I'm currently looking for a new place to move in with my girlfriend, so I've become painfully aware that Cambridge rents are really high, especially compared to the North - if Cambridge wasn't convenient for both of us right now we could get a comparable place for half the rent in Yorkshire.
The town centre is packed with students during the university terms and tourists clog the pavements the rest of the time. Plus, because it's basically a town in a swamp, the humidity can get really high in the summer.
I live in Tulsa, Oklahoma. I don't have to point out why this place sucks, if you make a joking offhand comment that is stereotypical of Tulsa, you're probably actually right. Stereotypes sometimes exist for a reason.
I rarely have a lack of material for saying why Oklahoma sucks, it is much harder to find points why it might not suck. So far "All my stuff is here, along with my job" is about the best I can manage.
I live in Aberdeen. It's nearly always depressingly grey and all the people are mostly fat, ugly, boring and stupid. Oh and nothing happens here because the population is small. The rest of the country calls us "sheep shaggers". Other than that it's great.
I got with a chick in Glasgow who said she was from Aberdeen. You guys have some fucking thick accents. Her and her friends said they've never even been hiking in the highlands and they've lived there all their life, which to me is completely insane. The hiking in Scotland is more wonderful and incredible than I ever would have imagined, and you guys are a 2 hour trainride away from it. One day I want to live over there, just for the wildlife.
The accent is called "doric" and I hate it. Basically people decide how "Aberdionian" you are by the gutteral noises that escape you when you open your mouth. If you don't sound sufficiantly silly gooseish they will call you "posh" and treat you like shit.
We do have nice hills in grampain though I'll give it that. But lately Donald Trump has decided to build a golfing hotel resort over our few sites of natural beauty.
The funny thing about Aberdeen is any other place on earth if you slag it off the locals will get defensive and defend their hometown. Not with Aberdeen. Say what you like, the streets are full of drunks, the people are ugly, the town is depressing, the council is corrupt or the football team fucking sucks.
Tyler, TX. Major "city" of East Texas. Official evacuation point of Louisiana for hurricane season.
It sucks here.
Nobody here can fucking drive. Almost everyone here has this habit of slowing down to 20MPH (in a 60 zone) before changing lanes to make a turn they need to make. And they never signal.
The racism is trashy and passive aggressive.
The town shuts down at like 10pm, and What-A-Burger and Wal-Mart are the only places that operate beyond midnight. A lot of stores shut down on Sunday, something I've never seen in California or in Oregon. The city has sidewalks in few neighborhoods and in the downtown area. There's few street lamps around. THERES NO FUCKING PUBLIC TRANSIT.
The city limits are abused to shit. There's a lot of businesses and housing outside the city limits, going fairly thick as 3 miles out, but the businesses in the city stop all service at that line. No cable, no DSL, no pizza delivery. And our infrastructure is shit. The roads crumble often, and some local company keeps filling them with asphalt, only for the potholes to re-emerge a month later.
The post office here is fucking god-awful. All mail is delivered a day later than it usually is compared to every other part of the country. Plus, the contracted people to deliver to outside the city limits are terrible and always bend packages that say DO NOT BEND.
The insects here are all Texas Big™. And insects make me nervous to be around.
Most every manager I've spoken to or worked with here has zero ounce of responsibility. Something in this town makes people lazy I guess.
The water in Texas smells and tastes funny. Fountain drinks are awful as a result.
The weather absolutely blows. It's chaotic, but likes to stay humid as fuck in the summer and I can't breathe outside almost.
All of this compared to Portland, OR: good tasting water, pleasant weather, public transportation, lights on the streets, sidewalks, open on Sundays and at night. I want to go back.
If I win the Powerball, I'll help you move. No one should have to endure Tyler for longer than is absolutely necessary.
Isn't east texas where smaller US companies file all the international copyright/IP/patent stuff, because both the judges and the juries are incredibly tech incompetent and tend to just go with "Muricans are right cause they be Muricans, dur"
Isn't east texas where smaller US companies file all the international copyright/IP/patent stuff, because both the judges and the juries are incredibly tech incompetent and tend to just go with "Muricans are right cause they be Muricans, dur"
Oh right, thanks for reminding me of yet another major failing of east Texas. I'm always shitting on North Florida, but it's light years ahead of east Texas. Moving here was definitely an upgrade.
Tyler, TX. Major "city" of East Texas. Official evacuation point of Louisiana for hurricane season.
It sucks here.
Nobody here can fucking drive. Almost everyone here has this habit of slowing down to 20MPH (in a 60 zone) before changing lanes to make a turn they need to make. And they never signal.
The racism is trashy and passive aggressive.
The town shuts down at like 10pm, and What-A-Burger and Wal-Mart are the only places that operate beyond midnight. A lot of stores shut down on Sunday, something I've never seen in California or in Oregon. The city has sidewalks in few neighborhoods and in the downtown area. There's few street lamps around. THERES NO FUCKING PUBLIC TRANSIT.
The city limits are abused to shit. There's a lot of businesses and housing outside the city limits, going fairly thick as 3 miles out, but the businesses in the city stop all service at that line. No cable, no DSL, no pizza delivery. And our infrastructure is shit. The roads crumble often, and some local company keeps filling them with asphalt, only for the potholes to re-emerge a month later.
The post office here is fucking god-awful. All mail is delivered a day later than it usually is compared to every other part of the country. Plus, the contracted people to deliver to outside the city limits are terrible and always bend packages that say DO NOT BEND.
The insects here are all Texas Big™. And insects make me nervous to be around.
Most every manager I've spoken to or worked with here has zero ounce of responsibility. Something in this town makes people lazy I guess.
The water in Texas smells and tastes funny. Fountain drinks are awful as a result.
