Honorable Mention: King Ludwig II

A shout out to my definitely rich, definitely eccentric homey, King Ludwig II.

For those of you who don't want to check the article on this guy, he was the king of Bavaria from 1864 to 1886 and was definitely, definitely crazy. Aside from commissioning the Neuschwanstein castle (which is credited with inspiring Walt Disney to build Disney castle in that style), he had some really interesting stuff built in his Versailles-themed castle, Linderhof Palace.

Before I get to the thing I really enjoy about Linderhof, I'll quote from the Wikipedia article about one room in the castle:

Hall of Mirrors
This room was used by the king as some kind of living room. He enjoyed sitting in the niche, sometimes reading there the whole night. Because Ludwig II used to sleep in the daytime and stay awake in the night, the mirrors created an unimaginable effect for him when they reflected the light of the candles a thousand times.

Apparently this room had an ostrich plume carpet. That's class. It's also worth specifically pointing out that Ludwig used to sleep during the day and stay up all night. My kind of guy.

But that's not even the best part about this palace. No, the best part is the so-called Venus Grotto. What is this grotto, you ask? Well, it's a cave. An artificial cave.

You see, Ludwig II clearly spent no time ruling the country, so he had to take up his time doing something. So he commissioned an artificial cave to be built in the image of something from Richard Wagner's operas. In fact, he liked Wagner so much that he built a room in his castle to house the composer. (Wagner, apparently, was happy to accept boatloads of money from the king.)

What did he do in the cave? First, take a look at the thing. It's awesome. He listened to Wagner's operas while floating around his private bat-cave. He had a stage and an orchestra pit. He even had dynamos installed to light the cave in different colors. He had a swan boat to float around an artificial lake in an artificial cave with dynamic lighting. Might I remind you that this was the 19th century?

So, to summarize: In one of his many castles, King Ludwig II built a private underground lake/cave in which he could float around on a swan boat listening to private performances of Wagner operas.

He was obviously very rich. And if an opera cave isn't eccentric, I don't know what is.

Bigass Gabled Awning

When I'm rich and eccentric,

I'm gonna have a huge fucking awning on the front of my house. Just like this.

I actually passed this building on my way back from Santa Rosa. It's a winery and hotel between Santa Rosa and Sonoma, and it's absolutely fucking ridiculous. I thought the slant of the roof was the best part of the building--it would be nowhere near as awesome as it is without that improbably steep roof.

And nothing says 'old money' like those hotel awnings that people pull through in front of the hotel and the valet grabs your car from you. Yeah, you know what I'm talking about. You may even be cheap like me and not even park your car at the hotel or let the bellhops take your bags (because you don't want to have to tip them, and besides, you need the exercise), but you still feel classy pulling up under a huge fucking awning.

The higher the ceiling on the awning the better. You need at least twenty feet minimum above your head before the awning is even worth it. The steeper the roof, the better. Let's say 55-degree slant minimum. I might even put some gargoyles on it. There could be old-school torches on the walls by the door, and a big glass chandelier to light the part of the driveway and steps that's covered. And I'll have ivy climbing up the pillars, just for effect.

You can't buy that kind of class. Well, maybe you can. You definitely can.

So, no matter what kind of house I have, I'll have the architect slap a big fuck awning on the front. To be honest, I wouldn't even want to live in an old house like this. I really enjoy more modern stylings (for example) in a house. But I would feel so classy getting out of the back of a car under an awning like this. And all my party guests would feel the same way.

Hot Wheels Lazy River

When I'm rich and eccentric,

I'm going to build a lazy river in my backyard. You know, the ones in the water parks that you can float down in an inner tube? They were my favorite part of going to water parks as a kid--fuck big-ass water slides. (To be fair, I also liked the wave pools, but they lacked some je ne sais quoi.)


So, I'm gonna have one all to myself. But since I have no liability to worry about, I'm going to treat it like a Hot Wheels track. My original idea was having it shaped like an infinity sign (or figure-8, if you're boring), but a friend suggested the classic hot wheels cloverleaf shape, which could include "boosters" underwater, like the real rivers.


Whatever shape I choose, there are gonna be intersections for tubes to crash in. Because it's water, there'll be rapids from two rivers colliding. What should I do to counteract the possibility of slowdown? Put big-ass boosters right before each intersection. That way, sheer inertia will keep my tubers on track. This will also make the collisions that much better. It'll be like Hot Wheels meets bumper boats.


For my mellow days, I'll devise some sort of system of metering (like on the freeway) so people can only enter the water at precise times. These will sync up to the intersections so no one will crash and my cloverleaf will be a splendid ballet of rocketing inner tube trains weaving in and out of each other but never crashing.


But Zach! I hear you cry. Couldn't someone slow himself down and disrupt the delicate timing? And to that I reply: well, sure. You can't win 'em all.