Can't figure it out

As I was working on my part of the wedding list, going through the list we made for Carolyn and Brent's wedding in 2001, I had to continually click over to

...hold the phone..."ad infinitum" has been approved! Google searched it while I was working on the last post and I just noticed.

continuing from paragraph 1; come on...keep up with me...

white pages.com to update addresses. All the routes are being changed over to 9-1-1 addresses. I was usually able to come up with a good address, but occasionally, while the road was given, the number was "undisclosed." So, I would then go to the online Wharton county data site for a search, thinking they might have updated addresses. During my search, I realized how much "nobody's business but mine" information there is at that website. So, I started looking at other people's information.

I compared our land value on our homestead to someone else's, who shall be unknown, Chris, and noticed quite a difference in value in our identical size lots. Not the improvements, just the land value. They should be identical. So, I was talking to him today and suggested that he might want to investigate why his is so much higher. I haven't heard anything back from him yet.

Meanwhile, I've been trying to work out in my mind how our 1.375 acres could be valued differently from his adjoining 1.375 acres. Maybe this is what has been observed by the appraiser's office over the 30 or so years we've lived here:

Them: Have an automatic sprinkler system
Us: Have used irrigation pipe to flood the yard 3 or 4 times. Every few years we have also used hoses and sprinklers to water, whether it needs it or not.

Them: Maintain their flower beds year-round
Us: Someone driving past might have seen us set fire to the flower bed (one that isn't next to the house) in lieu of chopping out the weeds. I must say I was against it at first, but it worked pretty well. The key is using the right amount of gasoline...too much and it kind of makes a "WHOMP" and it's all over...too little and it burns too slowly, trees and shrubs don't like that.

Them: Mow and edge regularly
Us: Not so much

Them: Decorate outside for Christmas and then take the decorations in after Christmas
Us: We put up Christmas lights probably the first year we were in the house. We didn't take them down until we needed new siding. They had quit working long before that.

Them: Board up the windows in preparation for a hurricane and then take them down afterward
Us: Well, we did that, too. Of course, the boards on the 2nd floor windows are still up...almost 6 months after the hurricane...but, I don't really mind. It sound proofs and keeps it nice and dark so I can sleep late without any sunlight waking me up.

That's all I can think of off the top of my head...I don't see how that would affect the land value that much.

It did get me laughing out loud while I thought about it, though. Really, I can still see that flower bed burning.