The weather absolutely blows. It's chaotic, but likes to stay humid as fuck in the summer and I can't breathe outside almost.
All of this compared to Portland, OR: good tasting water, pleasant weather, public transportation, lights on the streets, sidewalks, open on Sundays and at night. I want to go back.
If I win the Powerball, I'll help you move. No one should have to endure Tyler for longer than is absolutely necessary.
I doubt it but I appreciate the sentiment.
If you want to help though, help me get a job because I seem to have shitty luck. Work can get me out of here (again).
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HenroidMexican kicked from Immigration ThreadCentrism is Racism :3Registered Userregular
Isn't east texas where smaller US companies file all the international copyright/IP/patent stuff, because both the judges and the juries are incredibly tech incompetent and tend to just go with "Muricans are right cause they be Muricans, dur"
Dude, it happens right here in fucking Tyler. Whenever I go to the bank I walk right there in front of the court house.
The best part is Tyler is the "Rose Capital" of the United States but the only place that has roses is the rose garden. The rest of the town is shit.
Isn't east texas where smaller US companies file all the international copyright/IP/patent stuff, because both the judges and the juries are incredibly tech incompetent and tend to just go with "Muricans are right cause they be Muricans, dur"
Dude, it happens right here in fucking Tyler. Whenever I go to the bank I walk right there in front of the court house.
The best part is Tyler is the "Rose Capital" of the United States but the only place that has roses is the rose garden. The rest of the town is shit.
On the upside, the growing Mexican population means that there are taquerias all over the place, and there's an awesome Mexican supermarket on the northwest side. The sprawl is ridiculous though, for it being such a small town.
We have issues with urban sprawl, poor public transit, leading all Canadian cities in domestic violence and divorce, high rental prices (despite the economic slowdown), general high costs of living, did I mention urban sprawl, poor city planning (see our Anthony Henday Fuck Up Ring Road), a horrible hockey team and a complete disregard to the high number of homeless in our city core.
But, hey, at least we're not Regina. Or Winnipeg.
I was thinking about this last night and there are a few more points I want to raise about Edmonton. We have an overal effective, but highly racist police force. Every few months we have scandals coming out of their headquarters about racist videos, emails, comments making the rounds between the members, especially the upper ranks.
We have two godawful major newspapers competing to see who can basically vomit out the most asinine articles on a daily basis.
Nightlife is limited to basically restuarants/cafes in different locations of the cities that you need to drive to since there's no real strip of nightlife that doesn't consist of anything other than either university bars/pubs/clubs or douchebag clubs for the post-university/under-35 crowd. There are unique, interesting locales, but like I said, you need to drive to them because they're all in different parts of the city and they're not in one central place.
Also, this is probably a typical North American city issue, but we have commuter town problems, wherein our downtown core becomes deserted during the week. Also, our major airport is located about halfway to Calgary by the time you get to it.
Positives would be the great park system, the university, the more left-wing, blue-collar attitude compared to Calgary and some amazing neighborhoods. Most importantly, I find a vast majority of people in this city to be incredibly friendly and inviting. I think this has to do with the explosion in migrants to the city from all over Canada, and the world for that matter, over the past couply of years. People make fun of Newfies (Newfoundlanders) for their accent and overall attitude about life, but I think they're some of the most warmhearted and open people around. They're incredibly fun to socialize with and they're reliable friends. I will be heading to Newfoundland in October to visit a friend and apparently I'm being 'screeched in' when I get there.
Another negative, however, is that we don't get any fucking chinooks. Damn you, Calgary.
Morgenstern on
“Every time we walk along a beach some ancient urge disturbs us so that we find ourselves shedding shoes and garments or scavenging among seaweed and whitened timbers like the homesick refugees of a long war.” - Loren Eiseley
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HerrCronIt that wickedly supports taxationRegistered Userregular
I live in Aberdeen. It's nearly always depressingly grey and all the people are mostly fat, ugly, boring and stupid. Oh and nothing happens here because the population is small. The rest of the country calls us "sheep shaggers". Other than that it's great.
I got with a chick in Glasgow who said she was from Aberdeen. You guys have some fucking thick accents. Her and her friends said they've never even been hiking in the highlands and they've lived there all their life, which to me is completely insane. The hiking in Scotland is more wonderful and incredible than I ever would have imagined, and you guys are a 2 hour trainride away from it. One day I want to live over there, just for the wildlife.
The accent is called "doric" and I hate it. Basically people decide how "Aberdionian" you are by the gutteral noises that escape you when you open your mouth. If you don't sound sufficiantly silly gooseish they will call you "posh" and treat you like shit.
We do have nice hills in grampain though I'll give it that. But lately Donald Trump has decided to build a golfing hotel resort over our few sites of natural beauty.
The funny thing about Aberdeen is any other place on earth if you slag it off the locals will get defensive and defend their hometown. Not with Aberdeen. Say what you like, the streets are full of drunks, the people are ugly, the town is depressing, the council is corrupt or the football team fucking sucks.
Mostly the locals will just go "you're right".
I had a brief thing with a girl from Aberdeen when i was in Dundee, and i went to visit her one or twice. All i can recall about the place is it's main industries seem to be oil and strip clubs.
And yeah, the accent is crazy.
I've known a guy from there for about five years now and i still struggle to understand what the hell he's on about half the time.
Unless you live in east Texas, there's almost no good reason to ever go to Tyler. Then again, east Texas is its own little corner of fail in Texas.
On the plus side, there's the Piney Woods!
And... ummm. Well, those woods sure are pretty anyway.
Kansas! Specifically Newton, Kansas:
Pros:
-My Alma Mater (Bethel College) is here.
-Newton and North Newton are substantially less conservative than the rest of Kansas.
-There is an amazing authentic Mexican food place that gives you huge amounts of delicious food for cheap. They also have great salsa.
