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Old 03-21-2008, 04:30 PM
 
20,273 posts, read 32,891,955 times
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By~Tor,

I very much agree (and social science supports) the notion that the attitude one brings to life has a lot more to do with one's happiness than one's surroundings.

That said, I finally found something to disagree with you about. I am a long-time Detroit Lions fan, having been born and raised in Detroit. So, I speak with great experience when I say that it is not as easy as you suggest to rebuild a once-great NFL franchise, at least without the inducements of the NYC media market to work with (seeing as how the Lions have been trying to do that for about 50 years, with uncountable new coaches and players over that time).

But back on the other point: if I can be a happy Detroit Lions fan, then happiness really is just a state of mind.

 
Old 03-21-2008, 04:43 PM
 
Location: Foot of the Rockies
90,316 posts, read 120,244,119 times
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I certainly agree with your first sentence, BrianTH. However, being in nice surroundings is a great thing, whatever that means to you. I'd like to do a research paper sometime about moving. It's harder than one thinks. Things you've grown up with, that you take for granted, are different in the new place. Climate, school schedule, shopping opportunities, etc. It's called "culture shock". And every time you turn around, someone is asking you "how do you like (insert name of city here), with a big smile on their face and a pregnant pause, waiting for you to say "Oh, I just LOVE it"! It's hard. My daugter who went to college in Indiana said she finally got to the point of liking Indiana for Indiana, instead of constantly comparing it to Denver/Boulder. And,. . . she transferred back. Decided she liked Colo. better. The other one liked Minn. but came back here for grad school. 'Scuse the rant. Now back to the regularly scheduled thread.
 
Old 03-21-2008, 05:04 PM
 
20,273 posts, read 32,891,955 times
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Katiana,

Like so many other things, I think the impact of moving really depends on the person. For example, I more or less couldn't wait to move out of the suburbs of Detroit, and I have never had the slightest temptation to move back (not to Michigan, the Detroit area, or even the suburbs other places). But of course many other people are like your children, including many people I grew up with who are now living in Detroit.

So, I would suggest this is one of those situations where it pays to try it a couple different ways when you are young and relatively unattached, then go with what works for you.
 
Old 03-21-2008, 05:08 PM
 
Location: Pittsburgh, the Iron City!!!
803 posts, read 2,961,858 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by BrianTH View Post
By~Tor,

That said, I finally found something to disagree with you about. I am a long-time Detroit Lions fan, having been born and raised in Detroit. So, I speak with great experience when I say that it is not as easy as you suggest to rebuild a once-great NFL franchise, at least without the inducements of the NYC media market to work with (seeing as how the Lions have been trying to do that for about 50 years, with uncountable new coaches and players over that time).

But back on the other point: if I can be a happy Detroit Lions fan, then happiness really is just a state of mind.

Well, I was only playing "Devil's Advocate". . . .but even the DEVIL knows when something is unobtainable. . . . . . and the Lions winning ANYTHING, EVER AGAIN . . . well . . . . that qualifies....LMFAO!!!!


But, I suppose as a Texas Rangers baseball fan, I can sympathize........
 
Old 03-21-2008, 05:12 PM
 
Location: Pittsburgh, the Iron City!!!
803 posts, read 2,961,858 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Katiana View Post
Things you've grown up with, that you take for granted, are different in the new place. Climate, school schedule, shopping opportunities, etc. It's called "culture shock". And every time you turn around, someone is asking you "how do you like (insert name of city here), with a big smile on their face and a pregnant pause, waiting for you to say "Oh, I just LOVE it"! It's hard.
Man, I certainly FEEL ya' on THAT point!-- Moving from Dallas to rural southern Illinois was akin to Ned Beatty's experience in "Deliverance" for me....

And in St. Louis, I never grasped the "true" meaning behind their opening salvoes of "Wht high school did ya' go to?", until I finally learned that they gauge your social standing and possible family wealth, by which HS you graduated from.... very provincial thinking, and as much as I LOVED living in St. Louis, the constant knowledge that the mindset was so provincial, is what enabled me to understand why its glory days were long gone, and not likely to return...
 
