Thanks for getting the joke, gardengal. It was a pleasure to demonstrate that I can troll my own response better than anyone else can. Of course Sequoiadendron is much hardier. But the problem is it is also much more suspectible to disease caused by our muggy summer conditions. If you were to blend the Mason-Dixon line with the new USDA zn 6/zn 7 line, you would get an approximation of the east coast boundary between areas where Sequoia (coastal redwood) and Sequoiadendron could be grown on the east coast. Sequoia south of it, obviously, and Sequoiadendron north of it. Even north of the Mason-Dixon line, the several Sequoiadendron at zn 7 Planting Fields arboretum looked pretty bad. OTOH I'm pretty sure I saw one at a garden in Carlisle, PA, zn 6, that looked reasonably well. Nights there are probably a wee bit cooler, and I suspect you could grow them all the way down to Georgia on the highest mountain tops that stay in the 50s at night. Go too far north though, even zn 7 is still going to be too cold for Sequoias. One supposes that the Polly Hill arboretum, for example, has tried them and they aren't on the plant list for a reason. (still meaning to email them about strange tales of a monkey puzzle that dies back in some years yet persists)

Cliff, if you can't find any buys in the city, try Queens. Right outside of Manhattan and you can take the bus, train or taxi. We always stayed in the Pan Am hotel on Queens Blvd. www.panamhotelnewyork.com, after we moved out of Queens to PA. It's always been a nice place, nothing fancy, just clean and convenient. Close to Macy's in Queens and the Queens Center mall, too. Make sure you go to Little Italy for some Ferrara's canolis, have a good piece of NY pizza and don't forget the belly bombers - White Castle hamburgers! Bring me back a sack of burgers! You have to see a Broadway show. There's a Tickets booth in the center of Times Square where you can go to get last minute tickets left for the shows at discount prices. Just walking around the city is great. Don't forget Rockefeller Center, the Empire State Bldg. and the site of the WTC. Actually, the website for the hotel has a tour offer that seems to include all the sites in case you don't want to go it on your own, but sometimes the best part is just walking around the city and people watching! Oh and go to a Yankee game, not the Mets!lol Julie

I have, much to my complete embarrassment, watched OC and NY. I think I like NY much better - OC has become a train wreck and I have to wonder if a lot of "acting" is now being done. I mean, who could be that completely AWFUL. Or, in Vicki's case, completely loud, crude and desperate for the worst kind attention? In Tamara's case, so completely cruel and really - she is not "the hot one" - the fact that she demands to be makes her a cruel and a rather pathetic aging woman who doesn't know when her arc of youth is well behind her. And, OMG, the kids of these people. I know some people from that area and everyone there doesn't spring from the orange tree as that grasping group of women, I promise you *LOL* NY women seem to be much more 'real' even if they, too, are a bunch of oddballs. But - who would watch if they didn't put on a show for the viewers? And, these women are willing to be on TV for the world to see, so they aren't going to be normal or average. Which, of course, is why we all watch. At least most of the "chest apparel" seems to be "nature provided" on this one - except for maybe Bethanny's - her clevage does seem to be a little false, but she is a really gorgeous girl who might be sporting a hard working push up bra - but if it's false, she did it right. Not too much for her frame. The "soul mate" couple, Alex and Simon .... are they for real? They make me feel icky after I've seen them in an episode. And yes, please spare the speedo, please. Double ick. Alex needs some color in her hair or face, it's all one color to me. This is not an attractive couple in any sense of the word. Jill seems to be the most "real" of the bunch to me, Bethanny the kindest. The Countess needs to get a life. A real one. I agree with Fran - how is the financial train wreck we are in as a nation going to play with these two shows? The excess of both shows will have to be addressed, the days of conspicious consumption are now behind us, eventually nobody will want to see that stuff, even on tv. How they cope will make it even better television, I believe.

Skip atlantic city---even if you were to find those homes still standing, they would likely NOT be considered 'pretties' today--the city is a cesspool, and the homes that are left are in very, very sad repair. The marina section has been bad for many, many years--once you leave the casinos and head into the residential sections--DO NOT put yourself at that kind of risk. You don't want to go there. I just happened to drive past my Great uncle's home about a year ago (more to the south of the city, in Chelsea), and it was stomach turning to see what's happened to a formerly exclusive and expensive neighborhood, but even that isn't as bad as the inlet area. However, if you like that style of home? There are hundreds--no, more like thousands--of them all over South Jersey. As a matter of fact, I live in one like that in upper Camden County--on my block there are probably 20 of that style home. Of course, they do look different now than they did in the 20's when they were built. Mine and the house next door have had their porches enclosed. Someone years ago covered the stucco exterior on mine with brick. Most have aluminum siding. One has had a bathroom installed on the front porch. They've all been modernized in one way or another. Homes that old? Either they have NOT been worked on and are decrepit, or they've been modernized to the point of not looking a thing like that picture. Sorry, but I don't think you're ever going to be able to find 4 homes, like that, in a row, in original condition, in GOOD condition anywhere.