Share some facts on where you live - country, state, or county.....

A

Ameriscot

SF VIP
In my county, Fife, there are more CCTV cameras per head than anywhere else in Europe!

I don't have a problem with this, I feel it gives me freedom of movement, but I know many will disagree.
 
Bee, nice location and lots of history where you live!

Laurie, I don't mind CCTV and don't feel it's an invasion of privacy. After all, you are in a public place. I have an American friend who lives in Lochgelly.
 
All you folks have a good knowledge of your areas where you live. I find that interesting because I'm just the opposite. I guess it's because we move so often that I have very limited knowledge of my community. Never set down roots anywhere. Until my dad left, I'm not sure how many places we lived in. He wasn't a good provider and I think we moved a few times because the landlord was expecting rent that never came if you know what I mean. So we moved a lot then including a move to a different province and when my mom was 'single' we lived in 5 different places in the space of 9 years. Once I was out on my own, I couched surfed for a year (yes I left home with NO plans), and since my husband and I have been together we've lived in 15 different communities and likely we'll be moving again in a year or two. I'm also foreseeing one more move after that when my husband passes on and I move back to the province of my birth where my youngest may be living by then.

So no roots unlike you folks. I often wonder what that must be like. I think we must have have been gypsies in a past life :D
 
Debby said:
All you folks have a good knowledge of your areas where you live. I find that interesting because I'm just the opposite. I guess it's because we move so often that I have very limited knowledge of my community. Never set down roots anywhere. Until my dad left, I'm not sure how many places we lived in. He wasn't a good provider and I think we moved a few times because the landlord was expecting rent that never came if you know what I mean. So we moved a lot then including a move to a different province and when my mom was 'single' we lived in 5 different places in the space of 9 years. Once I was out on my own, I couched surfed for a year (yes I left home with NO plans), and since my husband and I have been together we've lived in 15 different communities and likely we'll be moving again in a year or two. I'm also foreseeing one more move after that when my husband passes on and I move back to the province of my birth where my youngest may be living by then.

So no roots unlike you folks. I often wonder what that must be like. I think we must have have been gypsies in a past life :D
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This is the longest I've lived in one place - 15 years. But I've lived in 4 states in one country, and then two other countries.
 
1. The name Chicago comes from the Algonquin word “Chicagou” or “Shikaakwa,” which translates to “onion field” or “wild garlic

2. Planning a road trip? Route 66 starts in Chicago.3. The Field Museum owns the world’s most complete Tyrannosaurus Rex skeleton. Its name is Sue.

4. The Chicago River flows backwards.

5. In the late 19th century, the river was reversed to empty into the Mississippi River instead of Lake Michigan.

6. Chicagoans can’t resist messing around with their river. On St. Patrick’s Day, the Plumbers Union dyes it a bright shade of Irish green and every summer the Special Olympics holds a fundraiser where tens of thousands of rubber ducks race down the waterway.

7. In 1917, writers Ben Hecht and Maxwell Bodenheim hosted the shortest known debate in history. The topic? “Resolved: That People Who Attend Literary Debates are Imbeciles.”

8. Seeing a room full of people, Hecht argued, “The affirmative rests.” Bodenheim took to the podium and nodded. “You win,” he said.

9. Wrigley Field was originally named Weeghman Park. Doesn’t have quite the same ring to it.

10. In 1927, Chicago bootlegger Al Capone made nearly $60 million selling illegal hooch.

11. Even before Capone’s activities, the city had a reputation for crime. In 1918, over 100 waiters were arrested for poisoning stingy tippers.

12. In the 1850s, the entire city was hydraulically raised several feet to fix a drainage problem.

13. Speaking of the underground, Enrico Fermi conducted the first sustained atomic fission reaction under the University of Chicago’s football field.

14. In 1930, the Twinkie was invented in Chicago.

15. Rebuilding after the Great Chicago Fire of 1871 was swift and legendary—rubble and ash were pushed into the lake to make new neighborhoods.

16. Chicago banned pay toilets in 1973
.
17. The World’s Fair (or Columbian Exposition) in 1893 saw its share of impressive feats and small oddities: A U.S. map made of pickles, a suspension bridge made of soap, and the first Ferris Wheel were just a few.

