On cold winter days do you think about the Florida Keys and Key West?

@Stereoguy I know it is, scorpions, copperheads, rattlesnakes, tornadoes, violent wind storms, and other such things are bad enough. We don’t need any stinkin’ gators here. Fortunately they are not a protected species since they are invasive.

@Stereoguy oh and biting red ants, each bite feels like a bee sting. The record-breaking drought wiped out a lot of colonies of those but they are probably coming back. Haven’t seen any in the city though.

@cherokeepatti The game warden that works the county our farm is in tells us stories about bear sightings, Moose sightings, and yes gator sightings along the creeks feeding into the local river. I wish he would get that excited about all the dang mountain lions!

@Stereoguy I am more likely to think about Kauai when I am fed up with winter, fantasizing about winning a Powerball and buying property there and building an off-grid home. Could grow veggies, fruits & herbs year round, raise some chickens for eggs and shore fish for fresh fish. Could be outdoors year round.

@cherokeepatti Oklahoma is in your blood. You would miss it.

@TexChik I didn’t think they have moose in Texas. I know they have elk. What surprised me was hearing a story on local TV station about how there are elk in every county in Oklahoma. I have never seen one and have seen deer quite a few times driving out in the country. We had a stray bear wander up into Norman a couple years ago, he was migrating and found his way into someone’s back yard and went straight up a tall tree. The game rangers, police etc. worked for hours trying to get him to come down and shot him with tranquilizers that didn’t seem to affect him. They ended up shooting him after he fell out of the tree because they thought he was a threat to humans and he was near I-35 and figured he would go across it and cause wrecks.

@TexChik I would prefer southern Missouri to be around clear water creeks and rivers though. I never have liked these red muddy rivers. Even our lake is muddy if the wind starts blowing pretty strong.

@cherokeepatti Yep the red dirt curse. Our farm is sitting on a patch of black dirt sitting in the middle of a sea of red. My husband is a geologist and cant quickly explain why its like that. Its a thing. The moose was wandering down the Red River and made its way to us. They had tranquilized it and put a radio collar on it. Others they have caught they moved back to Colorado where they determined it came from. Moose are rare in Colorado which is why they were so excited to find them in Texas. Bears are coming back to Texas from Oklahoma. The county north of me borders the Red River and they have had multiple sightings recently.

@TexChik I was born in northwestern Missouri. The area has black dirt that makes it so much easier to grow veggies & fruits. We grew onions the size of saucers easily. Here I would have to work and work the soil to get them to grow half that size.

@cherokeepatti I love country like that. Hills, valleys, creeks, hardwoods. Our garden grows amazing veggies.

@TexChik I’d love to have a few acres of a hobby farm with that type of soil and small creek running through it. I saw one for sale on Zillow this past year, believe it was being sold by Amish. A wood cooking stove in the kitchen and a wood stove fireplace in the living room, hard floors throughout and a huge kitchen with two sinks and plenty of storage. A building for horses or other livestock out back and it wasn’t that expensive. Could live off-grid with solar panels etc.

@cherokeepatti Sounds amazing.

@TexChik I would love that lifestyle for sure. Especially to be so close to an Amish community and Amish stores.

@cherokeepatti they probably wanted to avoid Panic from people about the Alligators

@Stereoguy maybe in a fast golf cart