I recently looked at one of our area's ubiquitous new builds. These are the Cape Cod-style, open floor plan, five bedroom, six bath, 3000+ sf, all grey and white, etc, etc, luxury everywhere, new houses. They are not tract homes; they are built by different builders and scattered around the city. They just happen to look the same. This particular one is in Valley Village, about half a mile away from one of our also ubiquitous homeless encampments.
For this particular home, the agent took me into one of the bathrooms and pointed out the huge quartz panel in the shower, above. Those aren't reflections, those are lights behind it. He proudly said, "That piece of quartz was hauled out of a volcano. In Brazil. It cost $40,000." He was serious, and for a minute I wondered if I had just time-traveled back to eighteenth-century Versailles.
Did you know that you needed a piece of quartz from half a world away in order to have a really good shower experience? I certainly didn't. Is this truly over the top and is it end-times, or is it me?