  · 
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LB,

i grew up totally believing in 9 to 5 (and tootsie and star wars, of course, back when the heroes were all kinda hippie-ish).

anyway, dolly is still way cool. slightly odd, but def cool. funny about the lyrics though. sort a like whinnie the pooh was her writer.

just went out with my old boss and had way too much wine. night all!

Jul 12, 06 12:05 pm  · 
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liberty bell

OK, rather than risk staining a pressed wood garage door, my clients have decided instead to fire their contractor.*

Ah, the joy of practice.




*Of course it's not that simple. But the option is being considered at this point, and I'll roll with whatever they decide. Who says architects aren't a service-oriented profession?

jump, Dolly's oddness is a huge part of her coolness. Glad you had a fun night out!

Jul 12, 06 12:12 pm  · 
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liberty bell

Also, I've been pondering ever since puddles pointed out above: why do terrorists attack commuters? People trying to go to work and get home to their families? The world can sure suck.

That said, I remain a big believer that overall, things are getting better, not worse.

Jul 12, 06 12:15 pm  · 
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myriam

Oh man, I hate being on jobs where contractors are fired. I hate hate hate it. I hate the endless rounds of interviewing new contractors, walking them through the site, explaining the half-finished work, pinning down their exact scope, endless bidding negotiations wherein all the contractors have each included a slightly different scope, pissed off clients, the project drags on when your office is budgeted based on having it FINISH, but you've put so much into it already you can't just quit and let the thing be built poorly without your involvement...

oh man. today is one of those days when our profession really, really, really gets me down. i'm tired of being both everyone's answerman and everyone's scapegoat; i'm tired of having everything, absolutlely everything, somehow end up my responsibility, i'm tired of clients who don't pay for weeks or months and having to make that tough decision on whether to keep working on their project or not; i'm tired of being constantly yelled at by both client and contractor, frequently for each other's mistakes that i had no part in and no responsibility for; i'm tired of both client and contractor wanting the power to make their own decisions without my input, and when i let them do that, they come to me for the responsiblity to fix the inevitable problem that arises...

also i am broke and tired of being broke. and when i say broke i mean that i don't have money for lunch today and the credit card is maxed out and i am hungry.

Jul 12, 06 12:46 pm  · 
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They're an easy target. They present themselves in large numbers, and once they're on their bus/train/plane they are sitting ducks.

Jul 12, 06 12:47 pm  · 
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liberty bell

myriam, every word of that post could have come out of my mouth!! I'll add to your broke scenario that when you have to worry every month whether you can afford to buy tampons, you really start to ask yourself why the hell do I do this?

The upside to my scenario is they might end up working with a contractor I know and love working with, whose schedule happens to be open and I would love to see have the work. We'll see what happens; I remain optimisitic.

Jul 12, 06 12:54 pm  · 
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brian buchalski

an architect really shouldn't go hungry...just keep scheduling those lunch-n-learns

Jul 12, 06 1:00 pm  · 
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A Center for Ants?

rationalist is right.

terrorism is a psychological/social attack. a terrorist is not trying to win a conventional logistical battle/war, but rather just show that they can get to anyone. that's their MO. so by default, a terrorist picks targets that are public. that are somewhat random, and in which maximum human damage can be inflicted with the least amount of cost.

unfortunately this means that crowds in urban areas are the inevitable victims. funny how a terrorist wants to target the kinds of spaces we, as architects and designers, find the most successful. thriving public areas, dense but pleasant spaces, gathering spaces, mass transit... you won't ever see a terrorist attack in sprawlsville.

Jul 12, 06 1:04 pm  · 
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brian buchalski

but it seems to me (in america at least) that an attack in sprawlsville would be much more frightening than attacking a subway given that most americans don't typically ride subways...oh well, whatever

Jul 12, 06 1:32 pm  · 
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but they wouldn't get as many people. Their aim is SCALE. Security is tight, these things are hard to do. If they want to do the suburban thing, disrupt the quiet and all that, they've got to do a LOT of them within a very short span of time to make any sort of impact. Security is so tight that they'd basically have to do them simultaneously to be sucessful because the first one tips people off to their MO. That would require a whole different scale of work than a city attack. They'd have to get many more people into the country, and every person they bring in is a risk, so the whole suburban operation is far less likely to succeed than one that hits a lot of people with one strike (city). The city, by contrast, is an easy hit- lots of result for much less risk to them.

I think I'll now be changing my name, just in case GWB is spying on archinect.

Jul 12, 06 2:26 pm  · 
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myriam: the secret to making money is to make models
;-)

Jul 12, 06 2:31 pm  · 
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awww, I can't stay away when our beloved Pixelwhore's back! How's life going, Pixel?

