Living in the country vs the city, as an independent product developer...

[Dien Rice]

Ha, Gordon, love it!

Let me tell you a quick story...

Long ago, my girlfriend (who is now my wife) came out to visit me where I was staying in suburbia... This was over two decades ago...

She was an inner city girl. So she drove out to my family's suburban house...

(I was actually living and working in the city of Sydney at the time, but visited Melbourne - where my family lived, and where my girlfriend lived - every month or so...)

Now, as I've mentioned before, behind this house is a creek. Back then, on the other side of the creek, were cows! (The cows are long gone now...)

But that gives you an idea... It's still suburbia, but there were patches of "ruralness" around...

As she drove out to the suburbs, she started noticing some trees... Then even more trees...

She started to panic!

"Have I left the city?" she thought to herself!

She eventually found the house (this was in the days before smartphones and everyone carrying around a GPS)...

But not before a "scare" that she had left the city, and was heading for the countryside!

She wasn't used to so many trees!

I still get a kick from that story... and I still tease her about it every now and then...

She teases me right back, and says how she used to be able to hear the cows mooing whenever we spoke on the phone...!

Best wishes!

Dien

Originally Posted by GordonJ

The country is clean living,
the air is fresh to breathe
the sky is clear and blue,
I never want to leave.

But my love of country living
slowly started to die, when
I noticed all the pests around
and no longer could abide.

Started with those adorable deer,
the ones out my back door,
until their ticks brought lyme disease,
and shook me to my core.

Then I startled an evening skunk
and it sprayed me head to toes,
I burned my clothes took long showers
but it still burned up my nose.

It was then that I really noticed,
all that Nature that surrounded me,
Possums, raccoons, groundhogs,
wasps, hornets and a bothersome bee.

Owls and hawks, and other birds
just waiting to swoop down
Ducks and geese dropping gifts
Wild scat upon the ground.

Feral cats, packs of dogs, even coyotes
Once that I took notice,
the quiet went away
and I began to focus on
the noise that comes with hay.

Yakking, quacking, screeching
sounds, never noticed before
buzzing, flapping, howling
flooded through my door.

And of course, the spiders and snakes
and swarms of gnats
the bugs, the mice, the squirrles, the fire ants
let alone the attic bats.

As I noticed all the pests, the noise, the danger
that was always lurking near,
I thought that maybe city life
might be very near.

Out in the country, where Nature thrives,
where we want to live good lives,
we must face the many things,
that Mother Earth always brings.

City life is much simpler, see,
they have pests but only three...
Of course the cockroaches and rats,
but the biggest pest of city life...

is your neighbor, left and right.

So, sting me, spray me, bite me too
do the thing that Natures do
Better that than a bougie bro,
in Starbucks line
with TikTok playing
with speaker on

Wait, what the hell am I doing in a Starbucks?

Where is Pepe Le Pew when you need him?

Gordon