Nobody Knows Anything

Welcome to Diane Patterson's eclectic blog about what strikes her fancy

Housing prices, French-style

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In the book A Year In Provence, Peter Mayle describes buying a home in France. Evidently everyone lies about the actual prices of homes in France, because of the taxes, so that when the house sale is actually transacted, the government official conveniently leaves the room and the buyer gives the seller the real amount of money.

Having just bought a home here in the great state of California, I find myself wondering if the same sort of thing doesn’t go on here. I haven’t heard that it does; I just find myself wondering.

Property taxes in California are calculated based on the sales price—initial property taxes are 1% of the sales price, and the taxes can only rise 2% every year thereafter. (Yes, Proposition 13, and no, we won’t get into how it’s a complete windfall for corporations and everyone else gets screwed.) So if you buy a house for $100,000, your initial taxes will be $1,000 a year. (You will also be very popular, because I am willing to bet there isn’t a house in the entire state for under $300,000.)

But if I say my initial purchase price was $50,000, and I pay you $50,000 under the table, then my property taxes are only $500 to start with.

When you start adding lots of zeroes to all of these prices, you can see why people might want to do this.

Other than the fact that it’s illegal—and in today’s climate, ripping the entire state of California off for billions of dollars doesn’t even rate probation, let alone jail time—why aren’t people doing this with home sales? Or are they and I totally missed out?

Greece! Rome! Monsters!

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Ever since Sophia’s birthday, we’ve had a little problem with her: she wants Princess everything. Most especially books. (Well, and music in the car. I bought her the Disney Princess CDs and I rue the day I did, because all I friggin’ get to listen to now is Judy Kuhn wail about the “Colors of the Wind.” You never know what you’ve lost until you can’t listen to NPR any more.) Whenever we offered to read her a book, she wanted a Princess book, and finally Darin put down his foot: when we’re at the bookstore reading books, no Princess books. He even hates reading them to her at bedtime.

So while we were at Kepler’s the other day we noticed a new book that was co-created by the author of one of our favorite children’s books. Calef Brown did Polkabats and Octopus Slacks, which is hysterical: if you have kids, or you like poetry, or both, run out and buy this book. (Its companion, Dutch Sneakers and Flea Keepers, is good but not superlative; we read Polkabats a whole bunch and Sneakers only a few times.)

The book we found at Kepler’s was Greece! Rome! Monsters! written by John Harris and illustrated by Calef Brown in his offbeat, folk art style. Darin and I have always loved the Greek myths, and we thought Sophia might enjoy this book. Then we opened it up and read a bit and thought, Hmm, descriptions of flesh falling off bones and monsters with three rows of sharp teeth and cutting off the Medusa’s head. Perhaps this is too scary for a three-and-a-half year old.

Wrong again, mater.

Sophia loves this book. She isn’t scared by it at all; she wants to hear it over and over again. If she could get both Darin and me to read it to her before bed, she would. She likes to point out the various monsters in the opening spread and she can name them all. Manticores and basilisks and Cerberus oh my! My little girl isn’t fazed by the tale of the Minotaur in the least.

I found D’Aulaires’ Book of Greek Myths when I was eight and on vacation in Bermuda. Yes, even at eight you couldn’t get me out of a bookshop. And I was looking forward to the day when I would get my kids and copy and sit down with them and discuss the Greek myths with them.

What can I say? That day may be now.

And she hasn’t asked for a Princess book lately, thank goodness.

If you have a tot who needs something a little offbeat, check Greece! Rome! Monsters! out. Or Polkabats and Octopus Slacks. They’re both excellent.

Pirates of the Caribbean: the review

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Short version: Darin and I give it two thumbs up.

Pirates, cursed gold, swashbuckling, Johnny Depp as a completely bonkers and wonderful pirate, and Orlando Bloom finally, finally, finally a brunet. (Blonds have zero appeal for me. I don’t know why that is, but it’s always been true.)

It’s overlong but hilarious. We had a great time. Johnny Depp is wonderful as the pirate who’s described as being not unlike Keith Richards, but since I don’t know what Keith Richards is supposed to be like, I don’t know what that means. I do know that Captain Jack Sparrow is one of the most fun characters to come down the pike for a while.

Damn, it’s so much fun to watch a movie where there’s an actual story. And how depressing is it that those movies are few and far between?

(And if you’re wondering which exchanges were in the movie and which were ad-libbed, check out Ted Elliott’s post on Wordplay about it. Short answer: 99% of them were in the script.)