AND, corner lots are great. Especially when you live in a neighborhood with small yards. You don’t see your neighbors out so many windows. And you feel like you have much more space. (We are on a corner lot)

The Cleveland area has not been getting much snow lately. This is not to say that they won’t this year or next, but the snowfall has been much lighter than normal. Maybe climate change.

Vermillion doesn’t get the lake affect snow that they get in Cleveland anyway. They are too far west. That said, I see one website that says Vermilion gets an average of 40 inches of snow a year. That sounds like a lot to me, although it may not be. Jeff and Kim have not had much trouble and I don’t think he cleared his driveway but once last year.

If nothing else It would be an interesting place to live. Snowbound for days, big wrecks by the bridge, sightings of deer and bear and who knows what all else. Fish frys. Long nights of arguing with the City Council over the inflated price of park benches.

And a snowmobile! I gave up dirt bikes but a snowmobile might be just the ticket. Grandsons love snowmobiles! If I’m going to get in snowed for weeks at a time I want to be able to run up to the corner grocery and get a six pack if I want one. A snowmobile would be perfect for that on days before the city got around to plowing. I haven’t ridden a snowmobile since I was 16 and we visited Minnesota in November, but I’ll never forget it and I really liked it. I’ll bet it will take very little convincing to get Jeff’s dad to buy one as well. He would want to take it hunting. I might want to go with him. He’s not a very good hunter but it will get us outdoors and we have sworn a blood oath not to discuss politics.

But if you’re really going to be self-sufficient in rural snow country what could be better than a Unimog? I don’t know very much about Mercedes-Benz but Mark and PJ speak well of them, and from what I have read there is very little that will stop one, particularly if you put chains on it. The idea of teaching my grandsons how to drive in a Unimog has definite appeal. We don’t need no stinking snow plow!

https://www.google.com/amp/s/w...g-u500-15620731/amp/

(But honey I am saving you money! If I get a Unimog I don’t need a snowmobile. Although the Unimog would be perfect for towing the snowmobile trailer...)

That boring house is perfectly good on the inside, but there is nary a tree anywhere near it! And the fenceless backyard that runs into all the other backyards gives me the willies. It’s like someone set down a bunch of houses onto a prairie.

quote:

Originally posted by AdagioM:
That boring house is perfectly good on the inside, but there is nary a tree anywhere near it! And the fenceless backyard that runs into all the other backyards gives me the willies. It’s like someone set down a bunch of houses onto a prairie.

I agree with everything you say. I did see that one of the houses in the development has a fence so there is that. We have dogs. We will always have dogs. I am not going to take the dogs on a leash for a walk twice a day, every day, for the rest of my life. I am a dog door guy and if you have a dog door, you need to have a fence.

It’s really a nice house. It offers us the opportunity to travel winter and summer without much fuss. I suppose I could plant a tree or something to make it a little more inviting. It’s a lot cheaper than what we have been looking at, and probably should not be looking at houses as expensive as the ones we are looking at now. Who knows what sort of expenses we will face when we retire.

OTOH we don’t want to hole up and die. Hence the Unimog.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wik...(1997%2C_122_PS).JPG

Yes it’s overkill. But does the local search and rescue team need a volunteer?

Oh wow, I got mental whiplash going from the house in the woods to the suburban treeless abode...

But, the treeless abode is very nice on the inside, and you could probably actually age in that house, whereas I feel like the house in the woods (as much as I live it) is not somewhere you could really grow old in. ...

Also what Jodi said about having neighbors who can see if anything’s wrong etc.

(We are a corner lot too btw)

What’s a Unimog?

The UniMog is the ultimate all-terrain vehicle. There’s almost nothing that can stop it, including the 15 feet of snow that is entirely possible in that part of Ohio. When the snow plow gets stuck, they’ll call the guy with the Unimog to get him out. You don’t need to plow the driveway because it doesn’t matter. They are made by Mercedes-Benz, they are very expensive, but there is nothing is as capable in difficult situations as a Unimog.

Realistically, there is nothing likely to happen in that neighborhood they cannot be handled by the average Subaru. On the other hand, why take a chance?

In the summer I could use it to haul my trailer to explore various places along the Great Lakes write a top 10 blog about my experiences. How cool is that?

quote:

Originally posted by ShiroKuro:

But, the treeless abode is very nice on the inside, and you could probably actually age in that house,

A nice place to crawl in and die.

[edit]. The real estate equivalent of puréed food.

quote:

Originally posted by jodi:
AND, corner lots are great. Especially when you live in a neighborhood with small yards. You don’t see your neighbors out so many windows. And you feel like you have much more space. (We are on a corner lot)

But don’t you have to remove all the extra snow on the sidewalks on the side of the house?

quote:

A nice place to crawl in and die.

Your enthusiasm for that house is overwhelming!

Boring house gets the nope from me. That's exactly the kind of place we tried to talk ourselves into buying - all the kids friends lived in developments like that, they could go outside and instantly find 10 other kids to play with, we could have happy hour on the deck with the other parents. But ultimately, we couldn't do it - no trees, no land, everybody looking right into your windows and you looking into everybody else's. (((Shivers))) Plus when there's that "bad influence" kid that you'd rather your kids avoid? Or that annoying neighbor you just don't feel like talking to while you hang out in your yard? Pretty much impossible in a development like that.

Snowbound for days is definitely an exaggeration. Since moving to the Philly area in 1994, I can count exactly once where things were shut down for more than a day for snow - we got 36" in the course of a few hours and there was a state of emergency that lasted maybe 3 days. In 1996. Hasn't happened since. Probably won't ever happen again given the current state of the climate. That was probably the last time I saw people seriously driving snowmobiles around too - they aren't popular here because we generally don't get enough snow and when we do it doesn't stick around long enough to make it worth owning one.

YMMV of course! And the beige box certainly is practical, if nothing else. :-)

quote:

Originally posted by Steve Miller:

quote:

Originally posted by AdagioM:
That boring house is perfectly good on the inside, but there is nary a tree anywhere near it! And the fenceless backyard that runs into all the other backyards gives me the willies. It’s like someone set down a bunch of houses onto a prairie.

I agree with everything you say. I did see that one of the houses in the development has a fence so there is that. We have dogs. We will always have dogs. I am not going to take the dogs on a leash for a walk twice a day, every day, for the rest of my life. I am a dog door guy and if you have a dog door, you need to have a fence.

It’s really a nice house. It offers us the opportunity to travel winter and summer without much fuss. I suppose I could plant a tree or something to make it a little more inviting. It’s a lot cheaper than what we have been looking at, and probably should not be looking at houses as expensive as the ones we are looking at now. Who knows what sort of expenses we will face when we retire.

OTOH we don’t want to hole up and die. Hence the Unimog.

We’re still on the very slow lookout for the perfect condo, at a price we’re willing to pay. We have our sights set on a building here close to us. Units come up every once in a while; priced a little too steeply but we’re watching. Most recent unit is one made up from 2 units put together. I loved most of it, but it had 2 tiny decks and I want one big one so we can see the kids during pandemic times. We see them in our backyard for now.

We should find an old resort and turn it into a retirement place for piano/music people from the forum. It would be nice to have some land around it for people to hike, run, ride horses, etc. We'll need space for a library and a small hall for recitals.

quote:

Originally posted by Steve Miller:

But don’t you have to remove all the extra snow on the sidewalks on the side of the house?

Depends.

I have 276 frontage. No, I do not shovel out front. Just the driveway area.