Making Progress on the project

So, the rainwater catchment is finally coming to life! We've almost got the entire gutter system installed! A few more hours this Saturday and the system will be ready for rainfall! Whoo Hoo. I'm crossing my fingers that we did everything okay and it holds the water and nothing goes wrong. This however won't be apparent until January or February when the rain really starts to come and cisterns start to fill up.

Some recent pictures of the project:

Hop-scotching the cisterns over each other along the narrow 4' pathway, trying not to crush the vegetables that line the path. 

The cisterns in their final location!  It was tight fit, but everything went smoothly, and it was a sign of relief to get them in place. 

Brian and I inside the cisterns. We were installing the pipe that runs between the cisterns. 

Me drilling the hole for the inlet into the cistern. I couldn't quite finish it, so the burly men had to step in and finish drilling... 

Ecotopia

Every summer, I plan on reading as many books as I can. It's my only time to actually sit down for an hour and read  (assuming I don't fall asleep). This venture of mine sometimes works out and sometimes fails miserably.

I have just completed my first book for the summer - called The Toss of a Lemon. It was about an Indian family and how through their growing family/generations, traditions and customs were lost, but that no matter what, family was always the most important thing. I love these types of books because I'm fascinated by other cultures and how different people live. 

Upon deciding what to read next, I thought it'd be best to read something that will benefit me in my life, future, and education. So I borrowed a book, called Ecotopia by Ernest Callenbach, from my roommate. I'm only 30 pages in and it's wonderful! It's set in the 1970's and he travels to San Francisco to learn about Ecotopian villages (or minicities) - basically where everyone tries to live off the grid, recycle, ride their bikes, and live in community housing. We definitely have moved far away from this in the past 30 years, but it's the direction that most people are heading back to... 

Resource Furniture: Italian-Designed Space Saving Furniture

A friend sent me this video a while back, and I forgot about it until randomly today, I remembered it! This furniture is SO cool. It's amazing the things you can make and how they really transform spaces. I really enjoy the furniture, however I would hate to live in that small of a place to have to fold up my bed everyday or switch my bed into a couch. But if it were temporary and I had a great job and lived in a city - then I'd be ALL for it.

Enjoy the video.

A dream design competition...

There is a design competition in Santiago, Chile to design a wine museum in a famous part of Santiago called Cerro San Cristobal. What a fun competition! This would be an awesome project to work on! I was so excited to go to the website and find out more about the competition. Not only do I love wine, but combining it with architecture is the ultimate. As I read on, I get to the nitty-gritty parts. The competition is open to architects (licensing isn't necessary), and students under the direction of architects. This was discouraging, but made me think of professor's I'd love to work with on something like this. Not that a professor would have much time for this, or take on a design competition in another country. But it would awesome. 

Photo courtesy of: http://www.arquitectum.com/index.php

Sex and the City 2

What a horrible movie - I read the review for the movie this morning (actually) and it said this "Sex and the City 2: I don't even want to talk about it." Why didn't I listen to this review?? I'm very thankful that it was only $1.50. I would have kicked myself for paying full price to see it.



It was a glamour-filled, no-content kind of movie. It's crazy to think about how much money goes into these types of movies when our country is millions in debt - but lets not even go into that. So, to anyone who is "thinking" about seeing it - don't. Not worth your time or money.