I’m not feeling well today. Still recovering from a sinus infection…and I’m hungry.
I’m interested to know what state everyone lives in. If you live abroad, I already know that (if you’ve remembered to set your country correctly in your preferences). You still might want to tell everyone else where you live.
I’m going to take a shower and then make up some turkey chile (extra spicy).
So, where do you live? And why?
Moved here right after grad. school, living is affordable, jobs usually plentiful, easy to get elsewhere (we’re closer to Mexico City than NYC by air). I’ve had the pleasure of having Ann Richards as my governor, and the eternal shame of Bush as our prsident (and governor).
Everywhere you live has decent folks, and things to do. No great natural redeeming features very near here, though. If you’re willing to take a plane or a long drive, there are things to see and do. That said, we’re going camping in a couple of weeks to the state park. Should be pleasant, and I hope my son catches a fish.
Me, too!
The Best Coast
…and I’ve probably mentioned that so many times that everyone knows already. LOL!
I’m near the Gulf Coast, so there’s plenty to see and do around here – and what isn’t around here is within driving distance. I love it here – born and raised – and can’t see myself ever leaving.
My mother and I made the migration to Cal. in 1960, from Johnstown, Pa. My mother had always dreamed of living in a sunshine state and even though we knew no one but an extended family member, we made the move.
A lot of it was to get out of Pa, pardon me Pa. but Johnstown is not the greatest place to live.
Having previously lived in other glorious parts of Pa., I can testify to that fact. so we set out on Route 66, (yes 66 for those old enought to remember)and after 14 days driving we arrived in Pasadena, Ca. and the waving palm trees signaled hello to us as we drove down Colorado Blvd and I was hooked.
I never wanted to leave after that; the climate, the landscape and the people made me want to stay. I found people here to be open, accepting and not too judgemental.
Unfortunately the country I live in, Orange, just happens to be the birthplace of Born Again Christianity, right on the beach in Newport in the late 60’s early 70’s. So says the Register, our local newspaper. Forgive me I do not recall the names or most of the details, but one man appeared and started to preach on the beach built a big following and that led to Calvery Chapel which grew and grew and with the foundation of Born Again Christianity. And I can tell you that by late 70’s some of us could see where this was going and how the direction it might take.
But all that aside, I love it here and the only other place I would want to live in would be Hawaii.
Well I finally was able to post a pic, this is one of Hearst Castle Swimming Pool that my son took during a trip up the coast a couple weeks ago.
I love California. My daughter lived in Venice for a while. Took the Amtrack and The Dog (Greyhound) to see her a few times. The landscape, the coast – the train follows Highway One – were beautiful.
On the Olympic Peninsula of WA state … about as far northwest as you can get in the continental U.S. And I can see Canada when I look out my window. Might swim over someday soon.
P.S. Do you use ground turkey for your chili, Boo? I’ve been using Yves fake hamburger for mine. It’s really good. Made in Canada, of course! But, here, all the grocery stores carry the Yves products because they’re so popular and so tasty. (The Yves hotdogs are scrumptious.)
Sue, you can see Canada from your window?
How totally fricking cool.
I really can. And, at night, the lights of Victoria, B.C. We’re very worried about the new requirements for a passport to reenter the U.S. because so many people here hop the ferry to Victoria all the time / and vice versa. We fear the ferry might go out of business because a lot of people will just give up the trip rather than shell out $95 (!) for a passport, not counting the cost of the photo, and because of the long wait to get a passport. Even infants are required to have a passport starting in 2008 … I think the kids’ price is $65. Insane.
We’re facing something similar in south Texas – what with passports soon being required to enter Mexico. A short day trip down there is nothing to southern Texans, but it soon will be. {sigh}
coming to Seattle for a family reiunion in july. What is required to go to vancouver for the day? Is it like it is here in South Texas where you just drive through with a US drivers License,declare any liqour or other taxables and drive on .or do they do extensive background checks?(I am questioning reentry ) they never ask anything going into mexico because they have checkpoints further in (20-30 miles) where a visa is required to proceed any further.
will be confiscated at the border by Canadian customs agents.
When traveling to or from Canada with your pet, you will need to have a health certificate from your vet showing that they are current on all vaccinations.
Have children’s birth certificates available. If children are in joint custody, have permission from the other parent.
US citizens don’t need passports to enter Canada yet.
Give specific answers to Customs’ agents on both sides.
Say “visiting my brother who lives in Burnaby.” instead of “visiting family.”
No plants allowed.
Have fun.
No way! We WANT what we see when we look out at you. You surely don’t want what you see when you look at us.
The Olympic Mountains! That’s what we see.
You see a fog bank and a few twinkling lights.
The Olympics. As a child knowing nothing about Greek mythology, I thought that the gods or a God lived there in that blue, blue, blue world.
I’m using ground turkey. My wife buys it from time to time. I usually do the shopping and I never buy it.
BTW- chile’s simmering as we speak.
Very important question, regarding the chili, Boo:
With beans, or without?
