Dream House Awakenings

Fabulous, but for a few problems, nothing she couldn't overcome, she believed.

"The potential," she said, "was clearly there."

But . . .

"For some reason the guy who owned this place before did the den in shake shingles put up with tar -- and the occasional nail." Outdoors, such shingles weather to a nice light gray, she said; "indoors, they just dry out and crack."

The effect he was going for? "Ugly-male-no-taste. He loved it."

She didn't. "In order to take it down I had to get goggles because the tar would fly off, and a crowbar. And then of course, the nails." She paused. "It's really hard to get nails out of this stuff."

Then there was the bathroom. "In the 1970s, wallpapering the ceiling of the bathroom was popular," she said. "The other day I decided to take off the purple floral vinyl wallpaper that matches the lavender tiles, only to discover that the paper was hiding three square feet of severe mildew above the toilet, which matched the little spots of mildew near the bathtub where the shower from the neighbor above me occasionally drips through -- nothing against the neighbor."

Yet to come, or go, is another toast to the 1970s, dark brown cork tiles on one of the long living room walls -- also stuck on with tar. The temporary fix has been to cover the wall with fabric, but at some point the tiles must come down. And, she suspects, "even a crowbar won't help."

Kuhn said: "I still love it here. But it turned out to be a little more daunting for a first-time home buyer than expected -- and more expensive."

Sometimes surprises come well after you think you're immune.

The U.S. Marine Barracks on Eighth Street SE, as its Web site puts it, "is home to the most dramatic military celebration in the world."

Through the fall, winter and early spring the barracks, smack in the middle of a Capitol Hill residential area, is quiet. But come May, "suddenly the cannons go off," said Jarboe, whose house is a few blocks away.

Every Friday evening from late spring through Labor Day, the parades bring busloads of tourists, scant parking and plenty of John Philip Sousa from the Marine Band and the Drum and Bugle Corps.

"Unless you bought a house in the spring, you'd never know about it," Jarboe said.

On the upside: During the daily morning practice, you can weed to the rhythm of "Stars and Stripes Forever."