living situation pros and cons
Mood: happy
Posted on 2006-12-10 13:44:00
Tags: proandcon
Words: 424

So I had this idea for a post about things I like and don't like up here, in the spirit of my previous pro and con post. I'm trying to limit this to location stuff. (i.e. no job stuff or complaints about the obvious lack of friends, etc...)

Con: The nearest grocery store is like ten minutes away by car if there's no traffic. This feels obscenely far away, given that we lived literally across the street from an HEB in Austin.
Con: The grocery stores here are nowhere near as good as HEB. The selection isn't as good and they aren't as clean, etc. And they require use of the stupid loyalty cards (which we managed to get without giving them personal information, but the idea still bothers me).
Pro: Our apartment complex is really nice - we love our apartment and they have a small but decent gym. And there are cookies in the main office! And there's covered and assigned parking.
Pro: We're right across the street from a mall, which we used to walk to in better weather. There's also a movie theater and restaurants there.
Pro: It seems like there are lots of good restaurants around here, Copeland's and Bertucci's among them.
Con: We definitely live in the suburbs, which means almost all the stores around are chain stores. Still looking for a good independent bookstore like Bookpeople.
Pro: We're close to both Baltimore and DC, which means there are lots of things to do if we feel like it. The huge number of museums and such in DC means we'll never lack for things to do when people are visiting. (hint, hint!)
Pro: The weather. Yeah, on the whole I'd say this is a pro. It is cold here, but it's warmer today (50s!) and it really does feel like Christmas. Also, I can't wait for snow! (I reserve the right to change this to a con in January...)
Con: Radio stations. This is another close one, but I liked Austin radio better than here. At least WAMU is a good NPR station with shows like The Kojo Nnamdi Show. (the Diane Rehm Show counts against them because I cannot stand her voice)
Con: This is probably a suburb thing and to some extent a Maryland thing, but things just aren't as close as they seemed to be in Austin. We have to get on the freeway to go anywhere. This also may be because we haven't lived here too long.

Anyway, that's what was on my mind today.

7 comments

Comment from wonderjess:
2006-12-10T16:54:20+00:00
hehe. did you know that saul sometimes buys things he doesn't want just to confuse the loyalty card?

also, I love that you listed the presence of a gym and cookies in the same line.

I'm going out with michelle this week -- I'll ask if there are any columbia secrets you should know :)

Comment from gregstoll:
2006-12-10T19:11:46+00:00
Hah! That sounds like him.

Yeah, give me the scoop :-)

Comment from quijax:
2006-12-10T19:42:31+00:00
Hmm, buying things you don't want kind of defeats the purpose of thwarting the loyalty card - you're still spending money at the store, money that you wouldn't ordinarily spend to boot. A better solution would be to trade cards periodically or let other people use your card when you're at the store, ideally people who don't have their own cads.

Comment from onefishclappin:
2006-12-10T21:11:10+00:00
Ooo - I can see it now - randomly going up to people in the store and trading cards everytime you visit it. It's a movement! The "anti-loyalty card" movement! I've always wanted to be a part of a movement...

Comment from ctroisi:
2006-12-11T10:08:21+00:00
I think what he does is not use the loyalty card so he doesn't get the sale price. Drives Hankje crazy.

Comment from quijax:
2006-12-10T19:44:57+00:00
As far as I can tell, the sprawl you live in is definitely a Maryland thing. I grew up in suburban New Jersey, and the towns there grew up as distinct towns, so they all have town centers where the library is within walking distance of the high school and that sort of thing. Of course, being Jersey, you have to get on the highway to get anywhere outside of your town, but I didn't bother to do that much.

Comment from yerfdogyrag:
2006-12-12T09:51:06+00:00
So, back in high school and early 20s (two separate times), this was my favorite book store. It didn't take much eat through my budget! Even (way) back then, there wasn't much in the way of independent book stores; Crown books was a staple. You might like Olsson's Bookstore. It's been there for quite a number of years, and I see it periodically with author talks on CSPAN/BookTV. I've only actually been there (Old Town) a few times.

On the radio, I seem to recall a station out of UMD which had some fun stuff, including a *real* metal show (in the late 80s, most of DC was bland piped in stuff), and some folk stuff. Don't know if they're still around. Oh, and you're now in one of the few places in the nation that has CSPAN radio on the air.

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