and the ramifications there of.  I try very, very hard to not let politics creep on to this blog; its audience is presumably not looking for my opinions on that subject.  I think I can comfortably leave it at the statement of ‘if Esperanza wasn’t in Connecticut, I would Never, Never live here’.

However, I have mentioned once or twice the importance of quality workmen; indeed of craftsmen who truly know their trade and can be trusted without a doubt.  For about twenty-three years we have had a carpenter of that variety.  A consummate craftsman able to build both a house and a fine china cabinet.  He has also annually hunted for deer on the property, helping to keep the population effectively checked, which is of major importance for success in gardening around here.  His work is always good, his prices always fair, and I can trust him with the keys to the house.  The men who have worked for him over the years have been the same way.

It was with some dismay that I learned that he is moving to one of the Carolinas; and not the urban area, though as a person skilled in luxury home building, he could do well there. 

Why? Well, Much lower property taxes, no state income tax, better schools, less nit-picky regulation, people actually building houses, and above all a culture less routinely insulting to his way of life: father, Baptist, gun-owner, hunter, libertarian, as willing to debate the humanities as hunting.

I wish him well.  I hope we can find someone of his caliber left in the state…he isn’t the only one to have left recently.