Small Town Details (Part I)

After dinner this evening, around 7:30pm, I badly wanted to take a nap. LIES! I badly just wanted to go to bed! However, it was a little too early for me and I had just had a big dinner...

So instead, I opted to do something different. And peaceful. Something that makes me happy. I went for a walk down Main Street. I love small towns. I walked the entire length of the town and back. I took it slow and spent an hour or so aimlessly wandering and taking pictures.

Clouds close to sunset always make me happy:
I love this wall, even if the paint is peeling away, it's charming!
I may have put my foot on their property to take this picture...
I guess it wasn't one of the guard duty nights...

FORTY CENTS?!? I need to check out the town grocery!
Just in case you can't make that out, it says, "Souvenirs, Stationary, Supplies, The Henkel Press Inc., Publishers of the Shenandoah Valley, $1.50 A Year, Historical Books - Printing."
What's a small town without a small barber shop?

I like the little stars on their corbels:

Ha! I love it! Damn Yankees!
Said metal plate:
At first, it's just a big house on the corner...
Upon closer inspection, you find a replica of a 19th century town pump next to the house. The pump was built with all of the original tools that were used to build the original pumps by an ancestor of the original pump builders. What an odd sentence...I wanted to know if the pump actually worked...

ACK! Dead bird behind handle!Nope, the pump handle is bolted down...

Then there is the very cute Water Wheel Square where you can get 24 hour laundry service...
So many of the buildings in town need a good scraping and fresh paint job... Just look at that window frame!
Whenever I walk on this section of pre-Revolution brick walk, I like to think about how many other people have walked on it...Then again, it's not as cool as walking over cobblestones in Europe - they are sooooo worn and shiny!

Here's the Calvert House mentioned in the sign:I like it when people paint bricks red. It has an interesting effect when the paint starts to peel...And I like the cheerful colors of this house and how even the swing matches:

I admit that I badly wanted to take pictures of the old men sitting in their rocking chairs in front of the town pharmacy, with their big mustaches and beers, hashing out the old days, but I couldn't figure out how to do so unnoticed. I need a spy camera.

I enjoyed my walk. I'm going to try to make walking or biking around town a routine when I get home from work. Maybe then I won't be sooooo tired?