I got some kidneys and some canellinis in there.
I likes beans.
Mmmmm….I love kidney beans.
I ask because it’s a debate down here – with beans or without? In a chili cookoff, you’re generally not allowed to use beans, because they’re usually ran by chili purists, but most people I know prefer their chili with beans. Me, I don’t care either way, as long as it’s good and spicy.
I buy the bean mixes from the bulk section* of a great grocery store … super. I don’t know the names of all the beans in it, but it’s good.
I also buy fresh peppers and dice them finely. Oh, is the chile hot!
GOOD FOR SINUSES!
___
*I’ve found the bulk sections of some grocery stores to be very iffy for quality and freshness. One nearby grocery’s bulk peanut and almond butters are lousy. I think they buy the cheapest possible peanuts and almonds. We’ve found one grocery on Bainbridge Island — a rich white enclave for ferry riders to their jobs in Seattle — that has the highest standards for its bulk section (probably because their customers are so picky).
I completely agree. The bulk section in my local grocery store sucks, unless you’re into gigantic boxes of macaroni and cheese and large bottles of veggie oil. Lord.
Now, what is this almond butter you speak of? Similar to peanut butter, I’m guessing…but I’ve never heard of it!
I always made fun of the cans of Hormel chili that say “with beans”, because I thought chili was originally a bean dish, that could optionally have meat (“chili con carne”). But you say “purists” don’t allow beans? My world is spinning here, LOL.
Alan
Maverick Leftist
LOL! Isn’t it funny? I think everyone eats it differently. Here in Texas, chili is a meat based dish, and beans are optional. Ha! My husband has a competition barbecue team, so we go to different cookoffs around the state, and in the ones where chili is being cooked, most of the time beans aren’t allowed in it. We met a woman not too long ago from Minnesota who considered ‘chili’ as spaghetti sauce. Her family boils pasta and pours what we’d call chili over it. To us, that’s gross, but they love it! (And it does have beans in it, too!) 😉
Weird. I lived in Minnesota for several years and never encountered that, but then we were not really native Minnesotans by any means. I did get acquainted with another Minnesota tradition, “hot dish” (what most people would call a casserole, basically).
Alan
Maverick Leftist
Everybody thinks I’m mad for suggesting this, but if you’re of a mind to: drink 3 – 3.5 liters of water as fast as you can (apparently more is bad for you) – that always makes me feel better, plus it replenishes what you loose from just being sick – and may you feel better soon.
from where I live and they are beautiful. We get the best view over here in Canada.
The Juan de Fuca water is pretty rough but a Canadian swimmer did make it over once.
I make Shepherd’s pie with the fake hamburger, very good.
BooMan get well soon. The steam is the best and lots of oxygen, go for walks in the park.
Oh, cool! I was in the Seattle area from Hallowe’en to New Year’s, and clipped out the P-I’s map of “red” and “blue” WA counties, which also used shades of colour to show how strongly a county went one way or the other. I found it very intriguing that Jefferson County was so blue, despite not being urban (surely Port Townsend doesn’t count), while neighbouring Clallam County was actually red (or light pink, really–maybe “salmon” would be appropriate here <g>).
So I started daydreaming about living there someday (one of my previous daydreams, which I still kick around, was about Point Roberts, which is so close to my sister in Vancouver but doesn’t require immigration to Canada, resides in a “sun hole” that spares it from the region’s raininess, and yet has great deals on real estate due to its unique location), and did a bunch of research on the county. Port Townsend is obviously an awesome place in all kinds of ways. But at the other end of the county, I found out about a neat little place I’d like to check out when I can: Rain Forest Hostel Have you been there, or heard about it? It looks really cool.
Alan
Maverick Leftist
I work in NYC, live in one of the towns in NJ, just across the Hudson River.
Transplanted from Norway because of work in a large, multi-lateral organization (have a wild guess). Don’t know how much longer I’ll stay here – you guys (the other 51%) are getting scarier by the day. My two kids have dual citizenship, the oldest not to far off from draft-age.
Bon apetit with the chile.
Brooklyn Zoo, NYC, New York, USA, Mama Earth, Milky Way
Why? I’ve been asking myself that question. You think living in New York it would be easy to meet lots of radical free-thinkers but it’s not as easy as it seems. Just more chaff to sort through to find the wheat. Not sure how much longer I’ll stay here as I might go to Chicago or Toronto to work with friends on writing/film/animation projects (political, of course).
I’d like to live in South America or Europe (preferably somewhere not run by a bunch of fundamentalists) at some point, just not sure when.
Clinton Hill checking in… Born and raised in northern NJ, I’ve lived in much of the Northeast but have travelled all over the country. Sorry, but I’m an east-coast snob. The people are smarter, the culture is better, the politics are blue-er, and I like snow.
Well, I’m from the midwest and find east coasters (NYers and Bostonites, esp) to be needlessly full of themselves. I’ve been pretty disappointed after nearly four years in New York of not finding more of an “underground” scene. I think since the Tompkins Park riots, the scene for artists, musicians, anarchists, etc has sort of dissapated. Which must be why I hear about these enclaves popping up further upstate. I met as many cool, creative people living in Chicago and St. Louis as I have in New York.
Maybe I’m just jaded because most of the “artists” I know here are people that do it for fame and money, not for the love.
And we love snow in the midwest, too!
Massachusetts – just outside of Boston. Was Eurrailing across Europe, met and fell in love with a dark broody man from around here and just ended up here (with him).
I live in Bergen on the west coast of Norway. Why? Why not?
A couple of pics from the waterfront:
Oh, how lovely, Sirocco! My first time seeing beautiful Norway like this. Thank you so much for posting these pictures!
My pleasure – glad you liked ’em! Here’s a bonus picture, which I believe I may have posted before:
Oooh, another one! Keep ’em coming, Sirocco! Any time you do a diary, or post in an open thread, just throw a pic in there for extra points. LOL!
So you can’t get enough? 😉 OK, here’s from New Year’s Eve as viewed from Mt. Fløyen, to where a light trail leads on the uppermost photo above. A funicular climbs up there at a steep angle, and there’s a restaurant on the top.
On 2nd thought, that probably isn’t New Year’s. Oh, well.
Sirocco,
That’s almost cruel with the pictures.
While Bergen is not the town where I grew up, I do miss the close to 5 years spent there to get my degree way back when…
But back with a vengance this summer. Will spend 4-5 days of the vacation for the Oslo-Bergen rail trip, fjords and the whole spiel (my American gf will join, hence the need to do the touristy thing on home turf).
My husband’s people are from Loten and Olso. I would love to visit there.
Those are the Olympic Mts in the background over where
SusanHu lives.
More Victoria
Live on Cotile Lake and work in Alexandria (Cenla). Just call me, CH. Cat-Herder (attorney-wrangler) and Computer-Healer (network of five offices) by day, fishing widow and snake-trainer (teenage daughter) by night.
Came to Louisiana 28 years ago when my career Army officer dad turned down a job at the Pentagon and was banished (er, transferred) to Fort Humbug, a National Guard facility around Shreveport.
Cenla is cool in that it is low-key unlike New Orleans or Baton Rouge, and not a part of East Texas like Shreveport. I still have to travel to NO and BR with some frequency because of the job thing, but mostly I get to enjoy 9 months of summer. This year we had almost a whole month of spring (instead of the 3 or 4 days we usually have), so that means only 2 months of winter.
Today, outside my office window, the Delta Queen has been docked all day. They conduct Civil War paddle-wheel tours from St. Louis and Memphis that take them down the Red River to the Mississippi and onto New Orleans stopping along the way to visit battlefields and other historic locales.
When I get home, it will still be a balmy 80-something degrees (high today was 86), it will still be daylight and then, I’ll have a nice sunset to look forward to.
If you subtract the angst of being around attorneys all day and having a very un-representative government, I say that this was a fine day to be alive and on planet Earth.
Boo–Sorry that the sinuses are grieving you.
Personally, nine months of summer sounds like hell to me, as does 86 degrees in April (and presumably muggy to boot). Nine months of spring could be okay, as long is it’s not the rainy spring. Basically, 68 and partly cloudy every day, with a visit to someplace snowy once a year, would be perfect for me. 🙂
Alan
Maverick Leftist
9 months of Spring would just be too much to ask for.
You are right about the mugginess of it all…particularly oppressive when it is still 90 degrees at 10pm. Then, I do get a bit run down.
Thank goodness for central a/c.
I grew up in Chapel Hill, NC, without A/C at home and I had A/C at school only for elementary school–my junior high was the only non air-conditioned school in the district, and it was hellish, let me tell you. Never again! We get plenty of muggy heat here in Missouri in the summer, and though we don’t have central A/C, we most definitely use a window unit in the room we are in at any given time.
Alan
Maverick Leftist
Tucson, Arizona here! (as I’ve mentioned before in posts) I moved to the Old Pueblo for schooling at the University of Arizona and decided to make it my home after graduation. I love the people, the culture and the fact that it’s 5-10 degrees cooler than the Phoenix area which is closer to my permanent home. Here’s a pic of what I see when I sit outside of my parents’ house in Superior, Arizona (where I am 7th generation).
Gorgeous!
My best friend lives in Globe, and I was just out there visiting about two months ago. You live in a very beautiful state!
Wow, what a small world!
“Wow, what a small world”. Yeah, but I wouldn’t want to paint it…lol!
Me neither, but I bet there would be alot of color. 🙂
Just north of San Francisco in Marin County…
Came to Oakland, California with the Army in 1974, married a native and stayed. Divorced the first and married a second native Californian. I had travelled the western US as a kid with my family and really liked this area.
Despite marriage I would probably have stayed anyway…beautiful country, wonderful and open people, liberal politics, wine country.
…okay so lousy football and baseball currently but we’ve had some good football years!
Go Niners! (I hope).
Del Mar, CA. where I manage a luxury apartment complex one block(most apartments have views of ocean) to the beach. I laso live there. Great job and 0 rent! I moved to CA three years ago after living on Kauai for eight years. Kauai is the most beautiful place on earth. Majestic sunsets, aquablue waters that are warm year round, fabulous people. I miss it alot but after 9/11 decided it was time to be closer to my darling grand daughter. I thought I would have a stroke the first year back driving the freeways but have adjusted. I ma fortunate to have a 10 second commute to the office.
Alohaleezy! You lived on Kauai!!? And you LEFT?! {gasp}
😉
I’ve been there once, three years ago. A dear friend of mine and his fiancee decided, after much research, to get married there, so hubby and I went as Matron Of Honor and Best Man. We were there 8 days and I did NOT want to come back. It’s the most gorgeous place I have ever seen, either personally or in pictures, and I still miss the people and warmth of the place to this day. I will go back, and soon, too. I fell in love immediately.
MM…know exactly what you felt about Kauai. I too went there for a vacation. Went home(with ex) sold everything and moved there three months later. If you ever need suggestions for places to stay or things to see /do just let me know. I was in property management there and we did vacation rentals and long term leasing for private owners. The owner and I are still very close(I was back last April and she tried to get me to stay). We have great condos and homes for rent in Poipu(the south shore where it is sunny most of the time).
and Oahu and Hawaii for another week, and never wanted to leave… even though I got carsick on the Hana Highway… ripe fruit falling off the trees and onto the road everywhere you look…
Actually flew there 1 month post 9/11 when it was considered a brave thing to do…
Leezy, that’s too funny, because while we were on Kauai, our main topic of discussion was how we could move there. LOL! The woman who did our hair and makeup for the wedding was originally from Mass. – she and her husband and daughter went for vacation, fell in love, went home and rented their house out and packed up everything, and moved there permanently.
I will most definitely get in touch with you when we start planning our next trip out there. Anything you can tell me would be appreciated more than you know! The Poipu area is so beautiful and we’d definitely stay on that end. We stayed at the Kauai Marriott right near Lihue when we were there in 2002 and it was lovely, but pricey! Next time we go, it’ll be on a much more realistic, we’re-paying-for-this-trip-ourselves kinda deal. 😉
Thank you so much for your sweet offer of help!
That’s the actual view from my living room window… and it’s not Las Vegas!
Ohhhhh! That is so beautiful!
You people are making me seriously jealous. Kauai, Norway, Paris…. we have some very blessed Boomen and women here to live in such wonderful places!
jealous & bitter party of 1 please…jealous & bitter party of 1.
I’ve got you beat – I can see the Fargodome from my window:)
How lucky you are to live so close to Busch Gardens!
OOOH, the only other place I’d wish to live! I’m thinking of returning the Statue of Liberty. We don’t seem to have much use for it these days. (Sad, too sad.)
North Florida Panhandle, tri-state area of Alabama, Georgia, and of course FL.
Farming community, and lots of fishing. Just bought property on the back feed waters of Lake Seminole, all spring fed, with white sand bottoms. The well water is crystal clear and sweet as can be.
About an hour and a half from the beaches, and that’s close enough, way too many people there these days, not like it used to be.
I live about 5 minutes from MSO, although I have never meet her. Me..Los Angeles, California…Swimmin pools, Movie Stars, and an Asshole Governor.
I lived in LA for 11 years (WeHo, Playa del Rey, Hollywood & Burbank).
Moved back to Toronto with my Yank hubby (Albany via Philly – Go Eagles!) 3 years ago.
(Can’t beat T.O. summers, but damn I miss the LA winters… what was I thinking?) 😉
this diary is working out great! I love all the pictures.
Time to turn it into a mojo fest!!!
Done.
I live in Lyon, France, close to this place:
And all Boomaniacs are welcome!
Okay, you are creating a serious risk of me showing up on your doorstep! J’adore your country. Rocamadour is a particular favorite of mine, but your place looks wonderful as well!
I accept the risk! By the way, Lyon is known for being the capital of the french cuisine…
Here is another picture taken from the top of one of the city’s hills:
Oh my God! That is beautiful!
I’m going to be in this diary all day just gazing at the lovely pictures.
Foothills above Boulder, The Peoples Republic of, Co.
Stopped here 35 yrs. ago on the way to northern Ca…never got over the mountains.
Nope…Alfred Packer was kind enough to leave some “snacks” in the fridge.
My Mother used to work at Colorado College. The students called the dining room “Packer Hall”.
Mmmmmmm.
Went to Law School there. When you live there you get used to how spectacular a vista the flatirons are. Love to live there now.
You never get used to it.
Every time I come over Davidson Mesa and see Boulder in the valley below I have an enormous sense of having come home.
It is a very special place for me and I have been blessed to have been a part of it.
Remember Niwots curse?
Law School lol
I do know I’m much more appreciative of the view on my rare visits there now.
