HELLO! everybody THanks so much for all that input. I am still digesting it all! I have been taking notes from your suggestions; meanwhile taking loads of garage/ household/yard junk to the landfill sprucing up our place; we're in the midst of remodeling while we watch the real estate market slowing down here...sigh. I realize you can not have perfection anywhere on this earth; I just know the few things we really seek should we move. (Also my husband wants to retire sometime but if we stay here he'll be working till he's 90!) LOL. He's convinced we could live cheaper somewhere in the southeast, I could have my dream house with a lap swimming pool and my daughter could get a better education and not be so isolated from friends. There are pluses to living here-being at our unique microclimate higher elevation on the slopes of a mountain, we have nice cold/cool nights in winter, no cockroaches or other creepy crawlies like the lower elevations. We live up where the Maui onions and protea grow and I will miss this but NOT the weeds which are a monstrous problem. People tend to assume Hawaii is Paradise and why the heck would we leave-having lived here on and off since the '70's it has it's good and bad points. THE BEST things are--relatively LOW property taxes and no snakes,trade winds most of the time, 80's most of the year though summer can be hell. We have NO bears (that horrid recent bear attack in TENN has got me a bit scared about moving to the mountain areas there now!)Matter of fact, we have no really dangerous critters which is something I don't take lightly. Cockroaches are jokingly referred to as the Hawaii state bird, however (yuck!) and there are scorpions, cane spiders and centipedes at lower elevations near pineapple and cane fields, i.e. where most people live here. We do have black widow spiders up here, just killed one at my daughter's school cafeteria the other day! I never had a fear of flesh eating bacteria until recently as more cases seem to occur--it's a fact of life in tropical climates where bacteria thrives. I also used to surf for many years, but there has been a definite increase in shark attacks so I am sticking to the local YMCA pool these days as most of my favorite surfing spots are also inhabited by sea turtles which is a shark's delight! We do get hurricanes here, and historically there have been some nasty tsunamis but not too frequent. No snow; but rain for weeks in winter that can be a bit too much. Many of our friends are selling their homes here mainly to get away from obscenely high gas prices-now approx $3.50 gallon; high medical/dental expenses and really not the best in medical care either; food and other products also very high priced--also cars,homes-- you name it, we pay through the nose for it here. PLus really poor public schools. This is a tourism based economy. Lots of rich mainland folks buying real estate here for vacation and rental homes and snowbirds buying vacation homes has made the market formidable for regular folks.) So when you live in paradise you tend to be too busy to get to the beach and play tourist! Anyway I have to book our trip to scope out all those areas and will give you an update in the future!

Eric oh: Supplements? Ur kidding? He is very opposed to taking supplements! Why don't u actually research the man before you... He tells you to grow your fruits, vegetables, and herbs! He is not concerned with money at all.... He does sell herbal tinctures of very high quality, $24 last 3 weeks... But he tells you to make your own. In his book he even tells you how to make them. Furthermore, you don't even need the herbs the fruit is enough to clean your lymph system for proper detoxification... He deals with patents with MS and spinal cord injuries who does not have the opportunity to live freely... You don't know our government, huh? They TRIED to sue/ lock up this man because they aren't making any money! He is curing people for next to nothing conpared to the thousands of dollars for chemo and radiation, which doesn't cure nothing, it kills!! The government wants us dumbed down, population control, world bank, etc.. Come on, wake up and stop running from the truth. Joe

My grandma taught my Mom who repeated it to me, "If you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all!" and... "If you look hard enough, you can find some good in every one." My Grandma (her pet name for me was "Obbie"...for some reason, I didn't pronouce "Grandma" and "Awe-bee" was the name she answered to when I was a small child. Even her neighbors & lots of friends called her "Obbie" throughout the years of my growing up. She was a "hired girl" on farms when she was a teenager...she was married and divorced at a young age...she was widowed after another marriage to my grandpa of 26 yrs...she worked in a bakery, she operated a cafe, she ironed clothes in her home for other families...she was always a HARD worker!...she passed that on to her 3 daughters & family. Here are some of my precious memories of my Grandma, Obbie that I wrote back in 1984 for a genealogy book my Mom created: In the back yard, Obbie had lots of flower gardens. I once found the cactus garden with my bare feet when I jumped a fence playing (where I shouldn't have been)! There were also lots of sour grapes, good ripe strawbeeries and lots of green apples. We were never without homegrown food at Obbie's. And, oh, that homemade jar of strawberry jam. Of course, inside the house, there were always homemade chocolate chip cookies. And on Sundays, the smell of Obbie frying chicken (that my 'grandpa butchered). Anyone was welcome to show up for Sunday dinner! Obbie taught me a few of the things every woman was supposed to know before growing up. The ol' treadle sewing machine put out lots of doll clothes and pin cushions. Crocheting chain stitches (by the miles). Obbie crocheted each grandchild an afghan for graduation. Never being bored at Obbie's, there were always old catalogs for cutting out paper dolls and clothes. (Ok, Gjers, I could go on & on...but I just want you to know that I was very blessed...I was a "crouper" as a child and finally outgrew it at 12 yrs. old...but my Obbie would always come running when I got sick...with "warm 7-up" and hugs. Anyway, I will end this post with a poem I wrote for this genealogy book (she died when my first grandchild was 4 mos. old): "My grandma, Obbie, always had time for her grandchildren. She was never too busy to forget us. I am the lucky one even to have had Obbie for my grandma... If I can be as strong, as you were strong, If I can give, as you have given, If I can be kind, as you always were kind, If I am loved, as you are loved, If I am cherised, as you are cherished, If I am mourned, as you are mourned, Then I can say..my life is truly blessed. Obbie passed on her love for gardening & flowers to me...as my grandpa did also...and my Dad. Here is a pic that I am so fortunate to have of my Grandma holding me in her backyard...I lived in the same household the first 2 yrs. of my life...and her LOVE shaped my life. Ahhh, pretty sentimental stuff...but I enjoyed all of your sharing and wanted to share a bit of this special lady! Thanks, Jeanne S.

A couple of hints: Townsend TN is what Gatlinburg wishes it was. The Cherohala Road to the south of the Park is awesome; the Dragon, just north of the Nantahala is a motorcyclists mecca and is the last thing several of them see on this earth every year. To the west of the Park the Foothills Parkway will probably never be finished. The segment to the southwest that ends near Chilhowee Dam is often underused (like your own private road.) To our south, near Chattannoga is an area in which the copper mining and smelting killed the trees for miles and miles. There's now a museum at Ducktown with the mining history of the area and pictures of 'before' the reforestation effort. (I don't vouch for how the reforest is doing after the drought; there was no humus left in the subsoils.) There's Fort Loudon important in the early part of the Revolutionary war. And a great road to Atlanta that is at the base of the Blue Ridge. Pete, if you come back in spring, please come by and say hello. (And if you've got a TN fishing license, the Holston River is at the base of our hill.)