Jul 12, 06 2:52 pm  · 
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Jul 12, 06 3:03 pm  · 
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liberty bell

Why oh why is it so dang hard to get metal architectural items in natural aluminum? Why is every freakin' metal item only available in white, brown, or "sandtone"? With hunter green thrown in for the really adventurous?

I'm really having a problem today with standardization in the construction industry. cf, please respond.

Nice pic, Pix.

Jul 12, 06 3:20 pm  · 
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A Center for Ants?

hey! mitre those corners!!! lets not get sloppy now.

Jul 12, 06 3:30 pm  · 
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AP

mitre and sand. geeesh. ;)

craft is dead!

...


there's something about that picture - totally banal foreground in focus, blurry yet energetic background...gables pensive in the middle-ground... ...I take back my craft comment...

Jul 12, 06 5:36 pm  · 
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vado retro

hey pixel is my cd ready yet???

Jul 12, 06 8:31 pm  · 
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LB, it took my partner and i ages (well, about a year anyway) to find importers/manufacturers who gots the non-standard goods. Here everything is handled by a few major companies (where bland bordering on bizarrrely unattractive is the standard), and when you ask the contractors if they know alternatives the inevitable answer is that what we want doesn't exist.

but it does.

and it turns out that we can get real hardwood floors imported from sweden for the same cost as the cheap japanese maintenance free (because the wood is encased in plastic) junk we have been using til now...

we are looking more and more to europe for the nicely designed hardware and materials, and then tracking down distributors here in tokyo. maybe you can find what you are looking for outside the states...?

Jul 12, 06 9:40 pm  · 
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liberty bell

Thanks jump. Some of my problem is I don't yet have relationships with local suppliers, who would be willing to answer my questions and dig a little for me. Today I spoke to a local garage door dealer who said no, you can't get the style I want with natural aluminum panels, only glass. A call to the national manufacturer of course revealed that natural aluminum panls are an option. But I know if I go back to my local dealer, s/he will not want to bother with an abnormal order, they just want to hear white, brown, or sandtone. Sheesh.

The good news is when you DO manage to set up good working relationships with people they will bend over backward for you. That's the sign of an owner/enterpreneur vs. an employee, usually: are they willing to go to lengths to fulfill your needs?

...gables pensive in the middle ground... love it AP.

Also, the Joshua Prince-Ramus video in the news section here is actually quite fun to watch - J P-R is very charming, and the graphics are impressive. Having actually visited the site of the Museum Plaza Louisville project, along with the amazing 21C by the same developers, I feel a bit of excitement now at the possiblity of the project going through. Still always concerned about removing street activity from street level, but there are other cool things about the project.

Okeydoke, time for Extreme Engineering.....

Jul 12, 06 9:54 pm  · 
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charming like brad pitt is charming, lb?

for about 5 seconds i thought pixelwhore's picture was of me. i couldn't figure out where i was and when it was taken. then i realized that those are piercings - so it couldn't be me.

Jul 12, 06 10:36 pm  · 
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liberty bell

No one is as "charming" as Brad, Steven. ;-)

Jul 12, 06 10:39 pm  · 
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vado retro

i thought that was you too steven! but with a bad cold...

Jul 12, 06 11:02 pm  · 
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vado retro

hey if there is no authorship let one of the "spearcarriers" give the freakin lecture.

Jul 12, 06 11:09 pm  · 
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AP

authorship or not, I enjoyed the presentation... He mentions low budgets for SPL and Museum Plaza - i'd like to know just how "low."

Jul 13, 06 9:06 am  · 
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WonderK

Er, hey you guys.....WTF is going on with Israel? Why are they bombing Lebanon now? I thought we liked Beirut? It just seems a little scary, I can appreciate Israel going after their own kidnapped soldier but other soldiers have gotten killed in the process now too, which is counterproductive. Meanwhile missiles are going all willy nilly over there.

WWI started with a guy getting assassinated and escalated from there. I'm just saying.

Jul 13, 06 9:13 am  · 
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Smokety Mc Smoke Smoke

Thanks for bringing this up, Wonder K ... I was just about to start a thread about this. I'll be the first to admit that although Israel does whatever it can to preserve its territorial and political integrity, I really do not know much about the specific wranglings behind Israel's domestic and foreign policies. I don't know anything about the different political parties, etc.

However, what is scary is that Israeli policy makers are experts in disproportionate responses. As in: you kidnap one of our soldiers, we launch missles against our ports and hold your leaders under house arrest. I wonder if such "negotiation" tactics are valid any more. It is a weird, scary, and sad situation.