I’m from Denver and I worked in Boulder for 3 years. I can still picture the view as you drive into Boulder on US 36.
Have Broomfield, Superior and Boulder merged into one yet? It was growing like crazy the last time I was there.
The greenbelt around Boulder ensures that 1) Broomfield will never touch Boulder and 2) that Boulder housing prices will remain stratospherically high.
The little white arrow (its hard to make out because I had to resize the image) points to the building I work in. I’m orginally from Denver, CO and moved out here from LA last year. The jump from 70 to -30 was a bit of a shock.
L.A. to Fargo????
Did ya just like the movie that much? Ya . . . sure, ya betcha.
Much of my family is from North Dakota and I lived in Billings, Montana for a number of years. I can not believe how similar they look.
It’s all about perspective I guess, my favorite season has always been winter. I moved to LA because it’s Best Software (my specialty) country and finding a job was easy, but the area just wasn’t for me. I knew it was time to leave when I was taking 3 hour trips on the weekends just to find snow.
I didn’t see the movie Fargo until I found a job here. I was disappointed to find out that only the opening seen takes place in Fargo, but the movie was still really good.
but I’m guarding my online identity… possible career repercussions… It probably wouldn’t be too hard to figure out, but lets just say that I’m a southerner and have been all of my life. This is a winter picture from a place not very far from my home:
Downtown Princeton, New Jersey.
Princeton campus.
Yeah I love that campus. Had a tour there once by an alum.
saw the Dead on campus in 1970. There was a bomb scare, and we all stood around smoking for several hours while they totally dismantled the stage, and set it back up again. No bomb. They opened with “Truckin”
I used to have the tape. Great ‘Love Light’ with Pig Pen.
I also have 3 or 4 trophies I won for playing awesome hoops in that gym.
Upstate NY.
Grew up in CO though and lived there until 1988.
Another Brooklynite here. Born and raised in Manhattan (summers in NW New Jersey), and after school in Massachusetts, I made the leap across the lower East River (which as some non New Yorkers might not know, is not a river at all, but a tidal estuary) over to Brooklyn, where I’ve lived for the past sixteen years now. Still work in Manhattan, though.
Why am I here? Mostly out of sheer laziness, at this point. If I ever figure out what I really want to do with my life, perhaps I’ll move elsewhere. Of course, I’ve been saying almost the exact same thing since the days of Bush père, which leads right back to the laziness factor.
I have no pictures available, but suffice it to say that I used to be able to see the World Trade Center from my living room window, along with the Statue of Liberty (which is still there, last time I checked).
On a dirt road at the edge of the Everglades. Literally. My home is a 2-1/2 acre fruit tree farm. We raise lychees, longans, tangelos, and 2 kinds of tangerines. Our trees just finished blooming so the night air is no longer heady with their perfume.
All down the paved road that takes me to the 2-lane highway that takes me to the feeder road, that takes me to town — Miami suburbs — are mango and avocado growers.
Nearest neighbor 1/4 mile away. The windows are open tonight, the frogs are singing, the radio’s transmitting Good News for Modern Marlins Fans (that’s me); we just spanked the Mets 9-2.
There will be a full moon Sunday and it will be so brilliant that I will be able to go outside after nightfall and see color. There are a million more stars than you realize because no ground-lume stifles them.
A strange bird we can’t identify (l o n g yellow beak, black body, short tail, melodious and varied song — someone’s pet mynah?) is nesting in a dead palm tree stump outside my kitchen window. Two years ago a family of red-headed woodpeckers raised two chicks there.
It’s peaceful but noisey. Later tonight my sleep will be interrupted when the mockingbird sings; then the whippoorwill; then just after dawn the female marsh hawk will soar and whistle, whisking just above the Bahama grass.
It will be another full day of sunshine, popcorn clouds, and Trade Winds. My private hell.
The name says it all.
Since everyone is posting pictures – these are from my “back porch”.
More great pictures!
Seattle looks beautiful, like all the other places everyone’s posting pics of! I don’t want to be at work today. I want to be in Seattle.
Or Fargo.
Or Kauai.
Or North Dakota.
Or Paris.
Or Norway.
Or Lyon.
😉
Surprise, AZ
ya, retirement paradise! Grew up in Hubert H. Humphrey country (Minnesota). Hate the winters there but we do go up in the summer to make sure the repugs have not stolen our farm. We are soooo norsky so really enjoyed the photos. Our relatives were from Trondheim. Do Norway Norwegians make lefse, rosettes,
flat bread etc? How about lutefisk? (Yuk!)
All of that and polar bears walking the streets…
Just kidding.
Read a book a few years ago by some norsky from Minnesota, most of it making fun of exactly lefse and lutefisk.
My grandmother was an excellent lefse baker. Passed away less than 3 years ago, well into her 90s.
