[digitallagasse]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

now that is a much more straightforward definition. much more useful than "this one looks pretty old, so it's a rowhouse, but that one looks pretty new, so it's a townhouse".

and then getting bogged down in the mind-numbing hair-splitting of "but was that detached garage in back originally built for horses or for cars, because that makes a big difference for some reason"

With all the mind-numbing hair-splitting between which is which just further reinforces what you said of blurry lines.