In which we are still in limbo...

[jesshartley]

Well, they made the offer. We're researching costs of moving/buying a new house, etc while waiting for the details. Technically we're "in negotiations" I guess.

Anyone have any insights into life in Western Massachusetts/New England?




Oh, and I stumbled across an old friend who's got a new CD out... Check them out. I'm very fond of urSOcool, but the rest of it seems really good, too.

Division Six

Comments

[solarbird]

I'm from here. If you're curious. ^_^

Hm. Northampton. Never spent much time there. Amherst was more interesting, and if you wanted a big mall, you drove the rest of the way down to Springfield. It's nicer than Greenfield, I think, which isn't saying much but, well, is something.

People tell me that New England winters aren't what they used to be, to which I say HAH! YOU LIIIIIIIIEEEEEEE! because I know better. Tho' typically the snow does melt in March, and April's a rain month, and then May is all lovely. Tho' snow in May isn't unknown, it doesn't last. The traditional pattern was that snow hit right around Thanksgiving, stacked up to three feet tall, and stayed there until March, when the floods happen.

About that front door: the airlock is the entrance room just inside that door. They may and not protrude outward from the house, and they're where you take off your wet/outer clothes. They're separated from the rest of the house by another door, and that's all for insulation. Occasionally people think it's a good idea to take those doors out. They're wrong.

9 Chickweed Lane has just undergone a huge plot advance and change in focus - a lot of it now happens in NYC - so it's no longer about the same thing. You'd be better off with an older collection. ^_^

And as for real estate... hmf. All I can say is, don't be carbound if you can avoid it. Unless you're buying with arable land, don't buy anyplace where you have to drive to everything. New England has the advantage of being good for that. And old houses are better than new houses. And by "old," I mean, "pre-War," and by "pre-War," I mean pre-Revolutionary War, as in Colonial. You know how the south is still fighting the civil war? New England still defends the Revolution. No lie. (Not that I understood this until I moved away, but it's true!)

Of course, I kid, but it's only funny because, well, it's kinda true. ^_^ I mean, honestly, my high school had dorms that're older than this country. My home town was burned to the ground four times by the French. Revolutionary War-style bunting is occasionally used as decoration, without a hint of either appropriation or irony. It's part of the native tongue.

And I really kinda miss it. In a lot of ways, I'm a New England Conservative at heart. That's the good, sane kind, that cares about Good Government and Balanced Budgets and NOT BEING AN OPPRESSIVE RELIGIOUS FREAK and all that. But I digress. ^_^

One thing that might and might not be interesting is that of all the other regions in the country where you could move, it's the most like here you'll find, with the possible exception of Minnesota. (The voting pattern in the last election? Blue means one of two things: "California," and "New England cultural background." The upper midwest was settled by people from New England, moving west. Then the PNW was settled by people who had stopped in the upper midwest and then kept going. That cultural heritage shows up, still.)