A friend of mine tipped me off to these small houses, because he's seriously thinking about living in one full time:

http://www.tumbleweedhouses.com/
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These homes are apparently incredibly effecient when it comes to size and energy use. They are designed to get the most living space while making the smallest dent in the environment. You can keep them on a small piece of land or hitch them up to a truck and take them anywhere.

Pretty neat! <img src="/images/graemlins/laugh.gif" alt="" />

*sigh* I'd rather be in any one of those instead of at work. <img src="/images/graemlins/frown.gif" alt="" />

Just add a generator and satellite internet and I'm good. <img src="/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Thoreau-ly impressive!

Geez, if you had a full production line, I'm thinking you could produce those faster than a RV. Perhaps FEMA should see abou this. It fills the niche between "americans don't sleep in tents", and "americans must have this RV because it has modern conviences they can't live without, including the hair drier plug"

*gack*


<img src="/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

" our house, is a very, very nice house house. With two cats in the yard, life used to be so hard. Now everythng is easy 'cause of you." I'd whistle the intermezzo to ' Tumbling Tumbleweeds' but I am recovering from Valley Fever. <img src="/images/graemlins/frown.gif" alt="" />

My boss, when I lived in the Arroyo Grande/Pismo Beach area up the coast from you, got Valley Fever during extended visit to the Bakersfield-area. It was an arduous recovery. If you've really got it (not that I'm suggesting you've ever told an untruth on here <img src="/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />), wish you a speedy recovery.

Thanks for passing along the link! What a neat little setup. I am definitely bookmarking this one...

Thanks, for anyone unfamiliar with coccidiodomycosis AKA Valley Fever; it is a fungal spore in the greater southwest. Usually stirred up up in dust after fires or storms ( and archaeologists digging units.) Symptoms range from a nasty flu like condition to individuals suffering additional effects including stroke and cardiac arrest. It is nasty stuff. Anyone who visits the area and becomes ill should be tested.Mmany M.D.s are not familiar with it.

a better idea for FEMA ....
I don't have details right now, I will have to take time some day and google/look for it ....
But I remember an architecte, in Japan, proposed small emergency "houses" made of cardboard (that was right after the earthquake in Kobe, IIRC) :
- easy to stock, unmounted
- easy, quick to install
- cheap
- tough enough for a few months
- more comfy than a simple emergency tent shelter (more privacy, like in a real house)
- when no longer needed, no need to take it back to some stocking center : just burn it !!

Frenchy-

You're right.

Read an article on this fellow's work awhile back. Designs some pretty amazing structures, built of cardboard and/or paper. BTW, his name is Shigeru Ban.

thanks for the name.
A search on Google (or any other search engine...) should give plenty references to that guy's works and designs. Very interesting/amazing what he builds with his Paper Tube Structures....

Chris,

Once you have it you should be free from it for the rest of your life. Everyone in my family got it when we first moved to Phoenix about 10 years ago.

Danger! Stay away from Phoenix! Valley fever! Rattlesnakes, scorpions, tarantulas, sharp pointy plants, mountain lions, and coyotes that will eat your pets. All true!

Amazing use of cardboard.

I have always thought that emergency shelters made from cargo containers would be the way to go. Cheap, plentiful, easy to transport. But big steel boxes do not look as nice as the shelters linked by Christina or Alain.

I might be sick but Cardboard ... Shelter ...

I can see the advertising slogans ....

"100,000 Hobo's cant be wrong"
or
"As used by the homeless and destitute world wide"

Excuse me while I see a psychiatrist ...

Ever try to destroy a wasp nest with a garden hose?

No, I always used the non-foam wasp killer and a lighter. Foam wasp killer isn't as flammable.

a big advantage for the "paper houses" vs cargo containers : easier to stock before and to ship to the disaster point, no need to remove them afterwards, no need to stock them again....

Reminds me of the old "shotgun houses" in NO.

But where does the hot tub go?

This literally could be "our house, in the middle of our street"!

Oh, Henry!

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Nah, I let them stay. Wasps eat Pecan Webworms and other obnoxious pests, so as far as I am concerned they are beneficial. I do, however, relocate nests that are close to my doors or windows.

I see your Tumbleweed House and raise you a yurt...

http://www.yurts.com/ <img src="/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />