Ohio in general? (Columbus, Cleveland, Cincinnati: 2009, lofts, credit)

[MaryBeth2]

Originally Posted by Beavercreek33

Great ending to your post, Cosmic. If only everyone else on these boards realized that no place is perfect, and every single place out there has its problems.

I think the trick is to find the place you can put up with. Extreme cold or extreme hot, one of them is easier to put up with for everybody.

[Beavercreek33]

Originally Posted by MaryBeth2

I think the trick is to find the place you can put up with. Extreme cold or extreme hot, one of them is easier to put up with for everybody.

Thats very true. Its just interesting to listen to the people in most of the different state forums that I go to, and someone has something to complain about.

[MaryBeth2]

Originally Posted by Beavercreek33

Thats very true. Its just interesting to listen to the people in most of the different state forums that I go to, and someone has something to complain about.

Just like you guys were saying, no place is perfect.

[Cosmic]

Originally Posted by MaryBeth2

Just like you guys were saying, no place is perfect.

Unlike a lot of peeps I actually tried to find it very scientific. This last time when I got ready to move, I said I want the perfect place, a sort of Eden, as close to Paradise as I can get. And I considered the entire World as a place to move.

So I set down and made up a huge list of things I wanted, bigger list of things I did not want. This was actually before the Web was really available but I wanted to wait for the house prices to quit climbing, wanted to get the best money, little did I know it would take so long.

Anywho, the web came along and made the entire process easier. So I am sieving out all these choices, waiting for the housing boom to peak.

The one chuckle during all this time I saw this film on Trisant Du Cuna. An island down in the south atlantic, about as far away from anywhere as you can get. Should be Paradise, is totally isolated, you can't even fly there, nice peeps, easy life. Turns out you actually can't move there but it sort of became a "Standard" to judge other places. Trisant is miles from anywhere, down between the tips of Africa and South America.

So finally the housing boom got pretty ripe and I had to pick somewhere. All of them finally wound up being in the USA. Three spots in Ohio, one in NC, one in MD. It actually comes down to some pretty basic points once you go thru all the gyrations. And when I look back on the experience I probably would have to do it the same for all the same reasons. Ohio is a pretty nice spot when you consider all the options, including a lot of nasty things that can happen in other places, all the negatives, versus all the positives. There are a lot of possible situations to choose from.

I also have a bro who still travels the World for a living. Ships out as a ship's doctor on all sorts of ships. Goes to some very exotic places, mostly in the Pacific. So we still compare notes, places I've been long time ago, is it better, worse, where is he finding Paradise? That part is very interesting, nothing looks like that much Paradise once you get out of the USA any more, some of it is really dangerous, some real depressing, the World changed. He lives in IL but probably will consider coming back to Ohio once his working days are over. If he compares IL to Ohio, lots of things he does not like about his town in IL. Ohio looks wonderful looking back in a lot of scum holes outside the USA. Things you take for granted in Ohio, just don't happen in so many other places.

If you go back to Tristan, I continued to follow what happened there over the years. Not exactly Paradise, they have their own sets of problems, just they are different than most other place's problems. They did have a hurricane that far south, a super no-no for me. Their economy has been hurt by a number of things, sneaky boat type peeps get in and steal their fish, number of disasters, some man made, some nature. Would it be boring, don't know, still would like to visit some day. Maybe be careful of what you wish for. Plus I already had found out that living on any island can be a bit tough if you were not born on one.

So I have never found any place to move too that remotely looks like Paradise, not even close. What you can get is define your criterion, try to find that the best you can in the real World.

You do not have the natural disasters in general that can totally ruin your life in Ohio. You do not have the weather extremes that rules out so much of the World. Even in the USA those two criterion rule out a huge number of states. Those two alone rule out a lot of the World. Then it is a matter of picking and choosing what things really are important. In the end, every place is a set of compromises. Most will have their own types of problems sets. To me it works best if you really know what you want up front.

Maybe I will find out about this Paradise tomorrow. Ready to move quick, so far, nobody has convinced me some place is that much better than Ohio once you do the fine calculations and apply the right criterion. Everybody's selection can be different depending on what you are using as the selection criterion. One size does not fit all.

