I'm really hoping Hank gets that lyric reference, but maybe not. I kind of hope the rest of you don't get it, though.
I was retesting my geographical inadequacy (in location, not knowledge) today and went searching on Google for "where should I live" or something. The site that I most wanted to visit (and was weirdly blocked by the school content filter) was FindYourSpot.com. After finding out that was a banned site (I'm still baffled as to the reasons), I tried some of the other links. I won't bother reposting those. Let's just say that one of them returned New York City as the city for me despite answering questions detailing my love of the mountains and desire to become an organic farmer.
Find Your Spot seems very comprehensive in the questions it asks, and from a few of the more familiar cities in my list, I think the results are fairly accurate. It does ask you to enter information at the end, but I just entered in a fake name and address and you can even leave the e-mail line blank. I think you could probably even leave everything blank and just keep clicking next, but I didn't test that. Here's my top seven and my reaction to the selection.
1. Spokane, WA: I dig the cost of living, but there are bigger cities out that way I'd prefer.
2. Portland, OR: Hells yeah. I dig this choice so much that I even said "hells yeah." I'm a bit ashamed of that, but if you're one of the people I've harassed about moving to Portland so I could convince K that she'd know people when we moved there, you're already aware of this.
3. Denver, CO: I've been there and my sister lived there for a while. I liked what I saw and my sister said I'd love the place. She really knows my tastes, so I'll take her word for it. Probably the driest and flattest city I'd be willing to live in, and if you thought the flat reference was supposed to be funny, you don't know your Denver.
4. Seattle, WA: Heck yeah, but I can't afford to live there.
5. Ogden, UT: Utah? You're kidding me, right? They'd outlaw beer there if the hippies in Salt Lake would let them.
6. Great Falls, MT: I have no clue. I was obsessed with moving to Montana in High School, so this could work, I guess.
7. Carlisle, PA: I bet this will be on your list too. Everyone I know has had this near the top of their results. I actually stayed there once, but it was in a hotel off of an exit on the turnpike during a trip between Cleveland and Philadelphia once.
9 comments:
You might consider Bellingham, WA, too. If you aren't familiar, it's at the northernmost part of the state, minutes from the Canadian border.
Or, if you're set on Portland (especially if you have kids...) think about Vancouver, WA. Just across the border from Portland, with no state income tax and better schools. And cheaper houses. Of course, the people in the PDX city limits will belittle you, but that's just because they're bitter from their poor public educations and expensive houses.
Oh, and I'm thinking the school filter confused it with "FindYourGSpot.com".
I'm leery about suburbs. They usually suck ass. You have to drive to anything interesting and all that surrounds you are chain restaurants and big box stores.
I'm also not worried about the quality of the schools. School quality only helps the stupid kids. The smart kids will learn and succeed regardless of the quality of the school. My kid will be intellectually gifted or he will be summarily shot and fed to the catfish.
Actually, I'm kidding (except for the part about the importance of the schools). I'd be fine living in the burbs, but only as long as I worked close to home. Honestly, if I move to Portland, I'd move out into the more rural areas about 30-60 miles away, find a job there, and drive into the city on weekends to drink and eat at decent restaurants.
I don't have any skill sets to qualify me for a job that would afford me decent shelter in any decent city, and for me, it's either fully urban or rural. I really dig being an hour or less from a major city, though.
New York is always the right choice. Catch the fever!
What? No Alaska?
Hippies? In Utah? I believe you are confusing hippies with Mormons.
I'll chalk it up to a Freudian slip that in your commentary on Denver you begin with: "I've beer there..."
I could enjoy living in New York City for a while, I think, although not so much with children. Well, people always say that, but I'm not really sure what if anything would be wrong with raising children in NYC.
Right on about preferring urban or rural living. I think I'd really hate living in the suburbs and driving an hour into the city to work everyday.
Kate: I don't handle having a fever well. It makes my slothful ass even more slothful. And pukey.
Meaghan: Anchorage was around #12-15 or so. I think it didn't score as well because it doesn't have as much of some of the more cosmopolitan aspects that the other cities did. It's still higher on my list than most people's.
Courtney: You'd think, but the metro area for SLC has the lowest proportion of Mormons in the entire state and is considered one of the most gay-friendly cities in the US. There are openly gay politicians who represent the city in the state House and Senate. A poll in the city suggests most people in the city support domestic partnerships and the city voted against a same-sex marriage ban and the mayor has be outspoken on several gay-rights issues. I'm just using the gay issue to represent everything else. It's really rare for a place where the average person supports gay rights to be conservative and boring elsewhere. I used the term "hippies" a little tongue-in-cheek, but it is far from the conservative place the rest of the state is. It's actually a heavily democratic oasis in Utah.
Utah sucks and for good reason, but Salt Lake City suffers an undeserved image problem. I still wouldn't move there, but only because I don't like dry-weather ecosystems and many of the state laws.
Chris: Most people change their lives too much for their kids. If you're not a negligent parent, there's really no reason to move into a bigger house, get a bigger car, buy kids music, or move out of the city unless you live in a one-bedroom apartment, drive a motorcycle or two-seater car, only listen to violent and vulgar music, and live in a really rough part of town. Or if you can't stop popping out kids and could field your own basketball team or larger.
Utah is awesome. Courtney doesn't believe me either.
No breweries, but then there aren't any where you live now.
Utah does have a couple breweries. I've even had a beer from there once, I think. There's a place that makes a beer called Polygamy Porter. Still, homebrewing is illegal and breweries are limited to basically Budweiser strength beer. Even my part of Georgia is better than that.
And I'm sure it's beautiful, but I think the lack of rain would stress me out too much. Basically, I want to go there to visit, but I have no desire to stay.
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