-There is a fancyish restaurant and bar that the on Wednesday does delicious gourmet burgers. On the weekends it serves as the music scene.
-There are a lot of really nice people here.
-Kansas highways are really good, and very straight, as long as there's no cops nearby you can really haul ass.
Cons:
-It's in Kansas. The state that gave us Sam Brownback, Todd Tiahrt, Fred Phelps, and Creationism in schools.
- OMG so much wheat.
-The two restaurants mentioned above are pretty much the only non-chain places worth a damn.
-It is hella flat and landlocked. Very little geographicly based recreation.
-In the winter is butt-cold and windy. In the Spring it is alternately hot and windy, cold and windy, or pouring rain and windy. In the summer it is hot and humid and windy. Also tornadoes.
-There is pretty much shit all to do in my town, except when the college is having events.
I live in Aberdeen. It's nearly always depressingly grey and all the people are mostly fat, ugly, boring and stupid. Oh and nothing happens here because the population is small. The rest of the country calls us "sheep shaggers". Other than that it's great.
I got with a chick in Glasgow who said she was from Aberdeen. You guys have some fucking thick accents. Her and her friends said they've never even been hiking in the highlands and they've lived there all their life, which to me is completely insane. The hiking in Scotland is more wonderful and incredible than I ever would have imagined, and you guys are a 2 hour trainride away from it. One day I want to live over there, just for the wildlife.
The accent is called "doric" and I hate it. Basically people decide how "Aberdionian" you are by the gutteral noises that escape you when you open your mouth. If you don't sound sufficiantly silly gooseish they will call you "posh" and treat you like shit.
We do have nice hills in grampain though I'll give it that. But lately Donald Trump has decided to build a golfing hotel resort over our few sites of natural beauty.
The funny thing about Aberdeen is any other place on earth if you slag it off the locals will get defensive and defend their hometown. Not with Aberdeen. Say what you like, the streets are full of drunks, the people are ugly, the town is depressing, the council is corrupt or the football team fucking sucks.
Mostly the locals will just go "you're right".
I had a brief thing with a girl from Aberdeen when i was in Dundee, and i went to visit her one or twice. All i can recall about the place is it's main industries seem to be oil and strip clubs.
And yeah, the accent is crazy.
I've known a guy from there for about five years now and i still struggle to understand what the hell he's on about half the time.
I also live in Aberdeen, though I'm English. To be honest, apart from nothing ever happening here I can't really recount any negative experiences; and the accent's fine. There are far worse.
EDIT: The (native) people are not the best-looking bunch.
I live in Tulsa, Oklahoma. I don't have to point out why this place sucks, if you make a joking offhand comment that is stereotypical of Tulsa, you're probably actually right. Stereotypes sometimes exist for a reason.
I rarely have a lack of material for saying why Oklahoma sucks, it is much harder to find points why it might not suck. So far "All my stuff is here, along with my job" is about the best I can manage.
At least you live in the liberal stronghold of Oklahoma. I grew up in Norman, which isn't as left-leaning as you think it would be, but Oklahoma City may as well be the fucking sticks as far as political and social leanings go.
I left Oklahoma 4 years ago and I'm at the point where I cringe when I have to go back. I love seeing my family and the few friends I keep up with, but honestly, I wish they'd get the hell out of that crappy state.
Isn't east texas where smaller US companies file all the international copyright/IP/patent stuff, because both the judges and the juries are incredibly tech incompetent and tend to just go with "Muricans are right cause they be Muricans, dur"
Oh right, thanks for reminding me of yet another major failing of east Texas. I'm always shitting on North Florida, but it's light years ahead of east Texas. Moving here was definitely an upgrade.
Not just international copyright stuff, national copyright trolls love East Texas as well.
And Henroid, Tyler does have a public bus system. Just because it doesn't cover much of the town doesn't mean it doesn't exist (I see people waiting at the stop near Wal-Mart all the time).
To those that don't live here, I cannot emphasize just how bad the traffic can get here. During the Christmas season traffic flow near the biggest intersection makes it look like there was a major disaster. Parts of Broadway (the main north-south street) are often backed up to the next light or beyond all year long. If you judge Tyler just on it's traffic you would think it was a major city like Houston. The traffic difference between Tyler and Normal, IL (Bloomington/Normal has roughly the same population as Tyler) is huge.
Isn't east texas where smaller US companies file all the international copyright/IP/patent stuff, because both the judges and the juries are incredibly tech incompetent and tend to just go with "Muricans are right cause they be Muricans, dur"
Oh right, thanks for reminding me of yet another major failing of east Texas. I'm always shitting on North Florida, but it's light years ahead of east Texas. Moving here was definitely an upgrade.
Not just international copyright stuff, national copyright trolls love East Texas as well.
And Henroid, Tyler does have a public bus system. Just because it doesn't cover much of the town doesn't mean it doesn't exist (I see people waiting at the stop near Wal-Mart all the time).
To those that don't live here, I cannot emphasize just how bad the traffic can get here. During the Christmas season traffic flow near the biggest intersection makes it look like there was a major disaster. Parts of Broadway (the main north-south street) are often backed up to the next light or beyond all year long. If you judge Tyler just on it's traffic you would think it was a major city like Houston. The traffic difference between Tyler and Normal, IL (Bloomington/Normal has roughly the same population as Tyler) is huge.
This is what happens when you over-develop one part of the city (the southeast side) without providing additional routes into it. Traffic in the rest of Tyler is just fine with the exception of Broadway being too narrow for being the main thoroughfare.
Western Massachusetts is, for the most part, a wide-open, rural land-of-boring.
