ANYwhere except Texas and anywhere else where an air conditioner is a necessity. At all. Maine (home), NH or Vermont. Northern NY. Alaska. Montana. Northern Idaho (beautiful!) Heck, Canada. Siberia. Iceland. And I need mountains to hike up and ski down and woods to run in and real likes and rivers to play in… anywhere but here, really at this point (can you tell I’m desperate… we graduate in May, can’t wait).
I spent a summer working with a bunch of people from New Zealand a few years ago and they seemed awesome. If they’re representative of the entire culture I’d happily live there. They were all very laid back and down to earth. It’s beautiful there too.
I also want to live somewhere where people aren’t so damn friendly. It’s effing suffocating. Southern hospitality my ass. If hospitality means intrusive rudeness, OK. And half the sweet-talkin’ lines are contrived and fake. My neighbors won’t let me go to the grocery store or whatever without a ten minute conversation asking about every detail of my life since they last saw me.
If I randomly see someone I know back home and I don’t want to talk to them a quick “hi” will suffice and they aren’t going to call me five minutes later about if I’m mad at them. If my hubby and I have people over for dinner, and we didn’t have a nice time, we’re NOT going to say, “Let’s do this again sometime, it was wonderful!” But people down here will SAY this with no intention of ever calling you again. The whole culture just seems really syrupy and fakey. I want to spend about five years living in the woods with nobody around (except hubby and dog of course :-)) after three years in Dallas.
/rant over… apologies to Texans, I know you love your state… cool, I’m glad you do, just not my cup of tea. And by that I don’t mean sweet tea, I mean real English Breakfast boiling hot tea in a thick mug with heavy cream.