The other sort of truth is the World in general is not getting any better. The question is ....... Is your particular spot getting less worse than most of the other spots? Sad but that is becoming one way to look at it big picture.

In the end, no matter where you are, it comes down to balancing out life's hassles, choice of material goods, services, culture, amount of danger from all sources, versus what opportuntities there might be. The people do make a big difference. Lots of places you will avoid because of the political systems and all the controls that brings. Ohio is still pretty nice place to come home to, no matter where else you go. Least some particular spots of it are.

It does help to keep it all in some type of perspective.

[db108108]

The part about groceries are expensive, though. Have you tried FL, CA, MA lately. In OH we get strawberries cheaper than in FL, where they were grown. Everything is relative. Food in Ohio is cheap on balance. Pick about any big city in the USA and you get the typical drugs, street crime and dismal situations. I was in San Francisco last fall, talk about the charm definitely being gone.

There are many sections or regions of Ohio I would never live in. Will not attempt any of its bigger cities. It sure is not all pretty or progressive, you do have to pick your spots carefully. But I temper that with where else am I going to go? The sad part is a lot of the USA is a rotting hole.

Like have you tried Boston lately. Tell me about drugs, crime, horrible urban environments, been there done that. You will not get anybody in the MA forums to tell you the truth about that mess, same goes for most of New England.

I am still looking for the perfect place where Paradise is cheap, easy and nobody else has found it yet. And there ain't some nitwit with a gun or knife around every corner. Certain parts of Ohio you actually can go out without being surrounded by illegals enough to feel you are in some foreign country. They will even speak English if poked enough or drunk enough.

Ohio does not have any claim on small minds. When was the last time you were in New England, no shortages up that way. Not only wee minds, but they are convinced in their own deluded manner. All what floats the boat. Lots of areas are going into the crapper, Ohio is not alone. Sometimes you are picking the best of bad choices. The good olde dazes are gone for so much of the USA, maybe even the World.

I'm not from the United States, period. Groceries are expensive here. They're cheaper in Southern Ontario, which is sad considering that everything is imported for half of the year. I've lived in California, and yes, there are expensive places to buy groceries. But there are also dirt cheap places, and they're fairly common. Ohio lacks that, unless you count Aldi, but their produce if kind of gross.

I live in inner-city Columbus, by choice (because it's close to OSU). Groceries are outrageously expensive here, and a good portion of the people eat nothing but junk. It's really quite depressing, and I can't wait to get out. My choice has turned into a (kind of) nightmare.

There are some really cool things in Ohio, and the people are nice and usually genuine. But in all of the "Ohio is the best rah rah rah" banter, people lose sight that no, Ohio is not the best and that it is falling behind many other states in SO many areas. People need to take off the rose-coloured glasses and figure out how to fix things. There's something fundamentally wrong with a state where 9 out of 10 and 12 of 15 of its largest cities had a smaller population in 2008 than they did in 1970 (the ones with growth are Columbus, Lorain and Mentor, BTW). Cities are the life-blood of any state, yet most of Ohio's have been sent off to sink for decades.

[MaryBeth2]

Originally Posted by Cosmic

Unlike a lot of peeps I actually tried to find it very scientific. This last time when I got ready to move, I said I want the perfect place, a sort of Eden, as close to Paradise as I can get. And I considered the entire World as a place to move.

So I set down and made up a huge list of things I wanted, bigger list of things I did not want. This was actually before the Web was really available but I wanted to wait for the house prices to quit climbing, wanted to get the best money, little did I know it would take so long.

Anywho, the web came along and made the entire process easier. So I am sieving out all these choices, waiting for the housing boom to peak.

The one chuckle during all this time I saw this film on Trisant Du Cuna. An island down in the south atlantic, about as far away from anywhere as you can get. Should be Paradise, is totally isolated, you can't even fly there, nice peeps, easy life. Turns out you actually can't move there but it sort of became a "Standard" to judge other places. Trisant is miles from anywhere, down between the tips of Africa and South America.