Then again, I live 15 minutes on either side between Springfield and Northampton. I've honestly never lived anywhere as dramatically polarized as it is here. Springfield is a dying, dirty and poor city. Transport is unreliable, jobs are scarce for the majority of the under-educated population, gang violence is present but restricted to the "bad areas" (I always feel safe), everyone is either saddled with a mortgage which prevents them from moving to greener pastures or they're receiving state/federal support. The population is predominantly minority and immigrant.
Northampton is a rather wealthy, cultural center with immense resources and a vibrant youth population thanks to Smith College (and the other 4 major Liberal Arts colleges that surround the area), it's a mecca for the gay community, the location for more Buddhist/New Age groups than you can count (seriously, something like 160 last count), and is generally a pretty liberal, white community.
And my city? My city is the poorest city in Massachusetts. Except that the abject poverty of the "bad" part of town offsets the 10+ room homes in the good part of town.
...except for the bugs and the heat and the hurricanes and the tornadoes and the sinkholes and the daily lightning storms and the sun poisoning and the gators
We have issues with urban sprawl, poor public transit, leading all Canadian cities in domestic violence and divorce, high rental prices (despite the economic slowdown), general high costs of living, did I mention urban sprawl, poor city planning (see our Anthony Henday Fuck Up Ring Road), a horrible hockey team and a complete disregard to the high number of homeless in our city core.
But, hey, at least we're not Regina. Or Winnipeg.
I'm actually glad for living in Winnipeg, because at the very least it's not in Alberta.
That being said. Winnipeg has its problems. Poor infrastructure which leads to other problems throughout the city. Transit system is unnaceptable. We have a large aboriginal population to which there is a sustantial problem with racism and poverty. Urban centre is largely ignored, it's only occupied during business hours really.
We have issues with urban sprawl, poor public transit, leading all Canadian cities in domestic violence and divorce, high rental prices (despite the economic slowdown), general high costs of living, did I mention urban sprawl, poor city planning (see our Anthony Henday Fuck Up Ring Road), a horrible hockey team and a complete disregard to the high number of homeless in our city core.
But, hey, at least we're not Regina. Or Winnipeg.
I'll add to that list the ridiculously stupid drivers that would be killed onsite if they drove anywhere in the US the way they drive here.
Most importantly, I find a vast majority of people in this city to be incredibly friendly and inviting. I think this has to do with the explosion in migrants to the city from all over Canada, and the world for that matter, over the past couply of years.
Actually I've found Edmontonians have always been that way. When I lived on the lower mainland I found people were disturbingly stand-offish and kept to themselves a lot. In Edmonton people tend to stick together and socialize with each other. I think it's because we are the furthest northern major metropolitan centre in North America, and kinda only have each other to keep this city going and make it through the winters.
You can find inviting sympathy through shared suffering.
This reminds me of one of the good things about Tallahassee: we're exceptionally friendly to homeless people. We have a pretty good budget for helping out homeless people, a fairly large shelter, pretty strong charitable organizations that help homeless people, and an overall tolerant attitude. There are no laws against panhandling and the police don't harass the homeless.
Once you live here long enough they recognize you and say hi and otherwise leave you alone. Mostly they grift on the constant flux of rich students.
I'm having a very hard time finding a reason to say this place sucks.
I live in Aberdeen. It's nearly always depressingly grey and all the people are mostly fat, ugly, boring and stupid. Oh and nothing happens here because the population is small. The rest of the country calls us "sheep shaggers". Other than that it's great.
Curiously enough I live in another Aberdeen and it's largely the same. We have it even worse though as were the third largest city in the whole state and #2, and #1 are exponentially larger and have far more to do. We also have skyrocketing cost of living due to all the slum lords jacking up rent prices, the price of a normal apartment here is like $450 for a one bedroom when it was like $250 ten years ago. We're also blessed with a wildly incompotent police force and a proliferation of idiotic drivers. All of this wonder packed into a town of 26,000 with the next larger town 200 miles away. As a cherry to this sundae the whole town is constructed in a dried up lake bed and about every thirty years is seriously damaged by massive flooding.
Heck we're only named Aberdeen because the railroad baron who had the town constructed wanted to name it after his hometown, and then never visited what he made.
The city limits are abused to shit. There's a lot of businesses and housing outside the city limits, going fairly thick as 3 miles out, but the businesses in the city stop all service at that line. No cable, no DSL, no pizza delivery. And our infrastructure is shit. The roads crumble often, and some local company keeps filling them with asphalt, only for the potholes to re-emerge a month later.
This is still a bit weird to me as a concept. Until I was pretty much out of high school I didn't even realize it was possible. In New England, with only a very few exceptions (uninhabited areas of Maine) everywhere is in a town.
The area we live in has great schools and nice people, although that may have to do with the Mormon church in the community. We haven't had missionaries come by but maybe we're "hiding in plain sight" and they assume everyone in the community is already one of them :P
I don't mind the heat and enjoy the fact I can play golf any day of the year. On the flipside, I pay a shitload of money (typically a few hundred dollars) each month for electricity during the summer.
My allergies suck during the spring/summer but using a steroid nasal spray has alleviated most of the problems. The housing market was out of control but is coming back down to reasonable levels.
It sucks that I have to drive 40 minutes to get to my job in downtown Phoenix, and if I didn't go in as early as I did (around 5 in the morning), the traffic would be horrendous. Fortunately I got a special AZ plate for driving a hybrid car, so I can use the HOV lane when needed.
I also have to be in the same state as Arpaio
Speaking of that, what's the deal with the HOV lanes in California? You can't get in or out easily, which sucks when you don't know where you're going.
The Cleveland Show even made a crack about it on one episode.
Our air is almost polluted as Houston's which is really terrible. We're like the New Jersey of Texas.