18. It’s also where Pabst won its famous blue ribbon.

19. When Bavarian Anton Feuchtwanger couldn’t convince fairgoers to eat his sausages, he served them in a bun. The hot dog was born.

20. A massive city of 200 buildings was created from the ground up for the World's Fair. It was meant to be temporary, however, and only two of the original structures remain.

21. You don’t take the subway in Chicago, you take the ‘L’—this is the name for the city’s rapid-transit rail system and is an abbreviated form of “el,” for “elevated.”

22. Tall-building construction was invented in Chicago and the city is known as the “Home of the Skyscraper.” It currently has four of the country’s ten tallest buildings.

23. Be careful parking in the Windy City. Leaving her car at O'Hare International Airport for a few years, Jennifer Fitzgerald received 678 tickets and was whacked with a $105,000 fine.

24. In 1902, an elephant named Alice at the Lincoln Park Zoo fell ill. The zookeepers gave her whiskey as a pick-me up. Unfortunately, it turned her into an alcoholic.

25. Chicago has 26 miles of public beaches that offer a refreshing respite from the summer heat.



















​
 
I live in a suburb of the City of Bankstown. Bankstown was named after Sir Joseph Banks who sailed with Cook on the Endeavour (1770). He was the naturalist who collected specimens of Australia's unique flora and fauna and who remained interested in the colony of NSW throughout the rest of his life.

Bankstown is located in the Sydney basin, SW of the Sydney CBD. It is a very multicultural city. Bankstown has two railway lines running through it, a busy airport for small aircraft, a university, many schools and shopping centres, is well endowed with sporting facilities and parks and gardens. It has a lots of restaurants serving different cuisines and a goodly number of licenced clubs and pubs where you can avail yourself of affordable entertainment and gamble on poker machines, lotto and sporting events.

For the boring description, see here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bankstown

For photo galleries see here

Bankstown Sports Club - Click a thumbnail then hover to see an arrow to advance gallery - http://www.paynterdixon.com.au/page/bankstown_sports.html

Lunar New Year in Bankstown http://www.bankstown.nsw.gov.au/SlideShow.aspx?AID=23&AN=09-02-2013 Lunar New Year

Australia Bites food festival http://www.bankstown.nsw.gov.au/SlideShow.aspx?AID=29&AN=2013 Bankstown Bites Festival

My Place photo competition - scenes captured in and around the city of Bankstown. The River is The Georges River which runs down into Botany Bay, named by Sir Joseph Banks. http://www.bankstown.nsw.gov.au/SlideShow.aspx?AID=42&AN=My Place Photography Competition 2013
 
I live in a smallish town in east central Mississippi. See below website. It's considered a 'family' town, but young people are ready to leave for the lack of entertainment. Pretty normal I guess. I have also posted a MS site that covers the state as a whole. Everyone knows of our checkered past with racial problems, but for the most part MS has come a long way in that respect. MS is the still fattest state and leads the nation in poverty, so nothing to be proud of there. Doubt I will see that changing in my lifetime. MS is certainly not for everyone, but its not all bad. I enjoy living here.

http://www.meridianms.org/default/

http://www.visitmississippi.org/

I have a vacation condo on the Alabama coast. Below is a little info on the area. Actually its more than a vacation spot as I'm there 30-40% of the time. Of course when you are retired.......you're always on vacation. ;)

http://alabama.travel/places-to-go/orange-beach
 
QuickSilver said:
1. The name Chicago comes from the Algonquin word “Chicagou” or “Shikaakwa,” which translates to “onion field” or “wild garlic

2. Planning a road trip? Route 66 starts in Chicago.3. The Field Museum owns the world’s most complete Tyrannosaurus Rex skeleton. Its name is Sue.

4. The Chicago River flows backwards.

5. In the late 19th century, the river was reversed to empty into the Mississippi River instead of Lake Michigan.

6. Chicagoans can’t resist messing around with their river. On St. Patrick’s Day, the Plumbers Union dyes it a bright shade of Irish green and every summer the Special Olympics holds a fundraiser where tens of thousands of rubber ducks race down the waterway.

7. In 1917, writers Ben Hecht and Maxwell Bodenheim hosted the shortest known debate in history. The topic? “Resolved: That People Who Attend Literary Debates are Imbeciles.”

