Fear the Mullet

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Sometimes I have trouble sitting down to write. Sometimes I procrastinate. Ten years ago I would have had to clean something to justify not accomplishing what I should. Now I can sit at my computer doing what looks like work as I take a quick peek at an interesting web site or two, telling myself it's for inspiration.

My favorite lines of Internet research involve travel. I plan a lot of imaginary vacations. A person can find a hotel, book flights (I can tell you how much it costs to fly to most of the major cities in the US off the top of my head because I check these so frequently) and make reservations for restaurants and museums. I have cyber-visited Las Vegas, Miami, Bermuda and Kiawah since the first of the year.

In my most recent forays into fantasy travel I have been planning a month-long trip to New York in September. I visit nyhabitat.com to see if any new sublets have come up and the Village Voice classifieds for the same. If I really want to take some time I might look up restaurants or events in September in the city.

I am also planning a birthday trip for next spring with several of my friends. We haven't really narrowed down where we will go so I researched Hawaii and Barbados because that's where I would like to go and the Outer Banks because that's where we probably will end up.

When I first started looking up things on the Internet (I can't bring myself to say "surfing the Net" because I have listened to my mother-in-law say it sooo un-cooly a lot recently), I got easily side-tracked, one thing led to another and the next thing I knew I had inevitably gone down a road that led to porn. It always leads to porn. One night I looked up "Baby Clothes." I point. I click. I see a few nice sites with children's clothing. I choose the next site in my list of results which flashes open to hairy men and large women (and by large I mean women with breasts that are each bigger than my head) decked out in size XXXXL baby clothes, complete with knee socks, bonnets and in some cases, pacifiers. Yuck.

There is certainly something for everyone out there in Internet-land; my friend Chad gathered us all around the computer at a recent party to introduce us to mulletsgalore.com, a fascinating site about, you guessed it, the mullet haircut. The party atmosphere pretty much fizzled when someone thought it would be funny to view the naked-mullet site - it wasn't. I tried to avert my eyes but I got a glimpse of something that looked like Billy Ray Cyrus with breasts. I am all for the exchange of information, I just don't want to come upon any more yucko pictures inadvertently.

The house at 611 Boonesboro Avenue was built in 1911, which if one takes the time to look around a little on the Internet will find was the year Ronald Reagan was born, Meridian won the Kentucky Derby and American geneticist Thomas Morgan proved that inherited factors are represented by genes placed at specific sites along a chromosome.

In 1911 a change was occurring in architectural styles. Some builders began to investigate the Arts and Crafts style while others continued to build in the Victorian tradition. This house seems to transition between both styles; inside it maintains the feeling of a Victorian house with rooms that can be used for anything and open onto each other while outside it begins to look more like a bungalow with its wide front porch that runs the width of the house.

Several years and two owners ago the house underwent a serious remodel. The then-owner removed all the plaster, took off the molding, insulated the exterior walls and replaced the walls with drywall. He also finished the second floor, which added another bedroom and a sitting area. The stairs, which look as though they could have always been in the house with their Victorian detailing, were salvaged from the old Emory Hotel in downtown Lexington.

Realtor Gary Soderman said that he imagined the builder of this house saying something to the effect of "This Arts and Crafts thing will never last; the old way is the best way," as he built this Victorian house in a time when others were beginning to experiment with new styles.

Current owner Andrew Grimes told me that he was living in an apartment in Bell Court when he learned this house was for sale from a friend who was part of a group of neighborhood children, parents and co-workers with whom he walked in the morning to school and work. At one time word-of-mouth, a sign and some newspaper ads were the only way to sell houses. Today it is entirely possible that this house will sell through an Internet contact. Someone could see this story at aceweekly.com or in other classified advertising that Gary has placed which also appears on-line.

The Internet: for some, a new way to procrastinate, for others, a new way to sell everything from baby-doll dresses to houses.