There's kind of a seedy underbelly that pops up every once in a while with a the occasional shooting or the one time a crackhouse next to my highschool burned down.
More people signed a petition to have a P.F. Chang's in town than have ever voted in any election.
Our freeway used to be entirely backwards. It was literally a text-book example of how not to design a freeway until they started fixing it.
People think we need a swim center downtown or a boardwalk to promote any growth and so downtown is still run-down but local artists and the younger generation have just recently begun to bring it back to life. It's pretty cool actually.
Overall it's a strange mix of mexican immigrants, rednecks, beachbums and retirees.
Speaking of that, what's the deal with the HOV lanes in California? You can't get in or out easily, which sucks when you don't know where you're going.
Guuuuhhhhhhhhhhhh
The HOV lanes themselves aren't bad, but the separate exits and shit that are HOV only, when no other exits to the same place ar visible? That shit could drive a man to violence. I was running around NoCal last year doing a ton of Chase Bank remodels, and I was all over the place, from Stockton, to Sac, to Redding, to SJ, Fremont, S. SF, San Rafael, and others, and the freeway system there just blew my mind. I wanted to hurt someone every time I had to drive to another new place.
I was driving from Fremont to Tracy, and had to get from one freeway to another, but when I got on the exit, I realized it was HOV only. I was hoping I didn't get pulled over and cited, but I didn't see another exit that would take me to the same place. And don't even get me started on SoCal's traffic.
All in all, if I had any complaints about Lovely Las Vegas, they all dried up after those infuriating months I spent in California.
EDIT: Okay, I've got one. In California, at least, you are never far from a freeway. Vegas, being such a standalone city, has places that seem really far out of the way, due to only having three highways in town. We could use one more, I think. But that's probably not in the cards.
I grew up in Royal Oak, Michigan. It's an upper-middle class white suburb of Detroit. It was actually pretty nice and safe. I mean yes Detroit city itself is a shit hole, half of the other suburbs in the metro area are either ghetto and depressing or boring and depressing. There is no real mass transit to speak of, if you don't have a car you are boned. Sprawl is pretty bad, you can drive 30 miles in any direction from downtown Detroit and never make it out of suburbia. The weather is pretty cold and terrible, winter takes up half the year.
Once you get over the "olol Detroit" factor though, there are some upsides. Cost of living is very low, decent houses can be had for under $150k in decent neighborhoods. Most of the suburbs are built on a grid system so it's pretty easy to get around. Some suburbs like Royal Oak and Birmingham have developed walkable downtown areas with all the shops, restaurants and bars that would have been in Detroit if it weren't so terrible.
It wouldn't be so bad is you could actually find and keep a job in the area.
Pretty much the only bad part is that if you go too far in any direction you end up in Texas. Although they do have good BBQ out there.
As a former resident of Austin and current resident of Houston, this made me laugh.
A lot.
It's pretty cool that in the spirit of a thread responding to ridiculous amounts of Texas and Arizona bashing, we have a post bashing Austin...by totally ignoring Austin and instead bashing Texas again.
Edit: I'll have to second the earlier comment about transportation being the biggest negative of Austin, and being so popular will only make that worse. Meanwhile I don't even think the hippies or hipsters or yuppie downtown folks, let alone the suburbanites with large spread out houses, would be willing to obtain large amounts of right-of-way to tear down buildings and erect tracks for new rail that actually could be used 24/7.
I was born and raised in Luton, England.
those of you from the Uk will know this town as the town that has been voted worst town in the UK. It is.
the only good things about this town are how many ways there are to get out of it. (3 railway stations, 2 motorway junctions and an airport.) and every year we hold the biggest 1 day carnival in the country, which is something I guess.
the bad things are: unemployment, a problem with drunks over-running the town centre (at 9 in the morning), a rubbish nightlife with only one club despite being a university town. teenage mums, foootball hooligans, and lots of crime. oh and lots of racism. The English Defence League was formed here (they are basically the new version of the BNP and National Front) and on the other side of the racism coin. we had some asian group (I dont know their name) spit and abuse a homecoming parade of British soldiers, throw a egg at the asian lady who is the Tory party chairwoman (Baroness warsi I think). and the guys who did the London bombing stopped over here on their way to blow up part of London.
basically this townis a festering hell hole and should probaly be burned to the ground
The drivers. Now many people may think that their state has awful drivers, but based on the other states I've driven through, there is something straight-up diabolical about the drivers here.
Oh, and we're corrupt as hell. The former mayor of Providence (Buddy Cianci) resigned after pleading no contest to an assault charge. Couple years later he was re-elected mayor. And then came Plunderdome, where he was convicted of extortion, conspiracy, and a few other crimes. As corrupt as he was people love him for revitalizing the city and he could probably run again in 2014 when he's eligible (a law was passed requiring a waiting period for running for office after leaving prison).
On the plus side, you can traverse the entire state from north to south in about an hour.
Mr Obersmith on
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My rent is higher than yours. And my apartment is smaller than yours.
Jobs exist aplenty. You just can't get a single one of them with less than 5 years of related experience and 2 degrees in the field.
The city government is broke, and is currently fighting tooth and nail with Muni, the public transit organization, because some (presumably stoned off their gourds) politicians decades ago actually wrote into the city charter an unconditional guarantee that Muni drivers would always get the second highest pay of any transit agency in the nation. Meanwhile actual service continues to be cut, and cut, and cut some more, to save on the budget, while there are drivers taking six figures to the bank.
The weather kind of sucks. Temperature-wise it ought to be comfortable enough, but it's inevitably a little bit colder than you wish it was, usually because of the almost constant chilly blasting wind. I haven't spent any significant time in Chicago but I'd be impressed if "the Windy City" is actually windier than here. During the summer months, fog rolls in and may stay for literally weeks at a time. You know people all over the rest of the country are sipping iced drinks by the beach or the pool, while you huddle in your jacket and peer up at the perpetual dull gray gloom.