Old 03-21-2008, 05:24 PM
 
20,273 posts, read 32,891,955 times
Reputation: 2910
Quote:
Originally Posted by By~Tor View Post
Well, I was only playing "Devil's Advocate". . . .but even the DEVIL knows when something is unobtainable. . . . . . and the Lions winning ANYTHING, EVER AGAIN . . . well . . . . that qualifies....LMFAO!!!!


But, I suppose as a Texas Rangers baseball fan, I can sympathize........
I wouldn't say the Lions could never win again. It will just take the Ford Motor Company going bankrupt, which might force the sale of the franchise from the Ford family (and which could happen sooner rather than later).

Or maybe the "Curse of Bobby Layne" has finally run out. Supposedly when he was traded to Pittsburgh in 1958, he said the Lions wouldn't win another championship for 50 years ... and my calendar says it is 2008!

Incidentally, one of the frustrating things for me is that I have seen both the Detroit Tigers and Detroit Pistons win championships, hit rock bottom, and rebuild into contenders, all in my lifetime. The Lions, though, last won a championship well before I was born, and have gotten worse since the Barry Sanders days (when they at least would make the playoffs every other year).

Oh well. Just do me a favor, and don't buy Fords (by the way, my Dad worked for GM, so I am allowed to say that).
 
Old 03-21-2008, 05:42 PM
 
2,039 posts, read 6,307,215 times
Reputation: 581
Quote:
Originally Posted by By~Tor View Post
:-O

Wow!--Elder18 sure did an "about face" there. . . . LOL!

Thanks for the info there. . . I find it amusing, that you had those two posts available without deep-searching, but it does show a striking difference in his attitude over a short period of time.

The way I see it, we are into it for the long haul. I grew up in Texas with over 250 sunny, hot & miserable days a year, and for me, Seattle or Portland's dreariness would be preferable, so I don't see the cloudy days as being so much a negative... beside, Ocean City, MD ain't THAT far away, if I simply HAVE to go get some sun...LOL!!!

I think the medium- to long-term city outlook is another thing though, which must be addressed by city elders/leaders.... as for corruption, no city is worse off than right here in the Big Apple, but if Pittsburgh has a corruption issue, it needs to be addressed by the citizenry and whatever watchdog groups there may be available in the area. I will be happy to oin in one of those groups after I get settled in, if need be, but after living in so many places and seeing the same stories repeated over and over again almost everywhere, I've learned that criticizing the "city" itself as a place not worth living in is a terribly shoersighted viewpoint, and usually brought on more so by personal experiences than by any real and quantifiable issues, in and of themselves.

Let's be hypothetical, for a moment: I'm moving to Pittsburgh for lower housing cost, less commute time, and a better overall quality of life than what we are able to afford in NYC..... so, I'll play "Devil's Advocate" for a moment...

Let's say I get there, the job market tanks and I wind up unemployed. Then, the skies turn black for a month at a time. Then, the crime levels skyrocket, and the politicians start robbing people door-to-door, just to finance their whores and carribbean cruises (or whatever they do with their ill-gotten gains)... and, to make matters even more dismal, the Steelers go 1-15 (like the Jets and Cowboys both have, in recent memory).....

I still would not bring myself to say that it is "Pittsburgh's Fault", that all these things conspired to screw my world over... okay, the weather can't be changed by man, but almost everything else CAN be... I can find a job somewhere else, even if it means I'm doing menial labor instead of management... the politicians can be run out of town on a rail, just as soon as the public gets tired of their corruption and rise en masse, to fight it... and even the Steelers could simply clean house and bring in some coaches & players to get the job done... so, as bad as things were, it "was" rectified by simple actions being taken, and that made the city begin to look "better", again.... (except for the clouds, of course).

My point, is only that people can complain about whatever they like; all cities have corruption, crime, job market ebbs & flows, and the unique issuse that ace each city, individually (like Pittsburgh's lack of a grid, due to topography). But earlier in this thread, the MAIN things I saw mentioned over and over, were the cloudy days (which don't bother me so much) and the liquor purchasing situation (which I grew up with in Texas anyway, under the famous "Blue Laws"), which is so easily worked around as to be a non-factor in 99% of peoples' books....

