Paul's Top Twenty Reasons: Why I Like Barre

1) Barre is a small town, hence no traffic lights.

2) Barre is a small town, therefore no drive-by shootings.

3) Barre is not a large town, so you can know a large percentage of the entire population if you really wanted to.

4) Barre is scenic. Not so scenic that you’d think people would come here to “visit.” But just in case, we have visitor center.

5) Barre is not pronounced “bar,” so if you’re talking to someone on the phone and they pronounce Barre as the word bar, you know they’re from the deep south or at least as far west as Missouri.

6) You can have a family of turkeys wander around your yard and start to call them “your” turkeys.

7) Barre has plenty of parking no matter where you go.

8) Barre’s town lines make a nice diamond shape on the map.

9) Barre takes very good care of the roads in winter.

10) Barre is close to the towns of Wheelwright and Orange but not close to Worcester.

11) Barre has hokey things like a farmer’s market and summertime band shell concerts on the common.

12) If asked how to address him, the Chief of Police in Barre will tell you to call him Eric.

13) You can see the stars really well from almost anywhere except perhaps the center of town.

14) It’s really hard to get lost in Barre.

15) Barre is not under water like Enfield, Greenwich, Prescott and Dana are.

16) It only takes 5-6 minutes to get to the town center no matter where you live.

17) You get your mail even if it is addressed to an old residential address from years ago.

18) You can actually see a bear or a cow cross the street in front of you as you drive by.

19) You can safely walk down the street at night keeping item number 17 above in mind.

20) I’ve lived in the town of Barre longer than I lived anywhere else (14 yrs.) so it’s starting to feel like home.

Magic Wishing Well Wish of the Day:

"I wish I had the power to wish"

Visit the Magic Wishing Well

This just in: I was looking for information on the Quabbin Reservoir and I found this picture from a site listing the reasons why small town living is good (it's comparing what you can get for your money in a small town as opposed to a place like NYC)

That house is freakishly similar to my house... Apparently this person knows EXACTLY what kind of house you can get in a small town! Wow!

The Life of a Story in Progress VIII: A year in the life.

It's been a year since we moved from 550 Old Dana Rd. in Barre, MA to our new home on some street in some town, MA. (I'd tell you where it was that I moved, but my daughter will not like that at all)

It's been an extremely busy year. We moved to our new home but first had extensive renovations done. We moved our business office (twice) after having to get a special variance from the town to run a business in a residential area.  We moved all the art to the apartment (Where our business was located) and then moved it all back to the house when we rented the apartment to a new tenant.
We had a massive yard sale and made about $30.00.  We set up an above ground swimming pool and learned to maintain it.

We escaped a big blizzard by having the good sense to be in the Caribbean on a cruise ship. We prepared for a hurricane, but it didn't live up to the expectations that were predicted. .

I had two significant injuries to both hands at different times, requiring stitches first time and although needing them on the second, I refused to have Lidocaine injected into the wound like the previous time. Allen also got involved in the medical drama by dropping a huge glass table top on his big toe. It’s been black and painful for over a month at the very least.

We installed 21 solar panels on the roof and will find out the actual savings we'll realize at the end of the billing period. Can't wait to see what it shows us. We saw The Book of Mormon for my birthday (2012) and also saw the musical Spiderman in November.

We had weatherization projects done in the attic including new flooring and air-sealing at the top of the walls (in the attic) for all rooms on the second floor.

We had new steps, railing, landings and gates built on our pool decking and we had a significant amount of trees cut down to open our vista.

And, of course, I got two new tattoos in May and without ceremony, got laid off from work in July. I’m probably forgetting at least half of what happened in the last year, but enough is enough.

Living in another locale--but still in Very Barre, MA

Last October, we moved into a new house on the other side of Barre. This house has almost 3000 sq. ft. on two levels and a huge master bedroom suite with a cathedral ceiling and loft. And by cathedral, I don't mean it has a Sistine Chapel mural :). The back of the house has a 10 X 40 foot deck. The house has an open first floor plan with a kitchen island (with counter-top stove), a walk-out basement, a two-car garage, a farmer's front porch and is ten years old but looks newer. In fact, there's not much evidence that anyone lived here for the last ten years. The entire house has high quality construction.

This property abuts the Phillipston Wildlife Management Area. We have two somewhat distant neighbors, although they aren't really visible through the trees. Well, not at first. Both neighbors seem to have some aversion to their own privacy and have cut down a lot of trees. But for the most part, we're still pretty secluded.

There is a 600-foot dirt driveway that feels like a road as it winds around curves in between the numerous tall trees. As you can imagine, it is quite a lot of work to clear snow from this driveway in the winter. At the roadside, there's no indication that you've arrived at our driveway. The only clue is our mailbox across the street with a house number on it.

The house came with a pool, and this summer we put in a new filter and pool liner and have the pool up and running. As it turns out, I love having a pool! I do a lot of work outside on the property, planting bushes, trees, perennials and making paths, rock "sculptures" as Allen calls them and lots of other landscaping projects. Whenever I get too warm, I either walk over and stick my head in the pool or jump right in.

We've made a lot of improvements to the house in the past 8-9 months. We removed all the carpeting from the 3 bedrooms and small office upstairs as well the master bedroom on the first floor and installed red oak flooring. All the walls were painted and major electrical projects were done. This summer, a fence will be built around the pool's deck and some rather large looming pine trees will be taken down before they rudely fall on the house.

The biggest project of all is adding solar panels to the roof; they're being installed today! They are expected to produce all our electrical power. How cool is that?

This house is very modern in comparison to the log home we previously owned. It's taken me all of the 8-9 months we've been here to get a handle on a decorating scheme that makes sense. The log home was rural and country-casual. This house isn't "casual" at all. Its style is colonial. I don't know why it's called that, the name colonial sounds like it would be reminiscent of the architecture of colonial times, but that's not the case. At least not to me.

Over the last 14 years, we've moved three times and this is our third house in Barre, MA. I think we like it here in Barre and we will stick around for a while.