[NCN]

Originally Posted by looking4home

I didn't realize they had shale deposits in NC. What spill are you talking about? you have to realize that these problems exists everywhere. So Vermont doesn't allow fracking but it does allow gigantic wind turbines which can ruin a ecosystem just as good. And despite the publicity around their phony no-fracking ban (Vermont doesn't have any appreciable shale deposits) they were cutting deals with Canadian gas companies to run gas pipes under private property despite owner opposition.

I don't know how old you are, but if you're over 30 you are old enough to know there is no real "escape" in life. there is always some other problem just as bad, or even worse, that awaits you wherever you go.

The spill is horrible but we have had those before when Democrats were in office. Our governor used to work for the company that had the spill or spills?? So the media and others are trying to make political hay out of it but the group who is supposed to deal with this is the utilities commission and I am glad they are finally doing it. Nobody here likes the spill and it is certainly not acceptable. It will be fixed. Coal ash is the problem. Get the picture?

I have no problem with anyone moving anywhere they want to and Vermont was beautiful but no more beautiful than North Carolina. The people of that state have an unrealistic view of their state as compared to North Carolina. I have a friend who is from there and she was telling me how much higher their mountains were. I just chuckled and pointed out that North Carolina has Mt. Mitchell which is the highest point in Eastern America. They do have more covered bridges though.

We had not eaten at McDonald's for ages and found it about the only reasonable place to eat there. I am really not into seafood. We kept laughing about the fact that we were looking for a place to eat that we would never eat at in N. C. because we haven't spent a lot of time at McDonald's since our children were grown. When we go to a timeshare we usually take soup and cereal. We usually bring the soup back home. None was left from our Vermont trip. So we didn't go hungry but we didn't eat out unless we were too far from our condo to get back for the meal. We had pizza the day we traveled to N. H. and Maine.

[Mouldy Old Schmo]

Will "the Jailer Man and Sailor Sam search forevermore" for the Southerner on the Run?

[Cackalassie]

Well, we obviously have different political perspectives. The spill has many facets, something that has likely been hashed out already on the NC forum. I love NC, I love the mountains. True no place is perfect and there is no magical place that offers an escape to utopia, but NC is rife with hogtying. We have friends who are Vermonters, so I'm fairly versed in VT issues. While not perfect, VT comes closest to the mountain childhood I had, and want my children to have.
Truthfully, I cannot fathom going to VT and shopping. We are outside taking in all the active beauty. The Blue Ridge, to me, are beautiful at a distance and in some coves and hollers, but development is a blight when there are too few regulations and too much money passing through political channels. Also the food was no more or less expensive than we eat out back home, and was fabulous. Every time we go up there I am astounded by the beauty and the access to nature.

[arctichomesteader]

Apparently, Brandon's selectboard has taken out a line of credit to keep their government running. The budget won't pass because taxpayers are at the breaking point, and they won't cut it enough for it to pass. Now people are slashing a selectman's tires and ripping signs down there: Brandon takes out $1.5 million line of credit after latest budget failure *:*Rutland Herald Online

As the taxes get worse things are going to get more "interesting" I'm sure.

[arctichomesteader]

I can appreciate wanting to get away from the development you're talking about, and pro-business gone too far with the mining and stuff down south, and I think the nature in VT is the best thing going for the state.

The problem is this state has been taken over by people who are making it increasingly difficult or impossible for the average person to live here. They think they can spend and spend and spend and tax and tax forever for any mount. Our real estate market is being driven by the economy in the big cities like Boston or NYC instead of our local poor economy.

[Cackalassie]

Plus we really like to ski!

Do folks feel like they can make a change in the govt's tax/spend mentality? Or is it a feeling of hopelessness? I do see the have and the have not up there. I've come from one, and am living the other. Vermont is unique - I suppose most states feel they can say that, I think otherwise - and I do hope that folks in VT politics understand that what makes VT so unique is the very thing that can make it money.

[happeemommee]

Lassie - I think when most people think of NC, they think of the piedmont or beaches and don't realize how cold it gets in the higher elevations or the COL here. And when I talk about the COL it's extremely high for what we get in return.

As for the spill, McCrory worked for Duke and still has ties to them. Because of this he wants tax payers to pay for their negligence. He has done a lot of questionable things. But as Lassie said, we clearly have differing political views.

Again, nowhere is perfect. I'm not expecting for Vermont to be the promised land, but it's definitely better than NC.

[Fire and Ice]

Originally Posted by Cackalassie

Vittle can be a multitude of things, mostly food, though my granny used it to refer to her husband's "unmentionables," as she also called it, for which I'm grateful never made it to her crying pan.
What? Y'all are so stoic that you don't flirt with babies? I don't believe it for a minute. And old men down here are the biggest flirts we've got. I suspect our notion of flirting is just a difference in semantics. I'm not talking about teenagers coming on to each other kind of flirting, but I'm beginning to get the idea how a southerner's way of communicating is misinterpreted by other cultures.

You are correct here because I had no idea what you were talking about lol.

Originally Posted by Cackalassie

Well, play, of course, but more like when you see a baby passing you in a cart at the store or sitting in a carriage on the street, and you'd play peep-pie or something to interact with them to get them to smile - just open their world a bit bigger.

Ooohh, ok, I was thinking that is what you meant.

Originally Posted by FrugalYankee

I just had a baby flirt with me at the checkout just now and I am about as Yankee as you can get.

Just be yourself hun. (But don't wear a Yankees t-shirt )

You had a baby flirt with you? That baby better watch it, you being too old and all, otherwise the baby can be placed under arrest for indecency with an adult! It's time to hold babies accountable for their cuteness!

[Cackalassie]

Yep, agreed. I live in the second highest county for taxes, and in a town where residents pays on average 30% more in property taxes than anyone else in the state. Also have the highest water and sales taxes in the state. So it is relative. I suppose if I were still holed up in Madison county (where I'm from) it'd be a different matter.

It does get cold up in the mountains! I like it. But I think the closest thing NC has to VT, as I see it, is Ocracoke. Granted, it's an island out in the ocean, but the feeling and the Ocracokers always remind me of VT and dyed in the wool VTers, just with sand and a lot of phenomenal seafood.

[jackmccullough]

Originally Posted by Cackalassie

Plus we really like to ski!

Do folks feel like they can make a change in the govt's tax/spend mentality? Or is it a feeling of hopelessness? I do see the have and the have not up there. I've come from one, and am living the other. Vermont is unique - I suppose most states feel they can say that, I think otherwise - and I do hope that folks in VT politics understand that what makes VT so unique is the very thing that can make it money.

Don't necessarily take the opinions of the extreme conservatives as reflective of reality. They do tend to claim that the economy has gone to he'll and the extreme left is running roughshod, but that view is, at a minimum, open to serious challenge.