OTOH if I listed all the things I like it'd beat that list above. But this is the bitching thread so I'll leave it.
But SF basically never ever drops below about 50 degrees right? I thought a year round moderate temp was the benefit to having all that fog and beach-inappropriate summers.
But SF basically never ever drops below about 50 degrees right? I thought a year round moderate temp was the benefit to having all that fog and beach-inappropriate summers.
Oh yeah, the temperature range is mild, pretty much 50-70 year round. With the wind and the fog it tends toward the lower end of that a lot more than the upper. That's the part that kind of sucks, it's never cold enough to really bitch about by any means, but it's never warm enough to relax in and enjoy either. It always seems tantalizingly close to being enjoyable but never quite is. You're forever putting your coat on and taking it off again, right on the border of comfort/discomfort either way.
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The town centre is packed with students during the university terms and tourists clog the pavements the rest of the time. Plus, because it's basically a town in a swamp, the humidity can get really high in the summer.
I rarely have a lack of material for saying why Oklahoma sucks, it is much harder to find points why it might not suck. So far "All my stuff is here, along with my job" is about the best I can manage.
The accent is called "doric" and I hate it. Basically people decide how "Aberdionian" you are by the gutteral noises that escape you when you open your mouth. If you don't sound sufficiantly silly gooseish they will call you "posh" and treat you like shit.
We do have nice hills in grampain though I'll give it that. But lately Donald Trump has decided to build a golfing hotel resort over our few sites of natural beauty.
The funny thing about Aberdeen is any other place on earth if you slag it off the locals will get defensive and defend their hometown. Not with Aberdeen. Say what you like, the streets are full of drunks, the people are ugly, the town is depressing, the council is corrupt or the football team fucking sucks.
Mostly the locals will just go "you're right".
If I win the Powerball, I'll help you move. No one should have to endure Tyler for longer than is absolutely necessary.
Oh right, thanks for reminding me of yet another major failing of east Texas. I'm always shitting on North Florida, but it's light years ahead of east Texas. Moving here was definitely an upgrade.
I doubt it but I appreciate the sentiment.
If you want to help though, help me get a job because I seem to have shitty luck. Work can get me out of here (again).
Dude, it happens right here in fucking Tyler. Whenever I go to the bank I walk right there in front of the court house.
The best part is Tyler is the "Rose Capital" of the United States but the only place that has roses is the rose garden. The rest of the town is shit.
On the upside, the growing Mexican population means that there are taquerias all over the place, and there's an awesome Mexican supermarket on the northwest side. The sprawl is ridiculous though, for it being such a small town.
I was thinking about this last night and there are a few more points I want to raise about Edmonton. We have an overal effective, but highly racist police force. Every few months we have scandals coming out of their headquarters about racist videos, emails, comments making the rounds between the members, especially the upper ranks.
We have two godawful major newspapers competing to see who can basically vomit out the most asinine articles on a daily basis.
Nightlife is limited to basically restuarants/cafes in different locations of the cities that you need to drive to since there's no real strip of nightlife that doesn't consist of anything other than either university bars/pubs/clubs or douchebag clubs for the post-university/under-35 crowd. There are unique, interesting locales, but like I said, you need to drive to them because they're all in different parts of the city and they're not in one central place.
Also, this is probably a typical North American city issue, but we have commuter town problems, wherein our downtown core becomes deserted during the week. Also, our major airport is located about halfway to Calgary by the time you get to it.
Positives would be the great park system, the university, the more left-wing, blue-collar attitude compared to Calgary and some amazing neighborhoods. Most importantly, I find a vast majority of people in this city to be incredibly friendly and inviting. I think this has to do with the explosion in migrants to the city from all over Canada, and the world for that matter, over the past couply of years. People make fun of Newfies (Newfoundlanders) for their accent and overall attitude about life, but I think they're some of the most warmhearted and open people around. They're incredibly fun to socialize with and they're reliable friends. I will be heading to Newfoundland in October to visit a friend and apparently I'm being 'screeched in' when I get there.
Another negative, however, is that we don't get any fucking chinooks. Damn you, Calgary.
I had a brief thing with a girl from Aberdeen when i was in Dundee, and i went to visit her one or twice. All i can recall about the place is it's main industries seem to be oil and strip clubs.
And yeah, the accent is crazy.
I've known a guy from there for about five years now and i still struggle to understand what the hell he's on about half the time.
On the plus side, there's the Piney Woods!
And... ummm. Well, those woods sure are pretty anyway.
Kansas! Specifically Newton, Kansas:
Pros:
-My Alma Mater (Bethel College) is here.
-Newton and North Newton are substantially less conservative than the rest of Kansas.
-There is an amazing authentic Mexican food place that gives you huge amounts of delicious food for cheap. They also have great salsa.
-There is a fancyish restaurant and bar that the on Wednesday does delicious gourmet burgers. On the weekends it serves as the music scene.
-There are a lot of really nice people here.
-Kansas highways are really good, and very straight, as long as there's no cops nearby you can really haul ass.
Cons:
-It's in Kansas. The state that gave us Sam Brownback, Todd Tiahrt, Fred Phelps, and Creationism in schools.
- OMG so much wheat.
-The two restaurants mentioned above are pretty much the only non-chain places worth a damn.
-It is hella flat and landlocked. Very little geographicly based recreation.
-In the winter is butt-cold and windy. In the Spring it is alternately hot and windy, cold and windy, or pouring rain and windy. In the summer it is hot and humid and windy. Also tornadoes.
-There is pretty much shit all to do in my town, except when the college is having events.
