Christopher replies:
 >>your thoughtful and interesting post does carry some
implication  that "we were so much more holy in the old days," does it 
not?  <<

While I AM a traditionalist at heart, this FastCheapGood triangle 
discussion has nothing to do with "the old days" and everything to do 
with today and our future.

 >>Would Myles Standish  really, if given the
choice, opted for paint-intensive clapboard siding instead  of vinyl?<<

I don't know what Miles would have done back then. I do know what I will 
do right now. I choose painted wood, rather than vinyl siding because I 
believe that vinyl makes more people sick and dead than wood and paint 
siding does.

One of the main strategies of of the corporateers is to "externalize 
costs." When they make vinyl and when we buy it we do not pay for most 
of the damage it causes to this earth and the people who live here, 
largely because this damage is done elsewhere, out of sight, out of 
mind. The damage is someone else's problem, now or in the future. This 
is why vinyl is so "cheap" (low cost), it does not include all the 
expenses.
Sure, people are hurt in the production of the wood clapboards I buy, 
but all that happens much closer to home. I buy clapboards at a mill 
that I have visited and I have met and worked along side the people 
there. I know that the mill owner takes good care of his workers. He 
pays for their health insurance, and when that is not enough he helps 
them out in other ways. These are expenses to his business, they are 
"internalized" and when I buy wood clapboards from him these expenses 
are included in my price.
Is this absolute? No, it's a balancing act. The wood claboards are 
hauled from the mill to my place using diesel fuel, a product of the 
corporateers with externalized costs. In fact, until this year the 
clapboard mill used diesel too, but now it has converted over to 
electricity, and the mill owner buys his power from the wind farm right 
here in Maine. So, the balance of my decision tips more towards wood 
than vinyl.
There is nothing "more holy" or "high and mighty" or "old fashioned" 
about this. It's just little practical actions today that, in my own 
view, helps people more than any other action. Repair a clapboard 
instead of replacing it, if not repairable replace it with wood, and 
definitely not replace it with a whole wall of vinyl.

 >> they could have saved a lot of energy by insulating
their walls - very un-green,  was it not?<<

Well, here in Maine they did fill their walls with insulation, seaweed 
and sawdust. Where I grew up in Nebraska they filled their walls with 
ground up corn cobs, or simply built the walls out of highly insulating 
sod or straw bales.

 >>They also dumped tannery chemicals
into the  rivers. Etc. <<

Yes they did, but in this case the "they" were the corporateers 
externalizing their costs.

 >>OK, cheap.  Gotcha.  I know cheap, and cheap is almost  invariably 
ugly.  <<

Well, there's two sides to "cheap", quality and cost. "Cheap" along the 
FastThingsCheap line are often ugly and low quality. "Cheap" along the 
CheapRelationshipsGood line are also low cost, but more often higher 
quality, especially as you slide along the line towards Good.

So one might wonder why the window restorer working in the 
CheapRelationshipsGood realm charges more,say $500/window, than the 
vinyl prirate working in the FastThingsCheap land, who charges 
$300/windows. How is $500 cheaper than $299? Remember, in the 
CheapRelationshipsGood realm everything slows down. Consider the $1500 
cost over the slower long-term of say 50 years and it might cost 
$10/year. Since the $300 replacement window is low quality goods that 
will last only 25 years, another replacement will be needed and the cost 
per year over 50 years is $12/year. So, $10/year for a restored wood 
window is cheaper than $12/year for a vinyl window. (Yes, a simplistic 
analysis, but include ALL the variables including the future value of 
money and restored is still cheaper than vinyl.)

 >>But, ya know, every time I help my Vineyard painter with  his 
children's fancy private school tuition, and pay him $7500.00 to paint 
our  two (2) porches  (which are just vertical and horizontal members 
with  screening!), well, I start thinking about other solutions. 
Solutions  which are ... cheaper.<<

While I don't know the situation with you and your painter, It sounds 
like it is down along the FastThingsCheap line, and your other solution 
might be found over in the CheapRelationshipsGood realm.


 >>And I have been fixing up my old windows (in the Vineyard, and in New
York), conscientiously*.   But I am doing it because I like it, and 
because I have the money to do it.  Not because it is  cheaper.  Very, 
very few others have such options. <<

They do not have the options because the corporateers have taken (I 
would say "stolen") their options. For example, over the past 40 years 
the building renovation industry has systematically eliminated the 
tradespeople who know how to repair windows and stopped making window 
repair products, and replaced them with costly whole-window replacement 
products.

When you fix up your old windows you are working on the 
CheapRelationshipGood side of the triangle. Good for you, good for those 
around you.

 >>A decade ago, while I was distracted, someone snuck in some Anderson
windows into the two dormers.  Funny thing, I haven't ever had a problem 
  with them!<<

Well sure, they're only 10 years old.

 >>But the 18th century ones drive me nuts.<<

See? It's all about relationships over on that side of the triangle.


John (triangle head) Leeke

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