So finally the housing boom got pretty ripe and I had to pick somewhere. All of them finally wound up being in the USA. Three spots in Ohio, one in NC, one in MD. It actually comes down to some pretty basic points once you go thru all the gyrations. And when I look back on the experience I probably would have to do it the same for all the same reasons. Ohio is a pretty nice spot when you consider all the options, including a lot of nasty things that can happen in other places, all the negatives, versus all the positives. There are a lot of possible situations to choose from.

I also have a bro who still travels the World for a living. Ships out as a ship's doctor on all sorts of ships. Goes to some very exotic places, mostly in the Pacific. So we still compare notes, places I've been long time ago, is it better, worse, where is he finding Paradise? That part is very interesting, nothing looks like that much Paradise once you get out of the USA any more, some of it is really dangerous, some real depressing, the World changed. He lives in IL but probably will consider coming back to Ohio once his working days are over. If he compares IL to Ohio, lots of things he does not like about his town in IL. Ohio looks wonderful looking back in a lot of scum holes outside the USA. Things you take for granted in Ohio, just don't happen in so many other places.

If you go back to Tristan, I continued to follow what happened there over the years. Not exactly Paradise, they have their own sets of problems, just they are different than most other place's problems. They did have a hurricane that far south, a super no-no for me. Their economy has been hurt by a number of things, sneaky boat type peeps get in and steal their fish, number of disasters, some man made, some nature. Would it be boring, don't know, still would like to visit some day. Maybe be careful of what you wish for. Plus I already had found out that living on any island can be a bit tough if you were not born on one.

So I have never found any place to move too that remotely looks like Paradise, not even close. What you can get is define your criterion, try to find that the best you can in the real World.

You do not have the natural disasters in general that can totally ruin your life in Ohio. You do not have the weather extremes that rules out so much of the World. Even in the USA those two criterion rule out a huge number of states. Those two alone rule out a lot of the World. Then it is a matter of picking and choosing what things really are important. In the end, every place is a set of compromises. Most will have their own types of problems sets. To me it works best if you really know what you want up front.

Maybe I will find out about this Paradise tomorrow. Ready to move quick, so far, nobody has convinced me some place is that much better than Ohio once you do the fine calculations and apply the right criterion. Everybody's selection can be different depending on what you are using as the selection criterion. One size does not fit all.

The other sort of truth is the World in general is not getting any better. The question is ....... Is your particular spot getting less worse than most of the other spots? Sad but that is becoming one way to look at it big picture.

In the end, no matter where you are, it comes down to balancing out life's hassles, choice of material goods, services, culture, amount of danger from all sources, versus what opportuntities there might be. The people do make a big difference. Lots of places you will avoid because of the political systems and all the controls that brings. Ohio is still pretty nice place to come home to, no matter where else you go. Least some particular spots of it are.

It does help to keep it all in some type of perspective.

I enjoyed reading your experiences, and found this sentence particularly curious, "Plus I already had found out that living on any island can be a bit tough if you were not born on one."
I agree with you so much. I've been here, in the South, putting up with hurricanes, till Ike. Ike was our last straw. Being from Ohio, we never put up with such things, I have got told every State has their problems, but you know I was born and raised in Ohio and had a good time, no evacuations and problems such as these. We are moving back, but only got transfered as far as Wv, now I am wondering about the hills, still I think we will be okay.

[Cosmic]

Originally Posted by MaryBeth2

I enjoyed reading your experiences, and found this sentence particularly curious, "Plus I already had found out that living on any island can be a bit tough if you were not born on one."
I agree with you so much. I've been here, in the South, putting up with hurricanes, till Ike. Ike was our last straw. Being from Ohio, we never put up with such things, I have got told every State has their problems, but you know I was born and raised in Ohio and had a good time, no evacuations and problems such as these. We are moving back, but only got transfered as far as Wv, now I am wondering about the hills, still I think we will be okay.

If you ask most peeps what they think will be Paradise, you always get this thing where they will name an island. But if you have much experience with islands, that can have some hickups. It is more than just kicking back with some fancy drink.

