MountainMornings

Nesting season is in full swing. The Newlyweds just moved to a bigger house with more than one bathroom. She is preparing the nursery – notice the fancy modern crib they found at a yard sale
– and reveling in their new master bathroom with two sinks. It took me nearly 30 years to get a bathroom with two sinks! But like our current President when he and Michelle were first married, our young couple is busy paying off student loans and so for now, they are renting…and saving for a downpayment on a home some day. Note: yes, we payed for college but she insisted on paying her way through medical school.

Now what about Mitt’s nesting habits? Today’s NYTime’s “Home” section is all about his plans to expand the Romney’s 12 million dollar homestead in La Jolla, California http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/07/garden/mitt-romney-the-candidate-next-door.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all And it is only one of six homes in his real estate portfolio – this one near San Diego, two in the Boston area, a ski lodge in Utah and two lakeside residences in New Hampshire. Why did the Times do a back page feature on the Romney’s current building plans? Some of his Modern Family-like neighbors are annoyed with the influx of driveway-blocking trucks and secret service; there are “…six gay households within a three-block radius of his house.” And none of them would sign anything Mitt’s architect wanted them to sign about the plans to build another level thereby blocking their view of the ocean! No? And some neighbors are complaining that Mitt doesn’t like people smoking pot (or weed or whatever marijuana is called today) on the beach! Imagine? http://nymag.com/daily/intel/2012/06/neighbors-report-romney-is-a-total-narc.html

So what if he needs a car elevator? Doesn’t everybody want a car elevator in their dream home, isn’t that the first thing on your list? An elevator, at first blush, seemed like a great idea to us. We actually hired an architect after finding our mountain view. We thought he could help us plan our “not so big” house, and it turns out that when you hire an architect, you start building at a certain level. He was encouraging us to include at least the footprint and structure for an elevator shaft in our house, since we may one day be unable to walk up a flight of stairs. Well, that’s true. This is called an “aging-in-place” design. And the more you talk with an architect, the more everything seems quite reasonable, even elevators. But in the end, it turns out that if what you really want is to downsize, to take Sarah Susanka’s ideas and apply them http://www.notsobighouse.com/ to build as our builder said “A Chevy, not a Cadillac,” then you probably should not hire an architect. Sadly, we had to fire him and I found our home’s design online.

In March, Fox News anchor Megyn Kelly asked Mitt what he thinks about how the Dems are trying to spin his rich guy image. His reply, “Guess what? I made a lot of money.” Well guess what Mitt? We all know you made a killing in the unregulated, financially wild western Gordon Gekko high times of private equity. We know you were never considered for McCain’s ticket in 2008 cause you owned 14 homes; look how you’ve pared down! Americans don’t begrudge you your hard-earned wealth, your business acumen. Or your private prep schools and Harvard Law degree, the privileged upbringing, your Daddy’s leadership of American Motors Corp; your Dad who was a three-time governor of Michigan and himself a presidential candidate in the 1960s. But don’t visit West Philly and pretend you care about public schools. Don’t send out pictures of yourself doing laundry like the rest of us. Don’t tell us you are a self-made man. And please, don’t piss off your neighbors by building ocean-view blocking car elevators…don’t throw it in our collective face.