I came back from the holidays to find that my health care provider Blue Shield has decided to ramp up the prices in my state 50%. It's not that I don't know that they are greedy bastards, it's just that they just increased it 50% with my Patron's insurance plan 50% last month. Since I do not want a new Patron I have decided to look for a new location.
I would also like to blame, erm, I mean give credit to longtime pal MadMollyMillions who has been egging me on for almost a decade now to relocate to Great Britain and even sends me nice links of job sites.
I figure this is going to take some time so I have allotted the entire decade to this search and yes I am committed. I will even be making World Re-location T-shirts which you can buy at our Subversify Web-store. Or if you are lucky enough to host my search for the most perfect place on earth to write with a Patron in tow and a gang of Brownies who will most likely be grumpy about re-locating, then you will get free t-shirt swag!
So this is my plan, I am going to start by visiting all the spots where my cohorts and writing partners already live. Don't worry I won't be writing anything bad about you unless you are veryvery bad host/hostess' in which case expect the worst.
No, really I just want to get a picture of the wide places people live and work and why they hang on there. People don't have to know I'm there if they don't want to. (just leave some warm cuppa by the couch and the bathroom light on so I can find my way)
I kid.
This sprung from my flippant remark that #in2011Iplanto show up in Alaska and Gloucester. And really I found that I want to. I have lived in California all my life and while I have travelled the western U.S. pretty extensively I have never been anywhere further east than Denver, I've never been to the American South, I've never been to the birthplace of my country-And yes Rich that does mean I am coming there, prepare.
Also I don't fly, I'm a big scaredy cat about it and really that needs to be fixed so that's another bit in this decision.
I will be writing about it, the places I go, the people I meet, the religions that try to get me to join up. And I do want to know if I want to relocate because to be honest I love California, but what do I know? Also our economy is in the shitter and the only thing really keeping me here is the employment gig, but there may be something out there...
Okay that sounded really "That Girl"-ish so there is definitely something out there but I don't know what's for me and us. I'm shy by nature. I am the one sitting in the crowd taking it in who you avoid because you think I look familiar and I know something about you or I am figuring something out about you. Which I am, it's my hobby which got worse in college when I discovered investigative psychology, but it helps me write.
It does not always help me interact with people, so I want to see how that changes as I move far out of places I have known.
I have a tentative list beginning as stated before with Alaska and Gloucester but also including:
Philadelphia, PA
Waterbury, Conn
Alberta, CANADA
B.C, CANADA-Okay I've already been there but I have to visit my second cousin anyway
Victoria,CANADA
Florida-undecided
New Orleans, LA
Puerto Rico
New Braunfels, TX
Santa Fe, NM
Phoenix, AZ
Portland, OR
The Sound Area of Washington State
Okay that's a start I'm sure places will be added, most places we have had contributors at Subversify from. There are other places I want to go but it will require more planning like Australia where one of my very favorite one-time contributor is from and New Zealand, and also India which I would love to visit and which may be do-able as we do have friends who have a family home there. But that may not make it in the decade-goal because...
This is going to be like a mix between a pub-crawl and a couch crash which as I'm writing this I realize go hand in hand anyway. It is going to be the anti-thesis of glamorous as it is the penny-tour. The sex drug and rock and roll bits of the trip will have to be cut out except for the rock and roll part. The sex and drugs are just out of my budget.
If anyone has great ideas of not-to-be missed cities/towns/areas/mountain tops for relocation let me know and I will try to add them in. Here are my requirements:
-There must be Internet/satellite connection in at least one pub or coffee shop in town.
-There must be someplace other than Walmart to shop
-People cannot be waiting there with effigies of me to burn...Okay, I'll drive by and get pictures of these places because an effigy of me is pretty classy, but really I can't re-locate there.
- Oh and jobs for Social Workers because yeah, we gotta pay the bills still.
Okay those are my preliminary plans, I am kicking this bitch off this year because really it's time to deliver on promises to visit and check places out anyway.
What: NO NEW YORK?!! pffft!
ReplyDeleteLOL
Good to see on on a "real" blog, Grainne. It's a big world out here in Blogger, but you have the skills and much to offer.
Ooops. New York Added, Eddie, you shall have to tell me which boroughs to visit.
ReplyDeleteIf you're serious, then you really ought to quit pussyfooting around, and start looking OUTSIDE the country.
ReplyDeleteAny way you cut it, this place is in serious trouble - the kind which doesn't rectify itself in time for you to start collecting your Social Security.
That said, I'm looking seriously at Belize.
Now - if you're still thinking that trading one-state-for-another is going to make everything better, you might start with some obvious things (crime rates; cost-of-living; etc.) This will rule out every major city - and a lot of the minor ones, including my home-town of Portland.
(If you're still interested in Portland, I'll save you the trip and suggest you watch IFC's six-part miniseries, "Portlandia". You'll get an idea. Just remember - 'put a bird on it'....)
You'd do well to ignore the morons who write for the travel-bureaus, also - they're paid to make a shit-hole look like paradise.
Of the places you've mentioned, I've actually been to quite a few, courtesy of my days of carrying a big 'bag' for a technology distributor. Some notes:
-- South of the 54th Parallel, most of the towns you've mentioned have serious issues - I mean; no one is moving to New Orleans nowadays; Florida has one of the highest foreclosure rates in America; Santa Fe's a dump, and Phoenix is riddled with half-crazy Teabaggers and Fundies.
