Facts about farmhouses

For a time it seemed to me that one of the things that made the northeastern countryside more picturesque than the southern one was that there was more money up here, which made for the easier preservation of the old wooden houses along the roadside. So there were more nice old houses, as opposed to the south where they had gone to seed and/or been replaced by mobile homes.

Broader experience driving around upstate New York makes me realize that this impression was based on a small sample size. Certainly the two lane roads leading from I-88 to Ithaca were dominated by the same single- and double-wides that dot the roadsides of the south.

Or maybe it's that things have changed a lot in the last couple of decades. I remember some of this, but maybe not quite this bad, from when we used to go to Canandaigua from Princeton in the oughts. That's maybe 150 miles west of where we are, so by many measures more geographically and economically isolated. So it should be poorer over there. Maybe the trailers are a more recent thing. Certainly, I get it. Particularly if you can spring for a double wide. That can be pretty good living.