We have some friends who just built a second home in the mountaintops of West Virginia and they invited us out last weekend to see the finished house. The weather was sublime and enough to sell me on the state entirely, though I know the winters are pretty unforgiving up there on that mountaintop.

Here's the view I had from the hammock I was sleeping in:


Maybe I should amend that to the hammock I was trying to sleep in, at least until eight bony elbows and knees decided they needed to share my peacefullness with me.

Right now they just use this place as a weekend getaway, but it's their plan that when they retire, they'll sell their property here and move there permanently. Taxes are cheaper, the cost of living is cheaper, traffic is almost non-existent, there's a nice community of people (though you wouldn't know it because they have several acres you can't even see the neighbors' lights from their house at night), it's quiet and gorgeous. It's so beautiful out there and all I could think was how smart they are to have made this investment now in their lives and how I'm going to have to be approximately one hundred and thirty-three before I can even consider retiring. Let's just say I had to work a little to hide my envy.

The girls had other concerns, which revolved mainly around the tree swing they had on their property,


and collecting enough acorns to last the winter.