Jul 13, 06 9:20 am  · 
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AP

Geneva only applies to those without the power to disregard it.

scary indeed.



WK - i believe they are bombing Lebanon because they hold it responsible for 2 more kidnapped soldiers - kidnappings which resulted from this current effort to get the 1st guy back from Palestine.

Jul 13, 06 9:24 am  · 
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myriam

That pic cheers me up, Pix. Thanks!

Another thing that cheered me up was PROJECT RUNWAY SEASON 3 last night!

There is an architect on the show this year, and she produced something really beautiful for the first challenge and almost won it. Hooray!

Not to change the topic from death and destruction or anything...but I've been meditating on that since November 2004 and...sometimes I just need a little design crit T.V.

Jul 13, 06 12:47 pm  · 
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vado retro

israeli officials saw an episode of we love the 80's got nostalgic for their invasion of lebanon in 1982 and had to relive the glory days,,,

Jul 13, 06 1:08 pm  · 
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A Center for Ants?

Onward ho! Next page!

(speaking of "ho"'s check out this article in the nytimes)

Jul 13, 06 1:13 pm  · 
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I was cheered up by major ego gratification yesterday. First, my boss actually accepted changes I made 100% the first time. That never happens. He ALWAYS asks you to study it another way, makes a couple of stupid little changes just to keep it 'his'. But he scrutinized it, pronounced that it, 'looks really good', and let me be for once. Bloody miracle.

Then I had my graphic design class last night, where I was asked to stay late to crit some extra work I'd done (couldn't choose between two concepts so I'd done them both), and was told that I was the type of student my teacher prays to get, that everything I did was great, and I was really helpful during critiques. And I had thought I was talking too much, but apparently the instructor really appreciates the help!

It's nice to have that sort of day once in a while.

Jul 13, 06 3:25 pm  · 
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AP

well done!

so when do we get to see the graphic work?! ;-)...

Jul 13, 06 4:40 pm  · 
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myriam

Yeah, that would be cool! Show-and-tell!

Meanwhile, here is another cool graphic you guys will like! Just a little late afternoon, first-day-of-WWIII pick-me-up.

Jul 13, 06 4:47 pm  · 
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myriam

Yeah, that would be cool! Show-and-tell!

Meanwhile, here is another cool graphic you guys will like! Just a little late afternoon, first-day-of-WWIII pick-me-up.

Jul 13, 06 4:47 pm  · 
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myriam

rargh. my first.

Jul 13, 06 4:48 pm  · 
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liberty bell

Congrats, rationalist - sounds like the graphic design path is a potentially great one for you.

I too had one of those oh so rare days when I feel virile in my chosen profession. Well at least it started that way. There is little that makes me feel more powerful than to stand on a job site with a bunch of guys trying to figure out how to make something work (in this case, how to route the supply/returns to avoid having a soffit with a 6' ceiling height below it the entire length of the exercise room) and pop in with a simple straightforward solution that makes everyone say "Yeah!" So I was queen of the jobsite for about four hours today.

Then the garage door installer shows up and points out that the way I've placed the ductwork in the garage doesn't leave enough room for the garage door track......crap. So now I feel like an idiot and the garage door guy (not to mention the client) go away thinking the architect is a total bonehead for not realizing something as basic as clearance for a garage door track.

But then I got to thinking about something Steven Ward said to me a couple weeks ago: "The traffic engineer is always right." In other words, in a complex urban project, with so many involved parties - several types of engineers, infrastructure issues, urban design issues, commercial parties, not to mention political interest - the traffic engineer's scope of concerns is so minimal that s/he is always right - if they say they need a 75' turning radius to make the ramp work, then that's that, no argument.

This garage doors guy's scope of concerns is one thing: do I have clearance for my track? He doesn't have to concern himself with how much duct space is needed or whether or not you'll be able to stand up in the exercise room or if the windows function or where the door makes sense or will the HVAC unit still fit in the room, not to mention what shape or color or height the building will be and whether it all is to code or whether the clients can afford it or even like it or does it enhance the overall quality of the neighborhood or is it an ethical project in any way....all he cares about is whether he has enough clearance. So why is it that he can so easily make me look like an idiot?

So - tonight I solve the duct/garage track conflict and try not to continue feeling like a dope. Sigh.

Jul 13, 06 5:10 pm  · 
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liberty bell

Oh yeah: page 30 wahoo!!!!!

Jul 13, 06 5:11 pm  · 
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myriam- the link worked, but the image contained within didn't. = (

you guys will get to see work after I've done a couple more assignments and get around to updating my coroflot portfolio. Speaking of which, is anyone else here on coroflot?

Jul 13, 06 5:26 pm  · 
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