Moving to Canada -- or to any other country with a solid emigration policy, which covers every one where English is widely spoken, including South Africa -- requires having a job waiting for you when you arrive, and an employer ready to verify the fact to the authorities. I tried it the other way, and ran smack into the universal "hire the citizens first" policy.

Pulling up stakes for another part of this country pretty much requires the same thing, unless you have such a good friend that he/she will let you run a tab until you find suitable work -- in this economy??? -- or have saved enough money in advance to cover the expenses.

But it only works if: [1] the career you've spent your adult life establishing is worth abandoning; [2] you have no children who've spent their entire lives in the same neighborhood and schools, and who are not yet adults; [3] you have no spouse who's spent his/her adult life building a career parallel to yours, and whose health benefits cover you as well; [4] you don't own a house.

In other words, Tom, you're shouting down an empty well again, confusing the Pioneer Spirit for the real-life possibilities.

And, if Mary Anne will forgive me for interpreting what she's been saying in the last day or two...

To many of us, myself included, there is no place left in this nation that is not "Matherville". The results of the election -- not only the presidency, but the 11 state constitutional amendments passed against gay marriage, and the widely-reported fact that those for whom "moral issues" were most important overwhelmingly voted Republican -- are indelible proof.