Austin, Texas, that is! I’m a third-generation Southern Californian who ended up in Hawaii for 10 years– Oahu, the unsung paradise. Came to Austin for economic and academic reasons, but stayed for the bluebonnets, the music, the funky neon on Burnet Road, and the weird, wonderful people. Met a sweet Southern boy, and we’ve been happy ever after!
This is me– Sandia Blanca– apologizing to my husband– Noisy Gong– who is the “sweet Southern boy” referenced in the above comment. Sorry, hon, didn’t notice that you were still logged on to BooMan.
“Keep Austin Weird”
I live in Cluj-Napoca, Romania which is in the heart of Transylvania. Yep, that Transylvania.
Picture is from Braşov, which I go to about once a month for rest and relaxation. Absolutely the most beautiful city in Romania.
Pax
We’re famous for our bluebonnets in this part of the world. Here’s a pic I took last Spring up around Llano somewhere . . .
mountains, trees, water, deer to eat.
came for the music …um…the fiddler, and stayed.
here’s a view on one of my routes to a job that i’ve been working.
hope you feel better soon, BooM. Best chili I ever ate was so hot that if it had been so tasty, one would not have been able to eat it.
I moved here in 1988 for a job with the local newspaper and stayed through retirement in 2003. I live 10 minutes from Magens Bay Beach, a mile of paradise, which I call St. Thomas’ living room — at least for us locals.
I visit my family in Stamford, CT, and College Park, MD, every summer, preferably during hurricane season.
It’s Carnival season, so come for a visit. The local culture is fascinating and the West Indians are warm and friendly.
Phoenix,Az. After 20 yrs in Vegas had to slide down here in ’90/’91 due to the building shutdown. Still
hangin’ around…
I live a 5 minute bike ride from this beach where the sun rises.
This is the view at the end of main street in my town.
Mount Baker, active volcano in Washington State.
Reminiscent of the view from Point Roberts. 🙂
Alan
Maverick Leftist
Sonoma County California in the north east part and nearby Santa Rosa. It’s mountainous wine country. I try always to live in sight of Mount St. Helena. San Francisco where I lived for years is my City.
Mt. St. Helena in winter above the grape vines.
Terrific bookstore in Sonoma — Readers Books, just off the main square. Independent, locally owned, literate folks.
And good beer at the brew pub nearby. My brother and his family live out St. Helena rd. outside town (“Monan’s Rill” community). Just visited them at Easter.
Fargo also! Small world,huh?? This is my first comment ever and I’m a little overwhelmed. Been reading at dkos forever but am too much of a newbie for that fast pace.The diary will probably be gone before I get this figured out. My computer skills are IFFY at best. Greetings to all from North Dakota. Sorry, but the “why” I live here would take some therapy.
Before you know it you’ll be posting pictures in pretty multicolored boxes. Perhaps even pictures of pretty oxes, er, oxen.
I went to Fargo one time (about a million years ago) for the weekend – from Dallas! Lots of driving like maniacs, and oh yes, nailed for speeding by an airplane in Kansas on the way. All I really remember about North Dakota was that it was snowmelt time and a lot of the roads were washed out. Since we were driving like maniacs in the dark, and the only warnings of washed out roads were unlighted sawhorses about 6 feet in front of the washouts, we were sure we weren’t going to survive the adventure. But by some miracle we did.
Thanks for the warm welcome.
I would not wait up for those pretty multicolored boxes though. Maybe next year,ha.
Ah yes. Spring in Fargo is always a matter of dodging the RED(river) bullet. It can produce huge floods.
What are the chances of having more then one member of this site from Fargo?
Your computer skills seem fine to me, you figured out how to post a comment. If I can survive at dKos, anyone can:)
Really. They would be staggering. Especially since I’ve
been told more than once that I’m the ONLY democrat in
town. That would certainly be my experience. All friends,
card group, bunco group–all republican. Ugg. It’s “hard
work” being a liberal here. Been lurking at Kos and here
for awhile. Saw your 70 degrees in Fargo there. WOW is
right. This seems a more reasonable place for me to
learn. Like posting pics, saw that someplace here…
But I know there’s at least 40 of us here.
The easiest way to post a picture is to upload your picture to Photo Bucket(you need to sign up for a free account) After you follow their instructions on uploading a picture, copy the Tag information:
Then paste it into the comment section:
After you are done, select post.
Let me if this doesn’t work, or doesn’t make sense.
You, sir (or ma’am) have changed my life, as I could never figure out how to post pics before and now I am LOVING posting my pics! 🙂
Here’s a Santa Fe pic for you as a token of my thanks (I don’t live there, but love to visit!):
Get your feet wet and post a comment on the diary Tell us about you.
Glad to have you here and don’t be afraid to comment, we are pretty laid back for the most part and we need more posters on here.
Will do-soon. Working on 2nd plugged kitchen sink in 2 weeks. None for the last 20 years in this house- hmm. The daughter in minneapolis is worried that 50 yr old MOM will give out too much personal info on the internets. Role reversal- priceless.
