You've described exactly what we did after the storm, except we went with the more simple option. The hookup is on the outside of the house and there is a four switch panel in the basement that controls that.

However, we've not gotten it so sophisticated, since our generator is in 80-90 year old garage. The generator we got still needs to be plugged into the outside of the house, but that's better than snaking an orange extension cable through the house.

We managed to get a generator, somehow. I do not remember how my father did it. It was only enough to power the fridge, freezer, and the pellet stove.

Luckily, we have a gas stove, so we could still use that without the electric starter.

I will never forget that sound of trees breaking, it is a truly scary sound.

Have you ever experience a proper winter before? I am not sure what the weather is like where you've lived, but for some the winter can be tough. Normally, it's cold and snowy, but that hasn't been totally true in the past few years.

The shortest day of the year ends at 4:30ish. Normally wintery weather can be expected between November and March. There are freak events, like the once in a lifetime ice storm, or 2021's snow in May with 90 degree weather next week. Springs are nice, falls are nice, summers can get hot, but they might be mild to you!

If you rent, you might get away with not needing to shovel, but you will need to deal with snow and ice existing!

Luckily used car prices have been dropping. This is not 2021 or 2022's environment anymore. There is no real easy way to slice it either. You basically need a car to engage with normal life in Worcester and Central Massachusetts. You might be able to get away without it in specific parts of the city, but you will be stranded anywhere else, since the WRTA (bus system) is, uh, lacking.

Oh, then you actually could find on older one for cheap, because people don't know how to drive them! Between the snow tires and the stick shift, my Corolla was like q tank in the snow.

I used to drive in snowstorms with that car.

The other advice I'd give you is to drive a stick shift, but that's no longer universal knowledge!

What I did with my Corolla is that I had a separate set of rims with the winter tires mounted on them. I would take the car to the shop and have them swap the rims out from November to March. It was cheaper than mounting and dismounting tires.

I would rather have any of my kids obsessively watching the weather news hoping that school will be cancelled, and then feel the same sense of joy that I did as I once did. Then I can let the dog play in the snow with the kids.

I can dream, can't I?

You know, sometimes I actually think locals are not the best people to ask about this kind of stuff. Locals are usually just living their lives and often pay no mind to the stuff around them, or if they are, they don't think it's too special.

With that being said, I agree with you about the drive. My rule of thumb has always been that I need to stay at a place at least the amount of time the round trip takes.

From the way the article is written, it doesn't sound like they want to make it a requirement for children to learn on a snowday, but instead creating something to allow them to do stuff at home to learn.

That's the impression I got from this.

However, that being said. Snowdays are perhaps one of the best things that we have as a part of our local culture. Growing up in New England, snow days were one of those things that one looks back upon fondly as an adult.

I really like that, I would have put my cat and dog in there three years ago. I am looking forward to the day that I make my marriage announcement there, now I just need to find my future spouse!

I was going to say that it looks like dirt, but I thought it would be too mean. It turns out that would be a compliment instead!

You don't have any nice friends or family to bother with that! I would do that! If not, I would take Knight's, since I actually worked for them briefly.

Okay, I found some more:

"According to RecyclingWorks Massachusetts, for a mattress to be recycled, it must be made of metal, textiles, wood, and/or foam, and must be dry and free of mold. Bedding items exempt from the new waste ban typically aren’t accepted by mattress recyclers."

I will try to dig deeper, but it refers to the items needing to be clean and dry.

https://www.mass.gov/guides/textile-recovery

Can't you throw it away if it's been contaminated with bodily fluids? Or is that only for clothing?

Sounds legit.

I played D&D while I was still in Worcester. I ran a weekly game that paused for 5 months in the winter, and I played as a player in weekly game. Both were on Sundays! We used to play in garages for both games, one was unfinished, and the other was. You probably can't figure out which game was which.

Regardless, I've enjoyed my time with 5e, but by the time I come back to Worcester, I will not run it again, and I'd be hesitant to play in it again too. When I come back, I will run a d100 Noire campaign set in a fiction 1929 American city: Westville Falls.

After that I want to go back to fantasy, but explore other game systems.

Yikes, if the WRTA is considered not too shabby by your terms, then where you came from basically had nonexistent transit.

Definitely, but I will be honest, I have had the same car since 2012, so I have no experience.

Consistently bad. They are usually timely enough, it's just that the routes that they run are very sparse and weekend service is rather limited. I highly recommend getting a car, if you can afford it, even a $2000 clunker.

No one's really answered your public transit question. If you are expecting something robust in that department, you will be disappointed. There is the train station with Union Station, but that's the only stop in Worcester, the bus system leaves a lot of room to improve, that's the nice way of putting it. Without a car in Worcester, you will find doing a lot of basic things rather challenging.

Are you telling me that you don't count the lakefront beaches at Indian Lake?!