I also live in Aberdeen, though I'm English. To be honest, apart from nothing ever happening here I can't really recount any negative experiences; and the accent's fine. There are far worse.
EDIT: The (native) people are not the best-looking bunch.
At least you live in the liberal stronghold of Oklahoma. I grew up in Norman, which isn't as left-leaning as you think it would be, but Oklahoma City may as well be the fucking sticks as far as political and social leanings go.
I left Oklahoma 4 years ago and I'm at the point where I cringe when I have to go back. I love seeing my family and the few friends I keep up with, but honestly, I wish they'd get the hell out of that crappy state.
Not just international copyright stuff, national copyright trolls love East Texas as well.
And Henroid, Tyler does have a public bus system. Just because it doesn't cover much of the town doesn't mean it doesn't exist (I see people waiting at the stop near Wal-Mart all the time).
To those that don't live here, I cannot emphasize just how bad the traffic can get here. During the Christmas season traffic flow near the biggest intersection makes it look like there was a major disaster. Parts of Broadway (the main north-south street) are often backed up to the next light or beyond all year long. If you judge Tyler just on it's traffic you would think it was a major city like Houston. The traffic difference between Tyler and Normal, IL (Bloomington/Normal has roughly the same population as Tyler) is huge.
This is what happens when you over-develop one part of the city (the southeast side) without providing additional routes into it. Traffic in the rest of Tyler is just fine with the exception of Broadway being too narrow for being the main thoroughfare.
Then again, I live 15 minutes on either side between Springfield and Northampton. I've honestly never lived anywhere as dramatically polarized as it is here. Springfield is a dying, dirty and poor city. Transport is unreliable, jobs are scarce for the majority of the under-educated population, gang violence is present but restricted to the "bad areas" (I always feel safe), everyone is either saddled with a mortgage which prevents them from moving to greener pastures or they're receiving state/federal support. The population is predominantly minority and immigrant.
Northampton is a rather wealthy, cultural center with immense resources and a vibrant youth population thanks to Smith College (and the other 4 major Liberal Arts colleges that surround the area), it's a mecca for the gay community, the location for more Buddhist/New Age groups than you can count (seriously, something like 160 last count), and is generally a pretty liberal, white community.
And my city? My city is the poorest city in Massachusetts. Except that the abject poverty of the "bad" part of town offsets the 10+ room homes in the good part of town.
...except for the bugs and the heat and the hurricanes and the tornadoes and the sinkholes and the daily lightning storms and the sun poisoning and the gators
really
really
really
really
fucking
seriously
goddamn
boring
Wouldn't trade the country for anything, but Jesus Christ it gets stale sometimes.
I'm actually glad for living in Winnipeg, because at the very least it's not in Alberta.
That being said. Winnipeg has its problems. Poor infrastructure which leads to other problems throughout the city. Transit system is unnaceptable. We have a large aboriginal population to which there is a sustantial problem with racism and poverty. Urban centre is largely ignored, it's only occupied during business hours really.
I'll add to that list the ridiculously stupid drivers that would be killed onsite if they drove anywhere in the US the way they drive here.
I never finish anyth
Actually I've found Edmontonians have always been that way. When I lived on the lower mainland I found people were disturbingly stand-offish and kept to themselves a lot. In Edmonton people tend to stick together and socialize with each other. I think it's because we are the furthest northern major metropolitan centre in North America, and kinda only have each other to keep this city going and make it through the winters.
You can find inviting sympathy through shared suffering.
I never finish anyth
Once you live here long enough they recognize you and say hi and otherwise leave you alone. Mostly they grift on the constant flux of rich students.
I'm having a very hard time finding a reason to say this place sucks.
Curiously enough I live in another Aberdeen and it's largely the same. We have it even worse though as were the third largest city in the whole state and #2, and #1 are exponentially larger and have far more to do. We also have skyrocketing cost of living due to all the slum lords jacking up rent prices, the price of a normal apartment here is like $450 for a one bedroom when it was like $250 ten years ago. We're also blessed with a wildly incompotent police force and a proliferation of idiotic drivers. All of this wonder packed into a town of 26,000 with the next larger town 200 miles away. As a cherry to this sundae the whole town is constructed in a dried up lake bed and about every thirty years is seriously damaged by massive flooding.
Heck we're only named Aberdeen because the railroad baron who had the town constructed wanted to name it after his hometown, and then never visited what he made.
90% of things are closed by 10 PM, 99% are closed by midnight.
wtf.
This is still a bit weird to me as a concept. Until I was pretty much out of high school I didn't even realize it was possible. In New England, with only a very few exceptions (uninhabited areas of Maine) everywhere is in a town.
QEDMF xbl: PantsB G+
The area we live in has great schools and nice people, although that may have to do with the Mormon church in the community. We haven't had missionaries come by but maybe we're "hiding in plain sight" and they assume everyone in the community is already one of them :P
I don't mind the heat and enjoy the fact I can play golf any day of the year. On the flipside, I pay a shitload of money (typically a few hundred dollars) each month for electricity during the summer.
My allergies suck during the spring/summer but using a steroid nasal spray has alleviated most of the problems. The housing market was out of control but is coming back down to reasonable levels.
It sucks that I have to drive 40 minutes to get to my job in downtown Phoenix, and if I didn't go in as early as I did (around 5 in the morning), the traffic would be horrendous. Fortunately I got a special AZ plate for driving a hybrid car, so I can use the HOV lane when needed.
I also have to be in the same state as Arpaio
Speaking of that, what's the deal with the HOV lanes in California? You can't get in or out easily, which sucks when you don't know where you're going.
http://www.menshealth.com/fattestcities2010/
The Cleveland Show even made a crack about it on one episode.
Our air is almost polluted as Houston's which is really terrible. We're like the New Jersey of Texas.