I've lived on a bunch of islands, including ones like England and Hawaii, even Guam. One thing always occurs after so much time passes. You start to get this feeling like cabin fever. It starts to feel very confined, something like a prison. Most folks claim it will feel safe but that is not always the case. Gets to be more like a big cage, you just want out for at least a while. Somewhere that the roads don't all go in a big circle. Lots of islands the peeps just live around the outer edges, the middle is a very steep hill, to get anywhere you fight all the other peeps on a road that is far, far too narrow and slow. Or you get very adventuresome and go up that hill, maybe only try it once. Traffic jams on islands are so, so different and you wind up saying, I moved here to avoid stress. Slow is the only choice.

The other thing about islands they are lil closed societies. What passes as the norm can be pretty brutal if the peeps are a bit on the closed minded side. You can get weird things like no competition for various type businesses, they are the only game in town, if you don't like it, try the next island over a zillion miles away. When they say not here, it has a different type meaning.

There is always limited something, things like land, water the things that can count in a very big way. In many island society historically folks did not "Own" things, it was more a shared community type thing, in a modern sense trying to "Own" whatever can be strange in some situations. Going native can become a must.

Things happen quicker if it starts to go sour. Like the economy is affected by whatever or any type of change. About like a small town, only you can't just walk away that easy. Somehow your World gets very tied to the boat that brings everything in. Guam lost all their birds. A tree snake got in from another part of the Pacific and started eating the bird eggs. Try as they might, could not stop the critter, problems when they occur have a way of really cooking off big, no place to run too, no way to hide. The place is designed to operate with only certain animals / plants / lifestyles.

Tourists go to Hawaii and claim they found Paradise. Little do they know. Of course they only stay two weeks so it might all seem wild, new and exciting, go explore this and that. But stay three weeks and it starts to dawn on them it is all going to repeat and repeat and repeat. There is not much new going to happen. The tourist bars, the dudes will just sing the same old trash night after night. Can be boring, very boring after you have seen the beach enough.

So be careful how you start to define Paradise, especially if you have some island in mind. Ohio might start to look very, very nice like it typically does from a distance. If your lil part of it is not exactly Paradise at the moment that can be changed by renting the U-Haul.

I had seriously considered moving to WV but it falls more into that category, nice place to visit but I really don't want to live there. Never did figure out where all that road money Senator Bryd brings home goes. I've been on some goat trails all over the World but WV definitely needs to do something about the road system. Ya'll can't get there from here, at least all that easy. Maybe bring that 4 wheel buggy in winter too.

I guess I would still like to visit Tristan Du Cuna one of these days. But could it ever be Paradise? It is a lot like every place you want to move too that will be so far better. Maybe a big part of it is the illusion in the mind. They are good at creating an atmosphere but the reality can be so far different.

[jam40jeff]

Originally Posted by Cosmic

If you ask most peeps what they think will be Paradise, you always get this thing where they will name an island. But if you have much experience with islands, that can have some hickups. It is more than just kicking back with some fancy drink.

Exactly, and I think that's what a lot of this "I want to move down South" hype is about as well.

[MaryBeth2]

Cosmic, that is so funny. You really painted a clear picture in my mind of Island life! lol

I can see your point, well.

I am concerned about Wv roads too. I just hope we will adjust, cause we are on our way.

Thanks for answering my curiousity.

jam40jeff, you know the saying, grass is always greener! lol

[Cosmic]

Originally Posted by jam40jeff

Exactly, and I think that's what a lot of this "I want to move down South" hype is about as well.

In the winter in Florida, seems like just about every other person is from Ohio. Some of them messed up and moved there.

Many of the super markets have this free coffee table up front. If you ask any of the ones that moved, if they think it was a good choice, they will always say yes, if the wife is present. The women never tell the truth.

But just let her go to do the shopping and he will tell you, I wish we never sold the house in Ohio, should just have come down for a few months in the winter. It is a totally different deal after about April.

I'm still looking for that guy that wants to move to Florida and sell some land cheap. About July in Florida, Ohio don't seem all that bad.