Pittsburgh has every chance to be a welcoming, beautiful, wonderful place to live, work, and raise a family... it's affordable, small enough to not feel lost in (except for driving...), has abundant cultural opportunities, a burgeoning medical industry and high-tech opportunities for tomorrow's grads, incredible atural beauty (rare, for ANY city) . . . . . . . hell, this place has so much going FOR it, that the few things it has going AGAINST it are really outweighed by a country ton!!!

I'm just sayin' that those who do the most complaining here, would likely be the same ones doing the complaining just about anywhere they wind up living, anyway. Every city has its faults, Pittsburgh notwithstanding. . . but I am coming to live there, and I'm a-gonna' like it, gosh-darnit!!!!!

And hopefully, in about another ten years, when my house value increases back up to near $200K and the city is in the midst of a huge boom in growth, then people can start complaining about the REALL issues it will be facing, and I may very well be one of them, by that point. . . but whatever the case, I certainly won't be telling people that it's no place to live. . . .

(Please feel free to save this post as well, and to paste it in 7 months, to see if my attitude changes. . . . I'm seriously interested in doing this, as a case study, now....)

You know what? You are doing the right thing. You are coming to the area with a positive attitude. It certainly can't hurt. I tried to do the same thing, however, the place just wasn't for me. Keep your chin up and maybe you will love it, it sure sounds like you are on the right path.
 
Old 03-21-2008, 05:51 PM
 
2,039 posts, read 6,307,215 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by fleetiebelle View Post
the color-coded wayfinder signs (U.S. Markers: Pittsburgh Wayfinder System) were really helpful when I first moved here.
Serious??? I suppose they can be helpful, if you can FIND the signs to keep you on the right road! The unfortunate truth is that Pittsburgh road design will never change. It can't, it's not economically feasible and the topography makes it impossible. So I do give the city some credit because there really seems to be very little they can do about that.

But, on the other hand - why the heck are there no street signs on the street you are traveling???? You could travel 20 miles on a road and never see a street sign telling you what street you are on! There are only side street signs. I've never experienced this before and for a city that is already difficult to navigate, you'd think someone would have the wherewith all to know that street signs usually help you. Does anyone have any idea as to why it is like this? It makes it impossible to get anywhere!
 
Old 03-22-2008, 01:57 AM
 
15,633 posts, read 26,129,358 times
Reputation: 30912
Quote:
Originally Posted by londonbarcelona View Post
Serious??? I suppose they can be helpful, if you can FIND the signs to keep you on the right road! The unfortunate truth is that Pittsburgh road design will never change. It can't, it's not economically feasible and the topography makes it impossible. So I do give the city some credit because there really seems to be very little they can do about that.

But, on the other hand - why the heck are there no street signs on the street you are traveling???? You could travel 20 miles on a road and never see a street sign telling you what street you are on! There are only side street signs. I've never experienced this before and for a city that is already difficult to navigate, you'd think someone would have the wherewith all to know that street signs usually help you. Does anyone have any idea as to why it is like this? It makes it impossible to get anywhere!
I was glad I grew up where we didn't have street signs -- that prepared me for living out here in California where lanes just END... ah, just slap a merge arrow there on the road and let 'em wreck! And where exit signs have two names -- the first one that lists one road name saying it's 3/4 mile and the one at the exit which is a different road name -- FOR THE SAME ROAD ... the first time I ran into that was SO frustrating.

I was blessed with an internal GPS -- I have never gotten so lost I had to ask for directions. And I look for back ways almost everywhere out here. People are so freeway dependent that it helps to know other ways around, to get out of the backlog. I mean -- I'd rather drive 10 miles out of my way around something than sit in traffic looking at the garbage blowing around in the dead grass... but everyone else would rather sit in traffic.

But as to no street signs -- I have no idea. And you're right. If I didn't know where I was when I was back there, I was lost. (Happily, I like being lost!) If I had to hazard a guess, I would bet it's more about Pittburgh not being a cohesive city, but a bunch of neighborhoods that have banded together over time -- and each place never put up signs and when it became part of Pittsburgh THEY never put up signs.
 
Old 03-22-2008, 02:10 AM
 
Location: County Mayo Descendant
2,725 posts, read 5,963,352 times
Reputation: 1217
To an earlier post about how many sunny days, ya know i read this somewhere and it was like we only had about 160 days of sunshine. I could have heard this on our weather channel up in clearfield county, its just as gray and raining here more so.

