This or That Old House

I was at a small gathering a few weeks back when the topic of residences came up. In particular - how many residences had we each had in our lifetime. We quickly determined that some rules had to be agreed upon accounting for various aspects of life and living. For instance, we decided that the minimum time of residence in order for an address to count would be six months.

Someone suggested that transient places of residence could be valid only if one received mail at the address. College and dormitories was an issue quickly settled by assigning each college and/or university a residential value of one. No matter how many dorms or apartments one occupied, each institution of higher learning counted as only one. Unless you had significant breaks in your attendance.

Military service had to qualify under the same six month rule but it was felt that unlike a college or university, Vandenberg Air Force base in California and Ramstein in Germany should count separately provided the six month limit was reached.

I finish a distant second with 21 legal residences. The winner was a true vagabond who may have some issues with law enforcement in several jurisdictions. The next day I wondered about how my 66 years divided up among those houses, homes, apartments and dormitories. As of today, I have:

32 years in Michigan (9 residences)*
 1 year in Massachusetts (1)
 3 years in Nevada (2)
30 years and counting in California (9)

*my parents home where they moved when I was a year old, accounts for a full sixteen of the thirty-two years I have accumulated in the Wolverine state.

I wonder how many of these Bob has penciled into his address book?