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As probably one of the only people posting here who has lived in both cities, I feel qualified to comment. San Francisco is great in many ways, but it's also filthy (I like all the needles everywhere) and way overpriced for what you get. Add in overcrowded and stressful and did I mention filthy? I do miss the weather, though. And the air over S.F. was usually crystal clear, because the wind blew all the nasty yellow-brown smog over to Oakland. No, really...I saw it almost every day from in front of my apartment building.
Pittsburgh has a litter problem and a lot of the older buildings are stained black from the old days, but the quality of life is so much better here that there's really no contest. If I didn't live in either place, I'd much rather take a vacation in San Francisco, and who knows...with a seven-figure income, I could afford a weekend place in the Bay Area to fly to in my private jet.
P.S....the smugness is one of the things I'm SO glad to be away from. The West Coast is so overrated it's not funny anymore, if it ever was. It's good to be back East after ten years.
Pittsburgh. The people in western PA seem to be cordial at worst and friendly on occasion. They are anything but overbearing or superficial, both qualities I find detestable in my current home of Kansas City. And when I visit Pittsburgh I always get a smile or two from the women in stores or at hotel check in.
Pittsburgh also has a fairly decent mass transit system including a couple of subway lines. And it has top notch culture and entertainment for a metro area of its size.
The only negative issue would be the roads and Steelers. With all due respect to the citizens of the Pittsburgh region, your roads are in dire need of repair. And the Miami Dolphins of the early 70's are the greatest NFL team at least since the inception of the Super Bowl. :-)
I guess I don't get know your version of "quality" time but he lives/works in Omaha where he spends and overwhelming majority of his time.
Also, I seriously doubt he owns two homes in Laguna Beach. Maybe an investment property at best...that wouldn't even make sense. I watched an hour long interview on CNN of Warren Buffet and he doesn't even drive a brand new car let alone owning two homes in CA.
He does have two homes in Laguna Beach. One in which his wife lives, and one in which his mistress lives. He isn't exactly who you think he is. I love the guy, but he is an atheist adulterer. And a guy who owns homes in Laguna beach- and spends time there.
chicago vs. detroit
seattle vs. cleveland
boston vs. cincinnati
washington vs. st. louis
Detecting your sarcasm, Pittsburgh is the only city in the country, with the possible exception of Seattle, which even remotely reminds me of San Francisco. More so than Seattle, which is way too sanitized and bland. San Francisco and Pittsburgh both have that hilly, gritty, Victorian, European cable-car thing going on, with Pittsburgh being the more European of the two, it having a substantial population of actual Europeans. A plus: Pittsburgh has trees, and lots of them. It also has twice as many steps, so there!
I am interested in Pittsburgh, but at the end of the day, it has little to no name recognition nationally or internationally.
You tell someone you live in San Francisco, and they say 'wow'. You say you live in Pittsburgh, and you get 'oh' with no follow-up whatsoever.
Main thing though is San Francisco has better weather, international people, an incredibly wide diversity of a multitude of international restaurants, microclimates all over the city, and well, tons of really really cool stuff.
I use to live in San Francisco, and the ONLY reason I left and have no desire to go back, is the HIGH prices, and that is the ONLY reason. I should mention the homeless problem was a huge annoyance as well, and mostly because without a decent income, you have to live around them. The wealthy don't have to deal with the city problems so much.
If someone had a 7-digit income, you would WANT to be in a city that offers you everything you can imagine, and SF does that.
You tell someone you live in San Francisco, and they say 'wow'. You say you live in Pittsburgh, and you get 'oh' with no follow-up whatsoever.
.
And that is part of the problem with SF; the smug, egocentric attitudes of mostly transplants who think they're the sh*t b/c of where the live now. I grew up near SF and I can't stand some of the people in that bubble.
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