My story thus far (warning: it's long) and where I would like to be

Originally Posted by Iwata

You should definetely pack your bags and hit up Philly. From my one time visit to Philly, It was a far more chilled out and accepting and nicer place then LA. Which personally i think is the cesspool of arrogance and hostility when it comes to people moving into and travelers in general, but I just may be bias, because i'm from San Fran and like most NorCal residents, i think SoCal sucks ass.

I'm doing the exact opposite move, going from growing up and living near Philly (and college in Pittsburgh) to LA, and nobody I know understands why I'm dreading it. I spent last summer out in California (Irvine) and absolutely can't stand the people that live out there. There's just some sort of completely different feel to people out here in the midatlantic states and there's no way I'd ever take the self-involved LA attitude over it.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Originally Posted by Divest

If you're going to move out here make sure you move to West LA, Hollywood, or Beverly Hills. Those are the only places where I would say it's actually safe for a person such as yourself to be. You probably don't believe what I'm telling you and will just blow it off, but trust me on this one thing. If you ever, ever, ever take even one tiny small piece of advice from me, let it be this: if you move to Los Angeles, make sure it's West LA, Hollywood, or Beverly Hills. Otherwise with the traffic and people... you won't last very long, I can promise you.

I'll be living in Pasadena in housing owned by my school (cheaper than surrounding area and it's maintained pretty well), and I didn't feel a terrible vibe while visiting there. It was much worse when I was up at UCSB and I felt like I'd have to smash someone's head in before my time was through there. Pasadena felt like an older city than most of the rest of California I had been in (the neighborhoods looked light they were right out of Adam-12 which made me laugh a little bit), so my goal is to pretty much never go on a freeway so I can stay in my secluded little pocket of the city.

I guess the defining experience for Irvine was when I woke up one morning dying for a diner-like breakfast. I couldn't find anything good in the phone book, google maps said there was a Denny's about two miles away, and when I went there, there was none. I stopped in a Starbucks to ask if anyone know of somewhere I could get waffles, bacon, sausage, and eggs for breakfast and they're like "Oh, there's one right down the street." "How much for breakfast." "Uhh, only like $15." I wound up having to drive to the inland part of Newport Beach (I forget the number, it's the road that runs from the peninsula across Route 1. Took me almost an hour and a half just to find somewhere to even find a restaurant that had a cheap breakfast place.

DragoonKain didn't mention it, but Ocean City, Maryland is also a great place. It's pretty family oriented, and there's some nice beaches (I feel they're nicer than NJ's), so my family's vacationed there every summer forever. If you're into golfing it's a fantastic destination as well. Lots of pretty reasonably priced, well maintained courses there. Only a couple of hours away from Philly now that they've got all the highways up and running, too.

Edit: Just be careful of the humidity you're going to be seeing in the summer. You might get hot out in LA, but Philly gets the same hot as there, PLUS a boatload of hot, wet air. Also, does your place have AC? Better start stocking up on fans and t-shirts to change out of if you don't.

And if you're looking for cheap living and a decent job market, I think Pittsburgh is also a pretty solid bet. The city's been consistently well ranked on quality of living scales, and for the price of a small rancher house in Pasadena you could buy two three story houses in a really nice neighborhood (pretty much around where Capo and I live).

There's nowhere I can't reach.

Rita's is ass compared to some of the local varieties I've had. I still remember one of my favorite childhood memories was going to the Vet to see a Phillies game and getting a lemon water ice on those really hot days when we had seats up in the 700 level and there's no shade in sight.

You should be fine getting a job that pays around $10/hr. In Pittsburgh you can split a pretty decent two bedroom aparment or a house for as little as $300/month a person, utilities are cheaper (except for gas if that's what heats your place, try to get somewhere that it's included or has good insulation), as should just about everything else. Just get used to having worse tasting fruits, though. Nothing beat what I would get from this farmer's market out in Irvine.

I was talking about UC Santa Barbara, actually. I flew out to there and Caltech to look at them for grad school and just couldn't stand the people at Santa Barbara.

Also, if you think public transit in Irvine was good, wait until you get out east where you've got the SEPTA system in Philly. You can take local transit to New York for pretty cheap or even out to lots of the suburbs for just a few bucks.

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

I hadn't even realized that Italian ice is a regional thing until you made that post, too. A google maps search for both "water ice" and "italian ice" only returns Ritas places for the entire Pittsburgh region.

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?