I wanna move to Maine.....

[DonnaBelle]

DOES ANYONE KNOW OF A PLACE THAT IS PERFECT???

DonnaBelle

 

[mom'sfolly]

Ooooh, I forgot about black flies. Nasty, bitey horrible things. Lyme disease too.

But 100+ for 50 days or 4 cords of wood. Feet of snow vs. huge air conditioning bills. At least I don't have to shovel the heat.....

I still want the north woods....

 

[HarlansHollowFarms]

Quote:
Montana!

 

[mamagardener]

mom'sfolly :

Ooooh, I forgot about black flies. Nasty, bitey horrible things. Lyme disease too.

But 100+ for 50 days or 4 cords of wood. Feet of snow vs. huge air conditioning bills. At least I don't have to shovel the heat.....

I still want the north woods....

wouldn't it be nice if you could have a summer home in Maine and a winter home in Texas?​

 

[Freckle Face Farm]

My husbands family is from Maine Sorry to say how much we laugh at them when its snows we are in Florida..DH mom had to climb out a window to shovel snow away from the front door so they could get out..
Lots and Lots of shoveling...Drive way, walk way...OHHH yah!! There car doors froze shut...Scraping it off your car windows..Not to mention driving in it..

 

[Rosalind]

Quote:
+1.

I'm only in Massachusetts. We actually get much less snow than the Mainers. We got about 15 feet last winter. It's pretty and all Xmas-y looking for exactly one day. Then it's just a pain in the butt because you can't go anywhere. Old folks and people not used to strenuous exercise regularly go to the hospital with heart attacks from attempting to shovel it all. And the ambulance often can't get there fast enough due to all the snow and downed trees. Snowblowers help, but they choke on anything over 4 feet or so, which means you have to go out and blow snow in the middle of a serious Nor'Easter a few times before the storm is over. Running a snowblower in a driving storm with sleet and snow and freezing rain coming down in your face really sucks, even with a new LL Bean parka. Last winter we had a major ice storm and power was out in the whole region for two weeks.

Plus, the gardening season is very short. You have to build cold frames, hoop houses, grow only short-season stuff. OEGBs and smaller bantams, Mediterranean birds with large combs and wattles, will require a lot of fussing or a heated coop. Heat is bloody expensive up here, even putting a space heater in a coop can get expensive.

Lemme think, other things that astonish Southern transplants? Oh yeah, the winter wardrobe thing--you need twice as many clothes, because you'll need sweaters, heavy pants, a couple of heavy winter coats, heavy socks, boots, real shoes (not sandals), which you will only wear 7 months/year. And heavy down comforters and quilts for the beds, which must be put away in mothballs for half a year. That gets spendy.

And houses up here appear "flimsy" to my Southern colleagues. This is because most are built with union labor, which costs a small fortune, and so even the nicer housing developments tend to have vinyl siding; plus, the construction season is short, you can't leave a house half-done in October and come back in the spring to work on it some more. It's not too hard to find an older, smaller brick house, but a new one, not so much.

 

[beak]

mom'sfolly :

I just got back from vacation and I don't wanna live here anymore. Texas is hot, brown and ugly! I wanna move to Maine.....

I just keep chanting in my head "four cords of wood, you need four cords every winter, four cords of wood". Unfortunately, its not working.

Can't help you there. Lived in TX for 7 years. You have a spot on assessment of TX and you even live in one of the nicer areas. I visited Maine while I lived in TX and I came back saying the same thing. Gets cold in the winter though and they talk even funnier than Texans. Not much in the way of jobs either.

Please tell me why I shouldn't move to Maine and why Texas is better.​

 

[wombat]

Sadly, all the places I'd really like to live don't have jobs unless you repair snowmobiles for a living.

 

[mom'sfolly]

I've lived in Alaska, Minnesota, and New York. I do stand in my yard in February and say "God, I love Texas" but my eyes get hungry for green. And Maine was so lovely and green, as was Massachesetts. Clothing here in Texas is much simpler than in the North Woods, shorts, t-shirts, tank tops and flipflops. My "winter" coat is a 200 weight polar fleece jacket.

I'm not really sure I could handle the dark, snow and cold of a northern winter anymore, but I sure could handle a northern summer. My dh and I actually go through this every time we leave Texas in the summer. One of these days we will just say the hell with it and we'll leave.

When Jim Bowie said "you go to hell, I'm going to Texas" I believe he was a little confused. This summer they have been one and the same.

 

[halo]

Ive lived up north, thru wicked winters, and I would far rather deal with the heat of the summer. I can always work outside in the morning and go in during the heat of the day, then back out in the evening. In the winter up north I NEVER want to go outside. Then since Im stuck inside I want to kill someone.

It doesnt work for me.