What makes your state great?

[Janet]

Originally Posted by Gonzo

Michigan... mackinaw island and other various landmarks... the bridge... the contrast between North and South... A border to Canada... an abundance of trees and wildlife... the great lakes... less pollution than in a lot of other areas of America... lower population density... lots of farmland and unobstructed acreage... peace and quiet... relatively friendly people, though seemingly an under-educated lot... A couple of decent colleges (NMU, Michigan State, MI Tech) ... lots of empty, abandoned buildings for rent, especially on Main Streets ... some rather talented people throughout.

Honestly, the best thing here is (1) the interesting people and (2) the landscape.

The fact that you left U of M out of that list means I will love you forever. You are awesome!

[curses]

Originally Posted by Leesifer

I don't have a state.

I said portal to Hell was acceptable too

[lisarea]

Colorado has the highest mean altitude of any state! And the highest low point! We are the least fat of ALL THE STATES!

We have weird, very dynamic weather patterns, which make Coloradans particularly adept at layering.

Oh! Also! We supposedly have the most microbreweries per capita of any state! They are seriously everywhere.

Subjectively, too, people here are usually pretty laid back and stuff. Like I used to go to this one pretty upscale old Denver restaurant that had right on their menu a little note to their patrons that they do not have a dress code, so please enjoy your meal without complaining that somebody else is wearing hiking boots or whatever. The lolnoob was implied. And this has changed quite a bit especially in the last 15 years or so, but we used to have super polite drivers, so if you'd put your turn signal on during rush hour on the highway, the person in the next lane would usually hang back to let you in. Not as much now, but it's still better than most places I've been.

I'm not gonna show you guys all our mountains and ghost towns and stuff, because you would all try to move here and you guys are not hardcore enough to handle it.

[livius drusus]

Originally Posted by curses

How about Warm Springs or Cloudland Canyon? Both are really nice day trips from Atlanta.

We went to Warm Springs when my rents were here in April and it was a marvelous day. The drive is beautiful. It's not that long but it really feels like you're way out in the country. Horses and split rail fences everywhere. My parents were really impressed with the small but excellently appointed museum at the Little White House, plus the house itself and the historic baths. I think they found the whole experience genuinely moving. Also, they got a Fala tree ornament at the gift shop that was totally adorable and we had killer bbq at Mac's.

I'm going to represent for Connecticut and Roma, Caput Mundi, since they are both my states.

What makes Connecticut great:

• the surprising number of trees everywhere even though people have been actively clearing it for 400 years or so
• tons of historic properties that have been in continuous use for centuries, including my parents' pre-Revolutionary farmhouse
• the Connecticut Yankee
• Mystic Aquarium
• the Atlantic coast in general, especially where the Connecticut River meets Long Island Sound which has a lovely warm microclimate
• clam bakes
• late 18th c., early 19th c. dry stone walls endangered by greedy developer pricks stealing them because they are awesome
• the flock of two dozen wild turkeys who live in the woods on my parents' property and come out to nom the bird feeder leavings under their pear tree every season after the babies are old enough to fly.

What makes Rome great:

• 2000 year old working sewers
• layer churches like Santa Maria Sopra Minerva (Baroque facade over Gothic church over temple of Isis) and San Clemente (11th c. church over 4th c. church made out of a Roman palace over a mithraeum)
• coconut chunks kept cool under little portable fountain carts sold by street vendors during the summer
• the "talking statues," ancient, busted statues dotting the city the most famous of which is affectionately called Pasquino. People would stick anonymous satirical poems and epigrams to the statues, thus making them "talk". My favorite and the most famous is "Quod non fecerunt Barbari/fecerunt Barberini" (What the Barbarians did not do/the Barberini did) written in the 1600s in response to the Barberini pope Urban VIII's stripping of the bronze tiles from the Pantheon dome to make Bernini's Baldacchino in Saint Peter's.
• super sweet crypts under every church
• the gold fork and spoon at Alfredo's gifted by Douglas Fairbanks and Mary Pickford that one lucky person gets to use to eat their fettuccine every night
• the island in the Tiber and its hospitals specializing in skin diseases since the temple to Aesculapius was built in 293 B.C.
• Tevere Expo, a crafts, art, music, food fair on the held banks of the Tiber every summer
• the city lit at night
• the city at Easter
• the city at Christmas
• everything else.

[Qingdai]

Jesus fuck. People in my state write things like this, "Lol.ya but ur choice Of guys is pretty piss poor.whatever.just don't think I bought on those piss poor ass messages you left me.get it togethr.look at the big picture
Jodi.really think youyav a future with a toker? Lmao.you Madeira bed lay in it.truth hurts but open ur eyes! Lol."

Me fail English? Unimpossible!

[Stormlight]

Positive:
It's not very large (no, really. You'd be surprised!) so you can get out of here in 15 minutes max.

Negative:
You'll be in France, Germany or Belgium.

[Watser?]

I live in a province called Gelderland, it used to be a duchy in the Middle Ages and still has the same borders I think. Except it used to be a coastal province until the Zuiderzee was turned into a lake in the 1930s. It's the biggest province of the land, which is not saying much of course. It's prolly bigger than Luxembourg though.

Gelderland has the biggest and best-known nature reserve in the country: the Veluwe, where there are wild boars There's also lots of castles like this one:


And of course Nijmegen, alledgedly the oldest city in the country.

