Is it true that Oregon is like the redneck/hillybilly version of the West without city vibe of Seattle? (Portland: fit in, home)

[Silverfall]

Originally Posted by MitchArk87

Very funny about redneck jokes! I could live with rednecks and country folks. When I said rednecks, I really mean extremely toothless rednecks with shotgun weddings, trailer parks using bed sheets as curtains, cars on blocks, and property with full of junk and beer cans while proudly displaying racist (or confederate) flags

As a real estate agent I have seen a few of these kinds of places, but honestly not a lot.

[sarahkate_m]

Originally Posted by MitchArk87

Very funny about redneck jokes! I could live with rednecks and country folks. When I said rednecks, I really mean extremely toothless rednecks with shotgun weddings, trailer parks using bed sheets as curtains, cars on blocks, and property with full of junk and beer cans while proudly displaying racist (or confederate) flags like you see in most southern states like Mississippi, Alabama, Arkansas, and Tennessee. That wasn't and still isn't a pretty sight for me to see since I'm from the Midwest (Chicago and Indianapolis). We do have rednecks but nothing like that you know what I mean. That's why I am leaving the South plus I hate hot summers with humidity too! I'm in Arkansas not by choice but because of my job anyway.

Hmmm... Extremely toothless? Like the whole front row on top & possibly the bottom? You wouldn't like it here... We have HUMIDITY... at least west of the Cascades...

Kate

[delta07]

Originally Posted by sarahkate_m

Hmmm... Extremely toothless? Like the whole front row on top & possibly the bottom? You wouldn't like it here... We have HUMIDITY... at least west of the Cascades...

Kate

Truly there isn't much humidity, not like the south! If you can handle a few days that are slightly humid, I think you will find Oregon to your liking. Don't be discouraged by these comments.

[sarahkate_m]

Here's a site with a customizable graph for Eugene, OR... wunderground...

Weather Station History : Weather Underground

Think what you will... It is humid west of the cascades & presumably less so east of the cascades. This is a bit like a rainforest here. Ferns volunteer in the yard. Moss prevails. Moss has to be scrubbed & sanitized off of sidewalks & roof tops. The yards grow like a jungle.

It's also very crowded for the limited resources. Anyone with alot of money (disposable income with their own deep pockets) can live in luxury here.

Kate

[Stormport]

Thank you, John Shaft, for you inclusion of Aloha in your list of hot redneck areas in
Oregon. Let it be known to all, we, here in Aloha are rife with rednecks. We even have
redneck Mexicanos. People around here drive BIG, shiny, unblemished diesel pickups and
carry personal protection of various sorts. They even spit in the street. And at least one of
us (not me) from Minnesota likes to go out back and pick squirrels out of his trees with a
.22 short rifle. Even unto this. We have meth houses and dark narrow highways where,
after getting off a metro bus from school, a young married woman was struck by such a
pickup as mentioned above. The story goes that the unnamed driver stopped, got out and
looked around after hearing a sound like he had hit something. She was found some days
later in the weedy ditch. Move along, nothing happening here. Yeah, we got it all. Aloha is a
TERRIBLE place, don't come here (especially you, Beaverton). Oh yes, I should mention
that Aloha suffered great loss during the tail end of the realty boom as the late comers
hastily cleared stunning trees to create weed filled lots. If I were ever in my life to have done
murder, it would have been during that time. Aloha is unincorporated and the County is
proMetro inspired infill friendly with Metro's unsubstantiated one million new people in 20
years claim. When pressed, the County Board threw up its hands and blamed Metro, "We
can't do anything, it's Metro" at a board meeting. Yeah, this is a lousy rednecked unsavory
corner of the hillbilly state of Oregon. Please don't come here. As our old govenor, Tom
McCall, might have said, "Come! You're welcome in Oregon anytime! Please enjoy your
visit and we'll see you next year again". I would also like to enter a request for a butt-
breaking analysis of the archetype 'redneck'. Corn pickers and shuckers. For me, it is those
fellows in that old movie "Deliverance". Sort of your primal white guy, the essential cauc. If
these people truly exist in nature, the demise of the Neandertal with its larger brain is more
easily understood. They died of disgust of their neighbors. I find that my own nuance on
the word is a bit shifty. Could we have other models of the archetype? What are the basic
characteristics of a redneck? Was Ronald Reagan a redneck? I, myself, believe that to be
the case. Hence his appeal to basic Americans. Aloha is actually a great deal like America
as a whole. Fortunately, we usually get excellent and professional service from our County
deputies and smoke eaters which may not be like America as a whole. But the distribution
of human head configurations in Aloha is very similar to the distribution of whites in the rest
of America, I believe. But, just a few salient rednecks (whatever a 'redneck' is), and I think
people will invoke the tip of the iceberg rule. Since Aloha contains more than a few of these
basic Americans, that rule will hold true here. But, still, we are gaining a new national spice
and we will incorporate that into the stew. If nothing else, it is difficult to fault the work ethic
of these new folk. They have another flaw as well. They smile a lot and, generally, are
friendly and unafraid. That's disconcerting to me as a grouchy white guy. My Republican
neighbors predict trouble. They, also, on occasion will say the exact word-for-word
sentences when we are discussing the events of the day. Usually it turns out to be from the
talk radio station they listen to that reinforces their perception of reality as a priviliged but
ever hostile place, full of people who want to steal what you have. Everyone but the
corporations are thieves and worse. Kill granny? Just wait, corporate medicine will kill her
soon enough through preventable medical error. Celebrate trial lawyers. Without them,
American hospitals would be even greater death traps than they are now. Fancy does not
make it safe, in Medicine. Remember what "maximize profit" did to the American
automobile industry. An example might be if you need a 3-D scan. Our system will give you
a CAT scan and, if not good enough, you will receive an MRI scan. The CAT scan is much
cheaper. The MRI more detailed. The CAT scan gives you in a short time the equivalent
ionizing radiation to 100 standard chest x-rays (look it up). The MRI exposure for nonhead
scans is probably a couple of cell phone calls. There is almost a century of data on ionizing
radiation damage to tissue. When you are exposed to such radiation, the area so exposed
literally ages at an accelerated rate and the changes are irreversible. For some number of
mammograms (I have misplaced the stat) given, a certain number of breast cancers will be
generated according to well-tested statistical evidence. No such worry with MRI or, if there
is, the threshold is much higher than with ionizing radiation. With much study of tissue
interaction with varying magnetic fields and studies of cell phone users, microwave
repairmen, et cetera, the case is still open for temporary or permanent tissue effects
secondary to chronic exposure. If your physician says X-Ray, you say "Ah, what about an
MRI instead?". You may receive an explanation in latin and greek roots or, after
discounting that, you persist, you may be told, "An MRI is not medically necessary".
Hmmm. I suppose this means that an inferior imaging technology which will create damage
in the tissue it passes through, small damage for some and great for others, IS medically
necessary. Ah, no. I am not paying for damage to me that allows a greater profit for the
particular corporation (whom we might call Thrive Corporation). There was a commercial a
while back that showed the perfect white collar white guy with a crew of health related
people around him who made all of the 'right' choices for him in exercise and diet and when
he gets home and heads into the bedroom at the apparent direction of a large smiling dark
male OB/GYN/Peds physician, there standing and waiting at the foot of the bed is the
perfect ASIAN woman. In my Japanese class at the University of Minnesota, Tan Tuan, a
large Vietnamese who always wore battle fatigues, told me that, in Vietnam they have a
saying: If you want to live a rich full life, eat Chinese food, live in the French style, and
marry a Japanese woman. That was why he was in the class. That may have been why I
was, as well, but it never occurred to me. But I would agree with Thrive's advert. Entering Aloha - State Redneck Area By the way, John Shaft, what kinda rig you drive?

