burg

It was the stand-in for a Midwestern town in Tom Hanks’ “That Thing You Do” and for a southern burg in “Big Mama’s House,” among many others.

His band rolled into the lakefront burg of Manitowoc, Wis., the heart of Green Bay Packers country, on a night in 1972 when the Packers were facing off against the Detroit Lions.

Most of the burg’s 200 houses were half submerged by slowly rising floodwaters.

Surrounding me would be the natural denizens of Martini Town, if such a burg existed, all eager to savor the lot’s first Hallmark Fan Experience.

That is a good thing – better than languishing like Rust Belt cities or poking along like other burgs in sleepier regions – but it comes with a downside: Living costs have skyrocketed.