I moved to the Northwest 10 years ago from Pgh, I loved it there always sunny and dry, no humidity.

I moved back because of family illness, I will move back to the Northwest again, I think many of us boomers will be doing the same thing in the next 5 yrs or so. Or they will do it for the first time to anywhere.

Most of my older family members have never left Pgh, most cousins have left and never came back.

Who in their right mind would complain about the black and gold? Are you nuts? I may not enjoy it here, but I'll be damned if I'd ever give up my black and gold, and that was even in the Northwest where I had to quit asking for jumbo.

The state store and beer dist have always been BS, thats a tax thing I doubt if it will ever go away. In the Northwest, I just had to go to a grocery store or a convenient store for beer, wine, wine coolers

I moved from Northwest to Central PA to stay out of the city, as I Iived in Pgh since I was born and if you remember going into the market house as a kid you can guess my age.

My reasons for leaving PA were mainly the changes that took place over the years starting in the 60's, the constant gray days and rain, making east street 279 why didn't they just use perrysville ave for that? The ripping down of the markethouse and total distruction of the old Northside shopping area, remember Sun Drug, Robinsons, Gerbers, I may have been quite young at the time, but in my teens they took everything down and built that stupid mall that went to hell, they could have just made the old northside stores like the strip area, anything would have been better for shoppers than that mall. I used to work downtown on 5th Ave yrs ago, downtown seemed to go to the pits also, last time i rode thru it I could not believe all that was gone. I miss the Jenkins Arcade, and Palmers resturants (is there any around anymore?) So change comes along and we got malls, and malls, first little malls then giant malls, so much for progress, I guess it depends on your age, I hate food courts? whoever made up that name? Once I went into Pgh to go Xmas shopping at Ross Park Mall, I had to laugh, we called it the procession up to the mall Also alot of the little neighbor bars have closed.

I think alot of the city people have the problem coming to smaller towns or smaller cities and want it to be like the city they came from, so they have nothing better to do than to start their ranting about things, changing ordinances, taking residental land in blocks and later turning it into sub divisons, ruining any views or they just like looking at houses next door or across the street.

From my experiece with family, they expect Clearfied County people to be like Pittsburghers, we ain't, never gonna be, we don't sweat the small stuff, we don't care what our neighbors think or do, we are not that nebby, we do have neighbors we can count on, that are genuine friendly and expect nothing in return, I can go over to my neighbors and chat for 1/2 hr to an hour or more, I never get the feeling I am being rushed out, or they have to hurry somewhere. You don't get frowned upon if you don't cut your grass
every week, my Pgh people just can't stand it if my grass ain't cut, why in the hell would they talk about me not cutting my grass as often as they would is beyond me, they don't realize in the country there are plenty of other chores to be done, its like they think this is a playground for them and this is a public park and should be completely landscaped for them. Ah! they want to mow, so go ahead, but damn if they didn't break my riding mower, so no more mowing for them, guess they will have to deal with the tall grass, its just weird that city people don't understand the logic that some trees do need cut down, (they will fall on your house) especially in the mountains, or get struck by lightning, or all the leaves go in your gutters and the snow and ice will make the gutters fall off. Oh and we don't shovel enough snow, well when you continously get snowed on day after day, whats the sense, a small snow blower ain't gonna help ya, maybe on your walkway in the city but not here. Shoveling snow got old for me about 20 yrs ago, put your boots on, it will melt. They don't know how to get there cars out of the snow hole, naturally they don't have anything in their trunks to prepare for an emergency, instead its full of books and CD's or a big tool box with no tools to help get out of the snow, like some chains, a block of wood or even kitty litter. Geez, I have to think about other things beside cutting the grass we just gotta prepare for each season as anyone does, but in the country its a bit different. We got brush to clear, tall heavy weeds to clear some snakes we don't want, or some red squirrels who can do alot of damage, make sure our trash lids are secure because the bears will smell it so will other animals, so if you city folk plan on a unannounced visit to people in the country you may want to ask if you can help with something besides the refrigerator, we got plenty of work to do. We have a walmart and a eat n park what more do you want.
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