[John Shaft]

You should be proud of me - I made it halfway through your paragraph-less post before I finally gave up. As far a my rig - we finally got rid of that POS American made lemon this past summer.

The Oregonian is relating a story about some cat in Salem who is on probation (probation, mind, not jail time) for putting dog shock collars on his kids because he thought it was funny. I'm moving that up to Exhibit A of hillbilly/redneck-ness of Oregon. I can just imagine the jiggling of his beer gut and his toothless grin while he pushed the shock collar button. And the fact that he was put on PROBATION. Nothing like shaking a finger at someone to really punish them.

[backdrifter]

^^^ Ha, that's terrible.

Re: what stormport said about Aloha... I only got about 1/3 of the way through that, but I have a funny story about Aloha and Portland culture...

My cousin lives in a typical dead-end suburban neighborhood in Aloha near Hillsboro. All the houses are in nice condition and everything. Definitely middle class. One day I was visiting and they were trying to move some of their parents' old furniture into their overstuffed garage. My cousin's husband moved the garbage can out of the garage to in front of the house, to make more room. My cousin saw this and got mad and told him to move the garbage can into the back yard so they wouldn't look like they were "white trash" and didn't recycle.

[The Cactus Leaguer]

Regarding humidity... the humidity is pretty much nonexistent here during the warm summer months... it feels like heaven compared to the muggy southeast.

It is "humid" during the rainy season (October-May), but it is cooler during those months.

No offense, but anyone who claims that it is "muggy hot" in the Willamette Valley in the summer has probably never ventured east of the Rockies in July or August.

[delta07]

Originally Posted by The Cactus Leaguer

Regarding humidity... the humidity is pretty much nonexistent here during the warm summer months... it feels like heaven compared to the muggy southeast.

It is "humid" during the rainy season (October-May), but it is cooler during those months.

No offense, but anyone who claims that it is "muggy hot" in the Willamette Valley in the summer has probably never ventured east of the Rockies in July or August.

Yes, thanks for clarifying Cactus. That was my point that I couldn't seem to get across! When most people say they can't stand humidity, they are talking about the muggy type heat, the kind that makes you feel like you need a shower when you just stepped out from one.

Yes, there is humidity in Oregon, but it's not the kind that bothers most people.

[Rickers]

Originally Posted by MitchArk87

When I said rednecks, I really mean extremely toothless rednecks with shotgun weddings, trailer parks using bed sheets as curtains, cars on blocks, and property with full of junk and beer cans while proudly displaying racist (or confederate) flags like you see in most southern states like Mississippi, Alabama, Arkansas, and Tennessee.

Here is a redneck wedding for ya all only without the shotgun or the confederate flag.
All the other prerequisites are there, the dog, missing teeth, trailer, the bare feet, the beer, smoking while pregnant, mullet and all !