Yeah, I get role reversal plenty with my children all over 23. But I know more about computers and the internet than they do, so they don’t bug me about posting personal info, just too much time online and too much time blogging.
Just love any sort of plumbing problems myself, not really. Our house is old so we can count on some sort of problem every six months, I’ve kept track.
FWIW I find it a lot easier to comment on this site than DK, which I am very timid about. I Have gotten flamed there a time or two.
Just goes to show with a little Google Images search, you can find a positive angle on just about anywhere, LOL.
As the site whence came the nature photos states, “Located just a few miles west of Kirksville (which itself is in the middle of nowhere north Missouri), Thousand Hills State Park actually very nice area and a very welcome break from the farmland and hoosiers that are so common in this part of the state. =)”
But we do have a nationally recognised university and medical school, which keeps people (students and professors) coming in from far flung locales and thus vastly improves the local culture from what it would be without them. Though there are some aspects of the “heartland values” that are nice, like people waving to each other and smiling, regardless of whether they know each other or not. My wife, who moved here from Seattle to be with me, spent five or six years agitating to leave. Now that I’m about ready to get out of here myself, she has grown attached to the town! Go figure.
Alan
Maverick Leftist
On the island of Gozo, Malta. Great sunsets over the Mediterranean, very old architecture with a tremendous amount of history, and a pretty laid back lifestyle. Easy to get pretty much anywhere when necessary.
I can’t seem to get a picture embedded, or I would post one with the view from my balcony.
Oh, please do, Wayward, whenever you can. I’d love to see your beautiful island.
OK, with a little help from the techies, will do.
I tried to embed one that I have uploaded to WebShots using the following:
<img src="http://image32.webshots.com/32/4/85/72/287548572Wduixa_ph.jpg">
with the box at the bottom showing AutoFormat. No good.
So what am I doing wrong?
I tried just removing the quotes:
irc src=ttp://image32.webshots.com/32/4/85/72/287548572Wduixa_ph.jpg (in angle brackets)
Make that, of course, “http” Accidentally erased the “h”
That’s it! That is my backyard. Thank you very much, Denver.
Beautiful!!
So, when’s the party, Wayward? We’re all coming. 😉
Any time! Always keep the necessaries on hand just in case! 😉
Seriously, we would love to have folks come by for a visit. We live in a small village of about 1200 people, and it stays really quiet most of the time; however the whole island is only 24 sq. miles, so nothing is very far away. Lots to explore, great hiking trails around the coast, and some pretty nice restaurants when one needs to rest the tired feet.
So come on over!
Wayward,
What’s the language on Malta? I got curious about size and configuration, looked at MapQuest, and the names (except for Victoria) seem to be Italian or perhaps the Moorish-influence seen in eastern Spain. Lots of Xs. Intriguing. And there’s that beautiful old stone tower in your picture . . .
Maltese and English are both official languages. English because it was a British protectorate until the mid 60s; Maltese is Arabic in origin, but has really become a polyglot with many words from just about every European language. Both are taught in schools.
The towers are all over the place – they were built by the Knights of St. John back in the 16th century when Turkish troops laid seige to the islands for three years. Many of the buildings here date back 400-500 years, and are still in use today. The Citadel the knights built in Victoria houses the main cathedral and the Law Courts. We have several pagan temples that reach back 5,000 years, but we don’t use them anymore. 😉
Run a Google images for Malta photos and you will get a slew of interesting pictures.
After I wrote my query, I remembered about the Knights of Malta stuff. The cross roads of the then-known world in the 12th or so century. It sounds as if Maltese as polyglot language is like Mallorqeen, if that’s how you spell it. Lots of Catalan, French, Italian, Arabic and god knows what else.
Off to Google for the pix.
Sorry I couldn’t come over to see you while I was in Malta!
but it just means you have a reason to come back down for a bit of a holiday. Boomaniacs and Kossacks are always welcome – I have a spare room, and always a cold beer and some nice wines on hand.
I hope I will find an opportunity to come back to Malta. I enjoyed it so much, even if I only managed to walk around Valetta and to visit Mdina. I had a very nice diner in a fish restaurant in Marsaskala, as well.
Maybe I can help you as just mastered this yesterday.
http://www.picturetrail.com/
is a good place to upload pics if you don’t have one.
So after you upload to that site, you can get a URL for pic.
To submit the pics. here
and you do use the ” marks, don’t use auto format, I don’t know what that does.
So here is the code I used to post a pic.
(jpg should be before the “> where the x’s are.
You can test if it’s working or not by looking at preview before posting.
I couldn’t post pics until I used the picture trail site.
Anyway the above method works for me, so I hope it helps.
Well the code I put didn’t come out right on posting, but here is a url for a pic, try it out,
http://pic15.picturetrail.com/VOL609/3507525/7211853/93770852.jpg
just insert above code below and see if it works for you on preview.
To use the picture trail site you have to first save the pic. on your computer and then upload to Picture trail to get the URL.
I have been using WebShots, but having trouble with it. I will give picturetrail a try. Thanks.