-- Alaska is a third-world country with pretensions of belonging to the U.S. In truth, if Congress took away all of the transfer-payments keeping the place afloat, the whole place would collapse, economically. Add to that the fact that you'd probably commit suicide during your first winter, and it's a good thing to confine your search south of the 60th Parallel.
--Canada (in general) is pretty cosmopolitan, if you stick to the bigger cities. Even Victoria is a pretty 'with it' town, albeit on the smaller side (largely due to the University and the Provincial government, which is located there). Unless you're under 45 and have a skill which can't easily be replicated there, you'll need a sponsor to emigrate - someone who'll look after you financially if you can't find a job. Health care's good, but then again, the place is cold most of the time.
In sum, it'd be far better to make a list, check it twice, see if the residents are not only naughty, but if the place is full of gang-bangers and other scullions, then make your travel-plans accordingly. Employment should be #1 on that list; #1.2 should be crime-rate.
Good luck.
Hey, you mentioned Alaska in the body of your statement, but not on your list! What's up with that? Alaska makes a good candidate. Insurance is as high as anywhere and cost of living higher than everywhere, but we are a people determined to take charge of our own politics. We voted against the health care package because of the mandatory insurance clause, but not because we don't want cheap, available health care. Experience with the auto industry has shown us that mandatory insurance is a bad thing. It allows the insurance companies to take the cap off costs and gives them too much influence in the courts.
ReplyDeleteOur legislation is full of flaws. Special interests has influenced the legal body as much as in any other state; maybe in some cases, more, since our resources are so abundant. But anyone who has lived here for more than two years and has managed to migrate out of the nursery room of Anchorage, or the umbilical cord of State jobs, develops a deep, abiding love for the state itself, and the interest generally becomes one of what's best for the people
Thanks Will, I know the time for pussyfooting is really far past. I'm actually afraid because it's getting harder to leave the country and costly, and I do have those Brownies to take care of they aren't cheap.
ReplyDeleteMost of the south I just want to visit, and I would never actually live in Arizon because of 1. the weather, I can't take it and 2. the crazies.
Outside the country isn't a rosy picture either I lost those lenses a while ago. Spain and Italy are both having serious troubles and Iceland has that ashcloud fallout to deal with. Norway which looks good hates foreigners who aren't just tourists. Tell me more about Bellize.
Karla I am very serious about Alaska. I don't mind the hardships, but crave a real community. Unfourtunatley I thing we would never be able to be without a State Job connection as that is where Social Workers tend to get hired and make the most money.
Sounds exciting! Come to Texas and we'll give ya a tour.
ReplyDeleteAs for where you belong, I'd say farther up north. The South does have a community, but it tends to be clique-y unless of course you're a bible thumping Christian. You are of course, but you're too smart for your own good so that could be a problem.
I don't plan on staying in Texas forever. Will probably start RV-ing full time at some point. Whenever that happens, I'll be sure and visit everybody. Whether you want me to or not. MUHAHAHAHAH!
Even rats know to get off of a sinking ship.
ReplyDeleteHey wait, is Kimberly calling me a rat? LOL!
ReplyDeleteMitch the R.V. thing is an excellent plan I have thought of that too as soon as we get everyone raised.
I'm thinking that if we stay in the States north and coastal is looking pretty good to me, but again, I want to get out there and experience some things. I really haven't lived in a city since I was a kid and that was San Diego which is a different sort of city, sprawling and made up of neighborhoods that make you feel like you are in a town rather than a metropolis.
Kimberly was probably speaking metaphorically.
ReplyDeleteAs to Belize, you can buy a five acre farm for $15K, and build a decent home there for around $50K. If you abandon the idea of, say, air-conditioning and rely on ceiling-fans, you'll do splendidly. There are plenty of expat-enclaves there which are very well off, mainly because they generate their own power (solar cells are now around $1/Watt) and most of their own food.
They speak English after a fashion there. The legal system isn't as full of corruption as some of its neighbors (but then again, the U.S. isn't exactly an archetype of legal purity, either).
As a foreigner, you're allowed to hold a job with a work-permit - although most ex-pats have incomes which transcend the locale (plenty of writers there with paying gigs elsewhere).
They have a military of around 2,000 men - most in their navy; mostly for drug-interdiction and anti-smuggling operations. As a result, taxes are almost nothing by comparison to the U.S.
There are issues - customs people require 'payments' to get things across the border tariff-free; there are two prices for everything (one for locals and one for expats) - unless, of course, you know someone.
Moving there is a process; it's not an event. However, I'd defy anyone to find a stable country with real estate prices and barriers-to-entry that low.
The water's warm; the people are friendly; the rum is cheap and the living easy enough - if your friends won't visit you in Belize, you have no friends.
This sounds like it is going to lead to some cool writing.
ReplyDeleteI realize that the circumstances that led to it might have been less than optimum, but it generally takes something rough to kick me out of my rut.
Best wishes on the journey!
Thanks KatyDid. I sure it will inspire inspiration in writing just from the crazy planning stages.
ReplyDeleteThe circumstances are not that bad really. I just need to move around.