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It would be, anyway, if there were a beach nearby, and it snowed less, but who can complain given other choices in the state?
Anyway, I think my wife and I will be driving down in Aug, if the finances hold out, to take a peek around and experience the city. I graduate in December with a Bachelor in Computer Science and my wife is a licensed physical therapist. I'm thinking I can find a job out there in my field, and I KNOW my wife can get a job anywhere (lucky her).
So please, I'm wondering if anybody has some good tips for us thinking of moving out there? Cost of living doesn't seem too high compared to here ( Mid-Missouri ), and I'm sure jobs are as plentiful as the Kansas City area or St. Louis area, if not more so.
Some things I like to focus on: Internet broadband access. Good? Bad? I like a lot of choices, and really hate ISPs that put bandwidth caps ( cough Time Warner, cough). We also both have ATT for our cell providers and wonder how service is out there?
How is the education systems out there? I hope to make enough money to send our kids to a private school, but that may be a pipe dream and we want to live in a place that has good public education. Are there a lot of parks? I notice the nearest lake seems to be 50 miles north, but what about river parks? Are there sections cut off for swimming / boating, etc, or is it mostly commercial? What about water parks?
How is the traffic there? I see some threads about it, but does anybody have a good comparison. Obviously it can't be as bad as L.A, but anybody been to St. Louis and can compare the traffic with there?
If anybody has some good pictures or anything to link to I would greatly appreciate it. Also any other comments are welcome. Critical or praising. I know some people hate certain cities, so if you hate it, please still try to stay pleasant and civil about it. I hate Missouri so I can sympathize.
Thanks in advance, and hope to hear from everybody.
addendum: Neither my wife or I speak fluent spanish, in fact we only know about 30 words or so and very little grammar or structure. Needless to say, she is worried about moving to the south and having to have the requirements of speaking it for her job as a Physical Therapist. Anybody know if such requirements are widespread or non-existant?
Last edited by dpgtfc; 07-10-2008 at 04:31 PM..
Reason: added an addendum
Well, I'm a bit of a natural disaster freak, and comparatively, ABQ seems to have less than average, which is great. Also, the climate seems to be right up my ally. It is a big city (I like), but not too cramped like New York city. Also I have read that they have a lot of hiking and biking trails, which I really love. (I thought of living in Portland because of their wonderful climate and numerous bike trails, but tsunamis, earthquakes and volcanoes turn me off on that).
I also LOVE mountains. Only thing better is mountains and either oceans or lakes. Lake Tahoe looks lovely, but Nevada has way too high of a cost of living for a recent college graduate.
Oh, for others, just out of curiosity, I fancy homes that are somewhat efficient and dream of a earth contact home or semi-underground home with alternative back up power sources and I was wondering what sort of wind strength there is, and how often the wind blows. I gather there is a lot of sun, so a few solar panels will be good, but how windy it is depends on if investing in a personal wind mill or two is cost effective.
(FWIW I'm not a hippie, just interested in energy independence)
Internet access stinks out here. I have Qwest DSL and I'm so fed up with it that I'm seriously considering paying the extra $ for commercial grade cable broadband. Residential broadband isn't very good around here - ok if you're a casual user, but not if you have a home based biz that's on the computer regularly. And I don't even upload or download that much. I can only imagine how slow it would be for that.
But that's my only real gripe. I love everything else out here. OK, maybe not the idiot drivers who come to a complete stop before making a righthand turn, but that's for another discussion
Internet access stinks out here. I have Qwest DSL and I'm so fed up with it that I'm seriously considering paying the extra $ for commercial grade cable broadband. Residential broadband isn't very good around here - ok if you're a casual user, but not if you have a home based biz that's on the computer regularly. And I don't even upload or download that much. I can only imagine how slow it would be for that.
But that's my only real gripe. I love everything else out here. OK, maybe not the idiot drivers who come to a complete stop before making a righthand turn, but that's for another discussion
It may depend on where you live, but I'm not sure. I've had Qwest DSL for 5 years without a single problem. I've heard others say that Comcast is good as well.
I won't comment on the rest, but I will say that I have never had problems with my Comcast cable internet service... although I have heard others complain. I've had it for 5 years with very few issues.
How's Qwest DSL for speed? I'm enjoying 2Mbps out here in L.A., and hate to think about losing it.
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