I thought everybody knew that by now. 🙂
We moved here from Austin, Texas in 1991 and have no intention of ever moving anyplace else. When we lost our jobs and a house in Austin we started thinking about places we could live where we the heat wouldn’t be so oppressive, the fire ants would be nonexistent and there might be some work. We finally settled on Seattle because my wife’s sister lived here so we at least had someone we knew nearby, and because frankly after eight years of hot, horrible summers Rain City was sounding pretty good. One of the first things we did here was have Thanksgiving dinner with some friends of my sister-in-law, a family headed by a big kind-hearted bear of a man we were lucky to know before he died a few years ago.
You may wonder why a guy from Seattle calls himself “Our Man In Redmond.” Hey, that sounds like a good subject for another one of these roll call diaries. Stories behind the screen names. What do you think, Booman?
Here’s mine
Seattle’s Green Lake, a little urban oasis surrounded by an Olmstead park (the same guy responsible for Manhattan’s Central Park). This was shot within about a mile of my house.
I love Seattle. My brother lives in Bellevue. He drops us off on Capital Hill but he won’t go there.
I’ve encountered that fear of Capitol Hill among suburbanites too–so bizarre! I don’t know if it’s the street kids with mohawks or the regular homeless people that bothers them. Still, it doesn’t strike me as a very dangerous area. (When I moved to U District for a few months in ’97, I was coming from Jersey City, NJ, so it’s all relative.)
Alan
Maverick Leftist
Mostly Denver, but we get away on the weekends to this:
from my patio.
Do get well.
I blog out of ~americanEntropy!
And I run the web site for a local action group Wake Up & Act
I live here for school (College of Charleston) I’m org. from Cincy, Ohio. I have no plans to stay in the south after graduation. In fact I can’t wait to leave…
in the East Bay across from San Francisco. Born and bred in Allentown PA where they’re closing all the factories down…
In, um, Venice Beach.
Los Angeles born and bred – and in love with the beaches, and the Santa Monica Mountains.
Started out in Wisconsin on the Mississippi and have lived in 8 different states, some several times making that about 17 times I’ve moved in/out of various states. Always tiny towns. I can tell you Hollywood has nothing on small towns for sex/drugs and people being on their 3rd or 4th marriages.
I’ve lived up in a national forest in Montana in a beautiful log cabin/no electricity/outhouse and middle of desert in Arizona, next to a cat house in Nevada and in Charlotte, N.C. when women still wore dresses and gloves to go shopping in the late 60’s.(so I looked kinda funny in my wild hippie bell bottom pants). And in a place that wasn’t even on the map at the time.
I now have the misfortune to live in Taft, Ca. which is some 30 miles from Bakersfield. Smoggy-90% of the time you don’t know there’s mountains around here due to the smog, smells of oil as it is the heart of oilfield country…basically redneck Ca. I live here due to my health as my sister lives here and has to help me with lots of things.
Not sure where I’d like to live except it would have to be much more liberal and rainy/cloudy/foggy at times and near the ocean, in any country, would love that.
.
Roots in Créve Coeur, Missouri
Living and laboring in the Netherlands – and loving it!
Peace Palace – International Court of Justice –
Donated by American philanthropist Carnegie around 1903.
[Decision Israeli security fence on West Bank – 2004]
Near the city of Amsterdam , Anne Frank’s House and its Rembrandt museum.
Travel the route through the fields of flowers – Keukenhof.
Visit Leiden University where my daughter studied and Constantijn Huygens.
Still have close watch on US support in Iraq & Afghanistan.
Spending too much time on BooMan Tribune and less on dKos.
Never thought I would still be blogging after Nov. 2, 2004 because our president would be JFK.
Only advantage though – a chance to meet some very kind persons at BT.
In weekends have date with field hockey as a club referee. Is a TOP level sport for men and women, the Dutch winning many World Cups and Olympic Gold.
A favorite Dutch politician, and acquaintance, who has moved on to a new job.
Oui – Liberté – Egalité – Fraternité
I live in Columbus, Ohio because I couldn’t find a job anywhere else after I graduated from The Ohio State University. I would like to move to Phoenix, Seattle, or Vancouver some day.
within sight of Penobscot Bay. Don’t have any pix of my own that I can post, but these show one of the boats we see around here a lot. Sweet little day sailer, beautifully balanced and easy to sail.
We have 2-3 months of lovely weather for sailing and such, then 8-9 months of winter. It’s a beautiful place, and gratifyingly blue politically, but remote and hard to get there from here.
I live in the armpit of California…and me no likey!
Heh, that made me chuckle. Have a 4! 🙂
I thought I lived in the armpit of Ca…which is the Bakersfield area. Anywhere close?
Where exactly is the armpit of Cal. Has my head spinning to try to guess, could it be Sacramento.
This is where I work.
It’s a really poor shot taken from my phone camera but you can just make out the Chicago river and if you squint maybe you can see Lake Michigan. You can barely see the Wrigley building on a turn in the river.