View from the North40: Simple doesn't have to be conventional

For a very brief period in my youth, I wanted to be famous, which was a very stereotypical urge but strongly at odds with my natural inclination to stay home and not be noticed.

If I were going to pull up a couch and have a session about this, I would say that my neurotic teen-self thought being the exact opposite of who I was would be a loftier goal. Fortunately, my practical little heart won that tug of war and I’m all the better for it. Though, if I harbor some desire for a touch of regional fame, we’ll have to table that couch session for another day.

More often, I dream of going radical in the opposite direction. Sometimes I fantasize about being a hermit.

Then I remember that caves are a bit cold and dank and hard, and hermit shacks trend toward ramshackle little hovels. Plus, I’ve noticed that hermits I’ve read about look very underfed. And unbathed. I’m not judging. You do you. But for me? This will not do.

I don’t require lavish accommodations, but I am quite fond of the simple creature comforts. My life is the balance of a common, practical life, between pulls to extremes on either side.

I am not the only person working on this balancing act. Some people just do it with more flare.

British mechanical engineer Tony Edwards celebrated that most suburban icon — the lawnmower — by building his own riding mower on which he broke a land speed record with the souped up machine. UPI reported Oct. 8 that Edwards broke the Guinness World Record at 143.193 mph at Elvington Airfield in York, England, then mowed some grass with the machine, just to prove he could.

And some people don’t intend to make a statement, they just see a need and fill a need — but in style. Columbus, Ohio, dad Sean Rogers Jr. couldn’t help it if he had to save the day in a custom black stretch limousine. He just used the resources on hand.

When Rogers’ children missed school on a Friday because the school system didn’t have a bus driver for their route, he took the transportation problem into his own hands. WYSX-TV reported Oct. 6 that Rogers arranged to use a limo from his father’s business then put the call out on Facebook that he had room to transport other kids, as well.

Rogers told WYSX6 News reporters that he hauled 27 school kids to school the following Monday and 42 Tuesday. This is one of the few recorded times in history when a person could shrug and say, “Hey, taking a stretch limo was the practical thing to do.”

But I think my favorite story this week is the true love story of a 72-year-old Bosnian man who built his wife the dream home I didn’t even imagine could exist.

Vojin Kusic told The Associated Press Monday that, in his younger years, he built the home he and his wife raised their family in, but after the kids left home, his wife said, “Thanks for building this house so our master bedroom faced the sun, but now I really wish our living room faced the street so I can see people driving up.”

Kusic said he did a major, time-consuming, expensive remodel of the house. He didn’t seem happy about this.

Then one day about six years ago, their one kid who stayed home mooching room and board off his parents got married, and Kusic was looking at another remodel of the house to accommodate everyone and the view his wife wanted.

But he was having none of it.

Kusic proceeded, with seat-of-his-pants engineering, to design and build a house that rotates on a central axis using electric motors and wheels from a retired military transport vehicle. And now his wife’s home can face any direction she wants it to, at any given time of day.

He told the AP, “Now, our front door also rotates, so if she spots unwanted guests heading our way, she can spin the house and make them turn away.” They said he was joking, but I don’t know.

I think he’s brilliant.

A modest-sized home that has a bit of magic, built with practical materials.

It sings a siren song to my little hermit heart, while still keeping my less than tough body safely cocooned at home among all my stuff, the kitchen and clean running water. It does all that while being just a touch show-offy.

Mr. Kusic may have built my dream home.

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I think I’ll have to settle for electric blinds that I can drop down from the comfort of my recliner on days I don’t want to get out of my sweats to be a host at http://www.faebook.com;viewfromthenorth40.com .