There's kind of a seedy underbelly that pops up every once in a while with a the occasional shooting or the one time a crackhouse next to my highschool burned down.
More people signed a petition to have a P.F. Chang's in town than have ever voted in any election.
Our freeway used to be entirely backwards. It was literally a text-book example of how not to design a freeway until they started fixing it.
People think we need a swim center downtown or a boardwalk to promote any growth and so downtown is still run-down but local artists and the younger generation have just recently begun to bring it back to life. It's pretty cool actually.
Overall it's a strange mix of mexican immigrants, rednecks, beachbums and retirees.
Guuuuhhhhhhhhhhhh
The HOV lanes themselves aren't bad, but the separate exits and shit that are HOV only, when no other exits to the same place ar visible? That shit could drive a man to violence. I was running around NoCal last year doing a ton of Chase Bank remodels, and I was all over the place, from Stockton, to Sac, to Redding, to SJ, Fremont, S. SF, San Rafael, and others, and the freeway system there just blew my mind. I wanted to hurt someone every time I had to drive to another new place.
I was driving from Fremont to Tracy, and had to get from one freeway to another, but when I got on the exit, I realized it was HOV only. I was hoping I didn't get pulled over and cited, but I didn't see another exit that would take me to the same place. And don't even get me started on SoCal's traffic.
All in all, if I had any complaints about Lovely Las Vegas, they all dried up after those infuriating months I spent in California.
EDIT: Okay, I've got one. In California, at least, you are never far from a freeway. Vegas, being such a standalone city, has places that seem really far out of the way, due to only having three highways in town. We could use one more, I think. But that's probably not in the cards.
Once you get over the "olol Detroit" factor though, there are some upsides. Cost of living is very low, decent houses can be had for under $150k in decent neighborhoods. Most of the suburbs are built on a grid system so it's pretty easy to get around. Some suburbs like Royal Oak and Birmingham have developed walkable downtown areas with all the shops, restaurants and bars that would have been in Detroit if it weren't so terrible.
It wouldn't be so bad is you could actually find and keep a job in the area.
Omaha has the opposite, nothing opens until like 11 or 12 noon.
It's pretty cool that in the spirit of a thread responding to ridiculous amounts of Texas and Arizona bashing, we have a post bashing Austin...by totally ignoring Austin and instead bashing Texas again.
Edit: I'll have to second the earlier comment about transportation being the biggest negative of Austin, and being so popular will only make that worse. Meanwhile I don't even think the hippies or hipsters or yuppie downtown folks, let alone the suburbanites with large spread out houses, would be willing to obtain large amounts of right-of-way to tear down buildings and erect tracks for new rail that actually could be used 24/7.
those of you from the Uk will know this town as the town that has been voted worst town in the UK. It is.
the only good things about this town are how many ways there are to get out of it. (3 railway stations, 2 motorway junctions and an airport.) and every year we hold the biggest 1 day carnival in the country, which is something I guess.
the bad things are: unemployment, a problem with drunks over-running the town centre (at 9 in the morning), a rubbish nightlife with only one club despite being a university town. teenage mums, foootball hooligans, and lots of crime. oh and lots of racism. The English Defence League was formed here (they are basically the new version of the BNP and National Front) and on the other side of the racism coin. we had some asian group (I dont know their name) spit and abuse a homecoming parade of British soldiers, throw a egg at the asian lady who is the Tory party chairwoman (Baroness warsi I think). and the guys who did the London bombing stopped over here on their way to blow up part of London.
basically this townis a festering hell hole and should probaly be burned to the ground
The drivers. Now many people may think that their state has awful drivers, but based on the other states I've driven through, there is something straight-up diabolical about the drivers here.
Oh, and we're corrupt as hell. The former mayor of Providence (Buddy Cianci) resigned after pleading no contest to an assault charge. Couple years later he was re-elected mayor. And then came Plunderdome, where he was convicted of extortion, conspiracy, and a few other crimes. As corrupt as he was people love him for revitalizing the city and he could probably run again in 2014 when he's eligible (a law was passed requiring a waiting period for running for office after leaving prison).
On the plus side, you can traverse the entire state from north to south in about an hour.
Live - MrObersmith
PSN - Obersmith
My rent is higher than yours. And my apartment is smaller than yours.
Jobs exist aplenty. You just can't get a single one of them with less than 5 years of related experience and 2 degrees in the field.
The city government is broke, and is currently fighting tooth and nail with Muni, the public transit organization, because some (presumably stoned off their gourds) politicians decades ago actually wrote into the city charter an unconditional guarantee that Muni drivers would always get the second highest pay of any transit agency in the nation. Meanwhile actual service continues to be cut, and cut, and cut some more, to save on the budget, while there are drivers taking six figures to the bank.
The weather kind of sucks. Temperature-wise it ought to be comfortable enough, but it's inevitably a little bit colder than you wish it was, usually because of the almost constant chilly blasting wind. I haven't spent any significant time in Chicago but I'd be impressed if "the Windy City" is actually windier than here. During the summer months, fog rolls in and may stay for literally weeks at a time. You know people all over the rest of the country are sipping iced drinks by the beach or the pool, while you huddle in your jacket and peer up at the perpetual dull gray gloom.
OTOH if I listed all the things I like it'd beat that list above. But this is the bitching thread so I'll leave it.
Steam: badger2d
Oh yeah, the temperature range is mild, pretty much 50-70 year round. With the wind and the fog it tends toward the lower end of that a lot more than the upper. That's the part that kind of sucks, it's never cold enough to really bitch about by any means, but it's never warm enough to relax in and enjoy either. It always seems tantalizingly close to being enjoyable but never quite is. You're forever putting your coat on and taking it off again, right on the border of comfort/discomfort either way.
Steam: badger2d