8. Seeing a room full of people, Hecht argued, “The affirmative rests.” Bodenheim took to the podium and nodded. “You win,” he said.

9. Wrigley Field was originally named Weeghman Park. Doesn’t have quite the same ring to it.

10. In 1927, Chicago bootlegger Al Capone made nearly $60 million selling illegal hooch.

11. Even before Capone’s activities, the city had a reputation for crime. In 1918, over 100 waiters were arrested for poisoning stingy tippers.

12. In the 1850s, the entire city was hydraulically raised several feet to fix a drainage problem.

13. Speaking of the underground, Enrico Fermi conducted the first sustained atomic fission reaction under the University of Chicago’s football field.

14. In 1930, the Twinkie was invented in Chicago.

15. Rebuilding after the Great Chicago Fire of 1871 was swift and legendary—rubble and ash were pushed into the lake to make new neighborhoods.

16. Chicago banned pay toilets in 1973
.
17. The World’s Fair (or Columbian Exposition) in 1893 saw its share of impressive feats and small oddities: A U.S. map made of pickles, a suspension bridge made of soap, and the first Ferris Wheel were just a few.

18. It’s also where Pabst won its famous blue ribbon.

19. When Bavarian Anton Feuchtwanger couldn’t convince fairgoers to eat his sausages, he served them in a bun. The hot dog was born.

20. A massive city of 200 buildings was created from the ground up for the World's Fair. It was meant to be temporary, however, and only two of the original structures remain.

21. You don’t take the subway in Chicago, you take the ‘L’—this is the name for the city’s rapid-transit rail system and is an abbreviated form of “el,” for “elevated.”

22. Tall-building construction was invented in Chicago and the city is known as the “Home of the Skyscraper.” It currently has four of the country’s ten tallest buildings.

23. Be careful parking in the Windy City. Leaving her car at O'Hare International Airport for a few years, Jennifer Fitzgerald received 678 tickets and was whacked with a $105,000 fine.

24. In 1902, an elephant named Alice at the Lincoln Park Zoo fell ill. The zookeepers gave her whiskey as a pick-me up. Unfortunately, it turned her into an alcoholic.

25. Chicago has 26 miles of public beaches that offer a refreshing respite from the summer heat.



















​
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26. Chicago use to be a great town for used book stores, now not so much.
 
I live 7 or 8 months of the year in the Orlando, Florida area.

In the summer, we have humidity that you have to swim through to get to your car. We have mosquitos that can carry off small children and palmetto bugs the size of Chihuahuas. Just when you get your roof fixed, another hurricane or tornado comes along and rips it back off.

On the other hand, we wear shorts and flip-flops in January and we don't have earthquakes. Sort of balances out.

The other 4 or 5 months, I move around the country enjoying the (mostly) good and (very little) bad of the other 49 states.
 
The county I live in - Aberdeenshire on the N.E of Scotland.
Regarded as having the best quality of rural living in Scotland.
Population : 462,900 (City of Aberdeen 217,120, 3rd largest in Scotland) and total area : 631,259 hectares (1 Hectare = 2.5 acres)

Average salary in Aberdeen is approx 1.5 times the national UK average and the Gross Domestic product of the city & shire is
over £12 billion ($20 billion). Unemployment is less than 1%. Gross added value per head is second only to inner London.

Over 40% of the barley used for the Scotch whisky industry is grown in Aberdeenshire.
It has the largest white & pelagic fishing port in the UK at Peterhead

It has the highest number of castles / hectare in the UK.
Craigievar Castle, near Alford, is one of the models for Walt Disney's fairytale castle.
Dunnottar Castle at Stonehaven was used as inspiration for Disney Pixar’s animated movie Brave, and
was the setting for Zeffirelli’s Hamlet, starring Mel Gibson and Glenn Close.
It also features in the new bestselling video game Call of Duty: Ghosts.
Slains castle at Cruden Bay was the inspiration for Dracula's castle in Bram Stoker's story. This was
written while Stoker was holidaying at Cruden Bay.

Famous people from Aberdeenshire include the percussionist, Dame Evelyn Glennie (from the village of Methlick)
and singer Annie Lennox.

