Fire Fire Expensive Pants on Fire
From Yahoo regarding the fire in Tahoe:
"When my husband and I drove down the street, we both just lost it. But we will rebuild," Evelyn Taylor said. "We're thankful it wasn't our primary home."Discuss.
posted by Armen Adzhemyan at 12:43 AM
9 Comments:
I think they're glad that their primary home didn't burn down.
damn rich people.
It's sad when ANY home burns down. So they're rich - does that mean they can't be upset? Come on.
With respect, kicking people when they're down is not cool. Show some sympathy.
Losing your home to a fire is totally horrific, no matter how much money you have (or I guess, how many homes you have).
That's why I'm giving Armen the benefit of the doubt and reading his post as a jab at Yahoo, who in all fairness probably could have found a property owner with a SLIGHTLY more heartrending story to tell.
But yeah, my mom's house burned down last year and she's still psychologically damaged because of it. As much as I hate the rich (KIDDING), I do sympathize with all property owners at the lake right now.
I think the quote was worthy of a repost. Usually when we hear about people's homes being burned down, we think of the people as now being destitute--all their worldly possessions are gone and they have no shelter.
But in this case, neither of those things are true. They have somewhere--presumably nice--to live, and apparently they had two of everything to start with.
So, the quote is funny because it is not what we're expecting. I read "house burned down," and my heart gets ready for another story of a tenement catching on fire downtown, or a story of a family of 4 who now have no money and nowhere to go. When the language, "primary home" pops up, my schema is forced to change. And that's funny.
Reading the quote again, it is also funny because when she said "we will rebuild," I initially thought she was using the word "build" in a metaphorical sense-- like: we will pick up the ashes *of our life* and find a way to survive this.
But, again, after the presentation of "primary home," I realize that she means it literally: she and her husband are actually going to hire a contractor and rebuild their second home.
i don't see anything ironic in the quote. jeez, their property was destroyed - what reaction do you expect?
I think it is interesting the Yahoo article chose to use that particular quote, which might imply that most of the homes that burned were expensive, second homes of the wealthy. From what I read in the New York Times, the vast majority of homes that burned down were owned by locals, typically lower-paid employees of casinos and bars, who have no other secondary residence to go back to. Either way, it is a tragedy.
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