[Stormlight]

Originally Posted by Watser?

where there are wild boars

"Where there are wild boars WHAT WE STOLED FROM LUXEMBOURG!"

[Sock Puppet]

I live in a great state, or so I'm told, endlessly. Since it's the largest in the 48 contiguous states, I suppose that's literally true.

It's solidly conservative, so my votes on a national level p. much don't count, like, ever. But there are some bastions of sanity here and there; viciousmammaries can tell you more about Austin than I can, but also the city I work in, Houston, now has an openly lesbian mayor, so that's something. Houston also has one of the best medical communities in the country, so a lot of specialized care takes place here. We also have decent energy prices. My bff in California pays a shit-ton more per kWh, which is good since otherwise my summer A/C would cost $500-700 per month. Housing is more affordable too, so the houses are huge. We actually have way more house than we need, and I would've gotten a smaller one if I had a do-over. Like so many others, we have a "game room," which is p. much unheard of where I grew up in CA. Property taxes are insane, to make up for the lack of state income tax.

You hear a lot about Texas screwing up public school textbooks for the rest of the country, and I may have plenty of rage about junior high and high school, but I have to admit that so far, our local public school has been waaaay better than the one I had. My public elementary school was crap, but Li'l Puppet's is pretty awesome. I don't know how much of that is due to Texas vs. California rather than 1970s vs. 2012, but I'll take it.

Our local community is friendlier, as well. When I lived in the East Bay, we barely knew any of our neighbors. People didn't talk to each other on the street. Here we know everybody who lives around us, and have the whole suburban block party thing going on. The kids play together in the cul de sac. That wasn't really my experience growing up.

There are a few decent places to go nearby. San Antonio is about a 3.5-hour drive, Austin about 3, and Galveston Island is sorta nice (although I wouldn't buy property there ever).

As for the aforementioned conservatism, at least here you only occasionally encounter someone for whom no bumper sticker was retarded enough, so they had to use vinyl lettering to get their pants-shittingly idiotic message across. On a brief trip through Louisiana, I encountered several of those.

[ZEZOZE]

marijuana.

[Miisa]

Well, it's not Russia, so that's kinda nice.

Also, not big on the natural disasters 'n stuff. It gets pretty dark, and some may argue also cold, in the winter, but the sweet, sweet niceness, dazzling lightness and general pleasantness of the summer makes up for that. And some even like the dark and/or cold, so that works too.
Only one venomous creature, and that will really not do much more than sting a bit for most people if they ever even see it.

Freaking' absurd sports and pastimes that keep the populace surprisingly happy.

The universal healthcare I kinda took for granted until recently, but that is a good point too. Especially when it comes to pregnancy/delivery and child healthcare. Oh, and free university is cool too.

Also, not Sweden, so another bonus.

[Kyuss Apollo]

Originally Posted by Stormlight

Positive:
It's not very large (no, really. You'd be surprised!) so you can get out of here in 15 minutes max.

Rhode Island 1044 sq. miles vs Luxembourg, 999 so p. darn close there.

Negative:
You'll be in France, Germany or Belgium.

In 15 minutes, I am in Connecticut, which has been clearly shown to be great!

WINNING!

[godfry n. glad]

Originally Posted by Crumb

godfry provided no visual aids.

Dammit, Crumb...

You show them those pix, folks get the wrong idea.

Here's a more typical non-summer view of Mt. Hood from the west Portland:



Everybody...Yeah, the places in these pix Crumb posted look nice, but you need to remember that those pix were taken on one of the few days in each year when blue skies are seen. The other 50 weeks of the year, you can't even see these things unless you're right on top of them in the miserable overcast and rain....and even then, it's hazy.

Well, maybe not in the last one. But if you were there, I'd recommend you don't step out of the car. Rattlesnakes.

[erimir]

Originally Posted by Miisa

Also, not Sweden, so another bonus.

You're just jealous cuz you wish ABBA was from Finland.

[Chris Porter]

Wisconsin. Let's see...Wisconsin Dells, Mississippi River, Lake Michigan and Lake Superior, um, lots of very pretty farmland where they raise lots of black and white cows. Hilly, but not too hilly, with plenty of fishing. Pretty much the only places I've gone fishing were out in a backwater of the Wisconsin river, and Ontario, Canada. They both have the same kinds of fish. Which are yummy. There's free concerts in the Park during the summer here in Kenosha, and most of the lakeshore is made up of park. Dog friendly. I have like 4 different farmers markets in Kenosha alone. They allow chickens in the city limits. Sometimes the winter is strikingly beautiful, with very large clumps of snow drifting to the ground silently, while the spring and summer are taken over by the lullaby of the frogs and crickets in the evenings.
It's quite humid, here by the lake, so swamp coolers would be unworkable. I live by a rather large park with the country's oldest still-in-use velodrome, where they race each week.
There is Bong Nature Preserve nearby, with miles of riding, hiking, skiing and snowmobile trails.

[godfry n. glad]

Originally Posted by Chris Porter

Wisconsin....

There is Bong Nature Preserve nearby, with miles of riding, hiking, skiing and snowmobile trails.

And quiet toking places, I'll bet. 4-20, Dude!!!! We're off to the nature preserve, 'cause we believe in cheeses.

[Chris Porter]

That's Richard Bong Recreational Area.

Having only been hiking there one autumn, I found a distinct lack of tell-tale aroma on the trail.

[godfry n. glad]

Buzzkill.