Captain George Duff, born in Banff, was one of Admiral Lord Nelson’s most trusted commanders and a hero
of the Battle of Trafalgar. A monument to him stands at St Pauls cathedral in London.

Actor and directorPeter Mullan, whose films include Trainspotting and Braveheart, was born in Peterhead.

There are lots more. The worst thing is that tourists often think that Scotland only has a west coast and ignore the east.
Well, that's their misfortune.
 
Capt, so many tourists go to Edinburgh and Inverness and think they've really seen Scotland. They missed a lot.
 
Hillsboro Ohio a county seat in rural area of SW Ohio, notable for the number of state highways that converge on the town form all directions causing a more or less constant traffic jam. Except for the business of county government, the downtown is devoid of consequential businesses, several second hand stores, a tattoo parlor, a martial arts academy, a lot of empty store fronts. All the real commerce takes place a couple of miles north of town in a commercial strip that includes Walmart, Lowes, Kroger, countless auto parts stores and most of the not upscale franchise restaurants you can name. All very convenient actually. Outside of town it's all soybeans and corn as far as the eye can see and this year is on tract to be a bumper crop. A lot of Amish live in the vicinity and it's not at all unusual to see several horse and carriages tied to lamp posts in Walmart's parking lot. My wife and I moved here because it was centrally located for all our business trips. The cost of living is very reasonable.
 
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I have lived and worked in the huge sprawling Toronto, Ontario, the largest city in Canada, on the shores of Lake Ontario, since 1986, transplanted from Ottawa and originally from Vancouver. This is a great place to live, everything is here.... gorgeous parks, recreational areas and lakefront beaches, shopping, the Skydome sports arena, the business and financial district, theatre and entertainment district, culture, arts and fashion district, Harbourfront lakeshore events area, the famous University of Toronto and a great subway system. In September we will be hosting the yearly Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF).

The city core is divided into small enclaves, little 'village like' neighborhoods, many of which are ethnic, which are like little towns unto themselves, while the suburban outskirts spread north, east and west. I live in a small village like neighborhood that is quiet yet has all the amenities within easy reach. North is Muskoka cottage country, and more south is rural and wine country in the Niagara Valley and of course, the Falls.

http://www1.toronto.ca/wps/portal/contentonly?vgnextoid=8e79f9be8db1c310VgnVCM1000006cd60f89RCRD
 
Fresno ---I live in the 5th largest city in California with a 500,000 population situated in the heart of the San Joaquin Valley. 60 minutes to Yosemite National Park,90 minutes to Monterey/Carmel /Pacific Ocean. It is a agricultural based community. The Valley produces a huge variety of fruits, nuts, grapes, veggies, dairy. The area also enjoys a much lower cost of living than Southern California or the San Francisco Bay Area and in the past few years has had a big influx of people seeking more affordable housing and cost of living. The Valley is noted for it's hot summers (currently 102F at 12 noon).
 
I live in the California mts. We have been here about 21 years. It's a pretty central location to the beach, desert, Las Vegas, San Francisco, LA and an hour to what some say is the largest living thing on the planet (I'm not so sure that is true though) General Sherman. And I think General Grant is suppose to be the tallest tree. I know, I should look it up but I'm not going to right now. My favorite thing here is looking at the stars at night. We are always watching for falling stars and other interesting things in the sky. If I posted a photo of my front yard no one would believe its where I say it is. The drought has hit us hard. Even some of the trees in the beautiful National Forest are dying.
 
IMO Chicago is the most beautiful city in the world.. I certainly will never leave her... But that's because she is home..

Preview-Image.jpg
 
QS, I've only been to Chicago once and it was bitter cold. But I could see what a great place it would be in nice weather!
 
The only time I was in Chicago was at the airport and I got to see the beautiful city at night from the sky as we took off. My daughter used to go there to visit her friend and my husband and one of our sons has worked there and they both tell me it's beautiful with a lot of good restaurants.
 
Ameriscot said:
QS, I've only been to Chicago once and it was bitter cold. But I could see what a great place it would be in nice weather!
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lol!! sometimes we have all four seasons in one day.. hahahahahaha....

Oh Chicago has a ton of warts.... but those of us born and raised here forgive those imperfections and focus on the positive aspects.. It's a great city
 

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