Big Blow

Stanford, Kentucky recorded record wind speeds at 58mph last night as a sustained low pressure cell stirred up trouble for most of Central Kentucky yesterday and last night.  We had porch furniture flipped over when I arrived home from work and the welcome mat was in the front yard.  Our wind chimes were singing a staccato tune that was almost unintelligible.  All this adds up to some frightening news for the Dollar General Store employees in Stanford where the record wind speeds tore a large section of roofing loose at about 5:00 pm. (Video)
The winds died down after 7:00 pm but it was a blustery day for most as reported by WLEX Channel 18 news.

All this brings to mind some of the research I have been working on for construction of a Tiny House as it related to structural integrity as outlined on page 49 of Chapter 16 in the Kentucky Building code manual.  I know, I know, many of us are building Tiny Houses because we don't want to be constrained by building permits and regulations like those, but you really have to ask yourself, or better yet, ask the employees of the Dollar General Store is they were more than a little worried when the wind kicked up last night.  Would you want your Tiny House to be safe and sound?

Which brings to mind the idea, or more specifically the ideals surrounding the goal of building a better Tiny House.  Greg at Towards a better tinyhouse continues to present an array of great topics relating to Tiny House design as well as a wide variety of ideas relating to living in a Tiny House.  He has a great amount of information that would benefit anyone with interests in living small or sustainable living.  Greg is hosting the Virtual Tiny House Conference #3 this coming Saturday evening at 8:00 pm and I would encourage anyone interested in Tiny Houses to stop in and participate.  Hey, it's free.  How many things can you say are free these days?

And another think; I think that those of us interested in building Tiny Houses should begin to examine the quality of construction that we employ before someone recognizes the burgeoning size of the Tiny House movement and decides to regulate the industry for us.  Greg has explored this a little on his blog but I believe we need to be more proactive and begin to outline our own industry.  It has been my experience that if you voluntarily self-regulate or govern your own actions, others decide that they have better things to do and are more likely to allow you to continue to define and refine the regulations that govern said function, activity, or industry.  I have employed this theory very effectively in more than one opportunity with excellent success.  I believe that there are elements of the RV and Mobile Home industries that could be used as a base line for creating a new definition for our not-so-new Tiny House industry and lead the way toward responsible construction and management.  This may be a crazy idea, but hey, that's just me.

Thanks for stopping by.  Let's get out there and make it a great day!