Dan Ho wants to liberate you from your own house. From the many unnecessary items, chores and other stuff that in theory makes your life 'better'.
And just how would he know anything about this? Oh believe me, he knows. Dan and his wife were, as they say (or maybe they used to say) livin' large. They owned and operated a successful Chicago-area restaurant (Jenny's) and lived in a house of their own design.
But the thing is, that lifestyle, that "success"... almost killed Dan. One day, as they were leaving the restaurant, Dan had a seizure.
I won't get into the particulars of this part of the story because I'd hate to spoil a good read. What I will say is that, after a fashion, both Dan and Jenny decided that maybe they needed to make a few changes. One big change was selling the restaurant. The other was (you guessed it) setting the "dream" house free.
So Dan & Jenny end up in, of all places, Portland Maine. Dan starts a new magazine dedicated to home design (Rescue) that is subtitled "Rescue from House, Food & Garden Perfection". See, he does have a point. The well-mannered home, stuffed to the gills with "shabby chic", is actually a high maintenance, time-sucking nightmare:
- There are chores, and then there are chores. The first set involves the usual cleaning, errands such as shopping for food, getting a quick oil change, perhaps going to the post office. The second set, the "styling" chores are those that we've all heaped on our schedules in the pursuit of house beautiful. I hate this new set of chores - arranging endless pillows, refreshing windowsill vases, dusting wreaths, replacing votive candles, wiping bath and olive oil rings, refilling individual salt bowls. Individually these are simple tasks, but en masse and on a weekly (sometimes daily) basis, they are insidious.
Rescue from House Gorgeous is one of the funniest sorta-memoirs I've read in quite a while. Ho constructs a life narrative interwoven with his plan for the de-crapification of your house. Fans of Martha Stewart may be shocked to discover that there's another way.
And speaking of Martha... in a bit of house design synchronicity, I just happened to purchase this book at Longfellow's in Portland, Maine on the very same day that our domestic diva was sentenced to five months in prison.
It's a beautiful thing.
Article comments
1 - Tom Johnson
Ah, now that's living. I've never gotten into just having knick-knack things around - whatever I have is important to me, and if it's not it's just not there. I'm always fascinated by people who fill their houses with, as Ho calls it, crap - and it is crap - and have often wondered if maybe my wife and I were the odd ones who never felt a need for this stuff. This sounds like a book for me - anyone who agrees that more stuff just means more stuff to maintain sounds like a genius to me.
2 - Mark Saleski
yea...his descriptions of the 'new chores' can be pretty funny.
like, who wants to add "scrape old beeswax off of edge of bathtub" to their list of stuff to do?
3 - Carol Driscoll
Do you know whether on not Rescue Magazine is still publishing? They have been running my essay, my photo and a banner saying that I am a $500 winner for 3 months now and I have yet to receive a check. I was told I would have it On August 15 by the latest and when I called them a few days ago, phones were disconnected and all my e-mails bounce back unsendable.
I would appreciate any information you could give me about this publication.
Thanks,
Carol Driscoll
4 - Mark Saleski
good question. i have no idea.
when i bought this book, i signed a sheet of paper that was supposed to get me a free subscription. it never happened.
5 - Dan Ho
When you googled "dan ho" and hit "i'm feeling lucky" you'd go straight to my site, and I used to be #1 .. boo .. :(
but this is interesting! I definitely would like to read about the other dan ho! :)
Is he an actual author?
6 - Jane
Dan Ho is a conceited fraud - everything from the cover of his book to calling his "wisdom" ho'isms...please! Has anyone else noticed that it's all about him?
7 - Jane
Oh, and by the way, Rescue magazine is definitely not being printed anymore; basically, anyone who bought a subsription was left without a word from Dan Ho or a return of their money. He skipped town actually (Portland, Maine) without a second glance. How could such a scam artist get a book published and a deal with the Discovery network?
8 - Kat
yes, Jane I'm starting to get that feel halfway through his book. I am interested in culling the junk from my life too, but Dan has a strangely judgemental tone at times (I guess we all do) that I find somehow amusing. Usually "gurus" are a little more accepting.