I'm tired of cooking/preparing 3 meals a day. It's just the two of us but boy oh boy can that woman eat!! She stays slimish, I get fattish. It's bad enough I do everything here much less start making her one thing and me the other. At times I feel guilty when I buy her fast food cuz of the nutritional value....not to mention I eat it too.
I grew up in WV. There are select areas that are poor. But many are not. I grew up in a nice community with high property values, nice well kept up homes. My parents had good professional jobs.
Eastern Tennessee is nice. My son went to university for his first two years in western North Carolina about 35 miles from Gatlinburg.
Brick is 20 minutes from my town!
I can definitely see how bad memories could bind you to a town - those memories are part of your life. Maybe if, God willing, Ray is well enough to manage on his own for a few days, I can spend a few days at Gatlinburg or Pigeon Forge. It’s probably booked solid now, but maybe next spring...
Can you imagine how much easier it would be to avoid buying that stuff if it was sold in plain packaging or kept away in a special section of the store you need never visit or even restricted to special junk food retail stores, kind of like progressive areas treat tobacco? No bans, no extra taxes, just hide it away like the dirty little items they are.
Geeeez, that woman is a nutcase!
I have family in Brick, NJ. Oh yes, the smokies are beautiful, especially in autumn.
Florida is nice. Don’t stay in NJ if you have the opportunity to move later and you really want to. Life is too short not to follow your heart. I wouldn’t mind considering living somewhere else too. I love New Orleans. Great memories and horrible ones too. Does that make sense? Should I think about leaving because of bad memories? Is that dumb?
Know what you mean about needing to feel at home. Since mom moved into my home. It doesn’t feel like home to me anymore either.
Let me hear about anyone’s favorite spot for it. I can at least live it vicariously through all of you. Pacify me, please.
No one say SeaWorld, either. I mean out in nature. I don’t like whales being captured, or dolphins, etc.
I assume I will end up in Florida like so many others up here do. But there is a town I have never been to, but keep tabs on: Townsend, TN. I think I might like to be in/near the Smoky Mountains. I visited a NC home in the mountains once and the view was breathtaking.
Don’t you find public transportation less stressful than driving in traffic? I do. Sometimes it’s easier. It’s not costly for public transportation. Very reasonably priced. Driving can be a headache! Do you people watch? My MIL loved people watching at the airport. Hahaha.
My cousin always walked in NY. He hated driving there. Public transportation or hiking in the city is best. He does the same in the DC area.
You know what I truly enjoyed seeing in DC. My friend recommended it to me and I loved seeing it. The Library of Congress, what a beautiful building!
Virginia is nice. DC too. My favorite at the Smithsonian is the Air an Space museum. Well, that’s my generation. We got to watch the moon landing in our classroom. Sister brought in a television and we marveled at it.
Those dogwood trees are pretty there. They don’t grow well here.
My cousin is in the Mt Vernon area. He just retired. He may move back to New Orleans. He isn’t sure. When he left Tulane he went to NY, then DC. He misses NY. He visits NY as often as he can. Technically he is my cousin but my mom and dad raised him since he was 9. He’s more like a brother. He had to retire early due to his health. Heart attacks and surgery recently, colon cancer survivor too. He’s slowly getting his strength back.
Light snow is good! It’s pretty but a mess to drive in, huh? Lord, we hardly ever get a sprinkling of snow but when we do we don’t know how to drive in it. Horrible accidents because we are not the best drivers due to being inexperienced drivers in the snow.
Yeah, your subway system is great.
The Commonwealth of Virginia is one of the best run States in the union, and that is because the Governor can only serve for one term. Thus the Governor needs to work quickly to get important things done. The State also is very generous to seniors when it comes to State income tax deductions. Real Estate property taxes are very reasonable.
The major drawback, house prices. Our average house prices are around $400k for a small older house,.... a two bedroom condo is around $250k. The closer one wants to live to Washington DC the higher the house prices. The subway system goes go out to the burbs now.
Excellent health care. Numerous outstanding hospitals. Just in my immediate area, there must be a half dozen urgent care centers.
Traffic isn't easy on the nerves. Standard excuse for being late for an appointment is that you were caught up in a motorcade :P
I also plan to remain here in the burbs. Lot of "Independent Living" senior facilities to choose from :)
Oh, and the weather is easy to deal with. No big storms, no flooding, light on the snow.
this was always the week we went to Lake Tahoe with mom and my niece and her mom /
it was always a perfect 80 degrees and our last night was dinner atop the hill at sunset overlooking the lake and celebrating mom’s Labor Day birthday
I’ve often wondered where I would go if I had a chance to move.
Here in Louisiana there are hurricanes. California has earthquakes and fires. Hawaii has volcanoes. Other places have tornadoes and flooding. We all have something!
As far as beauty goes, I adore California, the ocean, the scenic drive along Hwy 1, everything grows there! Beautiful produce and flowers and those spectacular redwoods!
I adore NY. So much to do! The museums, seeing a play, fantastic restaurants, Central Park for long walks and on and on and on.
New England is so beautiful in the fall. We don’t have the fall colors here in Louisiana so what a treat! It looked like God took a paint brush and painted the trees red, gold and orange. Just breathtakingly beautiful!
I love Florida and spent time there every summer as a kid. My daddy grew up in the Panama City Beach area.
I love Sedona in Arizona. Those red rock formations! The climate is better there than the warmer areas of AZ. Climate wasn’t as hot in Flagstaff either. Of course we drove to the Grand Canyon and there are no words that adequately describe the incredible views.
I love the mountains. I honeymooned in the Rocky Mountains. But I do hate the cold so I couldn’t live year round with long winters.
I love coastal areas. I’m happy around water. We have lakes and rivers in Louisiana. The water isn’t pretty here.
Our lake Pontchartrain is not beautiful like Lake Tahoe is. I loved hiking there. I am fortunate to know someone who owns a house right on the lake and owns a boat too! So much fun! That lake is so pristine, so beautiful!
What do you like and not like about your area?
New Orleans does have phenomenal food and music. Great people too! Interesting history and culture. We are not ‘anywhere USA.’ We are unique.
We love our jazz fest and Mardi Gras. Down side, crime, long hot summers, hurricanes, flooding in certain areas, mosquitoes, rotten public schools, etc.
I loved traveling before mom came to live here. I miss it.
I got used to it when Mom was still here.She couldn't breathe with her COPD and was on oxygen and we had to keep the house cooler and a fan on her all the time while she sat in her liftchair bundled up with her blankets and heating pads.
I aim to have it put back after we finish remodeling some things. But I recommend, I liked it.
Cute song lyrics. I love Robert Frost poems about nature. I love really good song writing and poetry on any topic.
That’s interesting. I would like that because I get so cold in the air conditioning. I snuggle up in a blanket. My husband hubby likes the house cooler than I do.
I understand that but she demands me to stay at her side the whole day - and today it was at least five hours watching Netflixlike streaming on her tablet. I feel like my ears are bleeding.