Supermeow!

In 2005, my husband and I got really fed up with hauling our laundry around town. real tired. We had pretty much outgrown our apartment in Somerville before we moved in, but so in love were we with the neighborhood, the price, and the place itself that we made do. We had a nice yard, a porch, an eat-in kitchen with lots of cabinets, and a short walk to Davis Square. Down the street, we had lots of good places to eat and buy food from, like the Belgian Truffle House and the Urban Gourmet, not to mention Kelly’s Diner (and fuck Soundbites, by the way). We had a permit for parking our lovely 2004 Prius and a short commute to work. We sucked up the lack of storage space because we liked the area, but we’d just about reached our limit. The year before, my grandpa decided to dole out inheritance money early, so I sacked a bunch away for a house downpayment. The night that we really, really, really got sick of doing laundry, we took a laptop down with us to the laundromat and perused the housing ads. We saw an ad for loft condos in Brockton. Brockton? Where? I sort of knew where it was, kind of. There was an open house that weekend, so down we drove to Brockton, noting that the commute on I-93 didn’t seem that bad.

Anyhow, the place we were looking at was recently renamed the Lofts at SoCo from the original name of the Etonic Lofts. The building had once been the home to the Etonic shoe company and a place of manufacturing. Anyhow, some developers bought it, rehabbed it, and turned it into luxury condos for the affordable price of “starting at $199,000.”

We were in instant love. We agreed that it was exactly the kind of place we envisioned ourselves living in as upwardly-mobile adults, and decided to show it to my parents. They  also thought it was pretty cool, but they (and all of our friends universally) wondered about the commute. Ah, it’s nothing. Look, commuter rail station across the street!

So, we put in an offer for unit 309 and the offer was accepted. We’d also been pre-approved for the mortgage. I forked over a 10% downpayment on the house. Maybe we’d move in that June!

I mean, that July!

That August!

Sorry, that September (at which point we put most of our stuff into storage and occupied a spare room at our friend Neil’s house), er, October! November? Okay, November! On Halloween, we closed on the house, and we moved in at the start of November.

I was born in Boston and have lived in Boston for my whole life, save when I lived in Somerville, and Christian (my husband, then my steady boyfriend) is from Carmel, New York. We both agreed that the south shore felt like another state.

For one thing, everyone has a crazy accent on A sounds. For another, Marylou’s Coffee.

Anyhow, I thought that I hated living here at first, but I’ve found some things about this area that I like a lot…

• The post office is next door to us.
• We can drive to two different turkey-vending locations: Asack’s Turkey Farm and Bongi’s Turkey Roost.
• There’s another farm stand within driving distance that sells the most wonderful bacon on the planet.
• We live two exits away from Ikea.
• Montreal French Fries: Obviously, this is a restaurant that I haven’t gone to since starting my diet. It’s run by a wacky guy named Gino. The food is, would you believe it, poutine-centric. If you don’t know what poutine are, do yourself a favor and run that term through Google. His poutine are out of this world. His burgers have made me re-evaluate what a tasty burger is supposed to be like. He will try to force-feed you with free french fries! Oh, the alliteration!
• We’ve made use of the communal media room several times for parties and meetings.
• Cape Cod Cafe, Brockton location: Wonderful, oily bar pies with a charred crust that’s sweet, rather than bitter. I don’t know who their pepperoni source is, but it’s a good one. They have Woodchuck cider on tap. They also make a tasty plate of nachos. When they put more than three toppings on your pie, beware! They get heavy. They’re so tasty, though.
• Korean King Barbecue Restaurant: When you don’t want to make the drive up to Koreana in Cambridge, go here. Prices are comparable, food is wonderful. They make use of charcoal grills unlike Koreana’s gas grill. Wasn’t nuts about their spicy pork, was quite pleased with the bulgogi and kalbi. Good panchan!
• Cheng-Du, Stoughton: Tasty food! They make some great crispy peppery chicken wings, in my opinion the star attraction of going here for dining in or takeout. I don’t think I’ve had anything from here that was bad, actually.
• Pho So 1, Randolph: Yay! Vietnamese food within 15 minutes of our home! Wonderful chicken noodle pho. Wonderful food. It’s in a crummy location, but it really delivers on yum. Cheap, too!
• Fuller Craft Museum: It’s not a restaurant! It’s a very nice museum about 5-10 minutes from our house in a gorgeous natural setting, overlooking a pond full of geese. It’s a great place to go spend some time. They always have something neat to see. Did I mention the gorgeous location?

Anyhow, that’s the stuff that comes to mind immediately. Want to come move here?