patrick.net

Booger says

Seriously?

richwicks says

I can't think of a single time I've had a negative interaction with a Mexican.

I've encountered the same. But the culture is a bit shady for some. Looks good on paper, you just don't know what's going on when you're not around them. They still have their gangs. Little Village and Pilsen in Chicago are the biggies. Hermosa in 3rd place. They're not remotely as violent as blacks though. So they're not all good as Trump would say.

Working Mexicans are some of the best people though. Especially the professional ones. Occasionally run with a legal immigrant who played football (not soccer) in Mexico. And about 4 other Mexican Americans. Great people overall. If we're talking race, which I turn a blind eye to 99% of the time. My issues have been in my daily going abouts has been with blacks.

I think music can tell a lot about a culture. There's nothing positive in black music outside of Jazz and that was decades ago. Can anyone even name a decent all black rock band? Hell even Jazz band now? It's all tits, booty, guns and killing for lyrics and average backing music. Says a lot. I love latin and Soca music. It's fun, good vibe.

AD says

Wookie, you wrote "We didn't move to CA because..." ... so your family and you now live in California ? If yes, then what town or city ?

We're high income W-2 so would have gotten trashed in CA regardless of any other factor. We wouldn't have made more there either. So no sense in moving. IL is 4.95% flat income tax. We would have gotten into the 13% range in CA and it sounds like from what I've read it's probably going up more. Then factor in property values/expenses and it was a no go. Would have been looking at $20-40k per year more depending on housing.

I think I deleted it, but I had a spreadsheet of different locations where my wife was offered a high paying job. As weird as it sounds, the math made the most sense to stay put in IL. Fuck winter, but I can manage and we usually travel at that time to warm places as it is cheaper generally. Her current work is flexible with vacation as long as she's available via phone/computer. Another job in another state would probably change that. So we stayed. In laws and our moms are here, not that I particularly care for them, but it's important to her. We were close though. It was CA or CO that lead the list. None made financial sense. So IL it is as crazy as that sounds.

Wife just got back from visiting family. Had two strangers come up to her asking about how it was here and how lucky she is getting out after seeing her cars plates. She went to mall by our old house and said there were way more foreigners not speaking English, we have only been gone since 2020. She said traffic and roads were even worse and everything just looked more run down. Only plus was she said mountains and hills looked very green and pretty from all the rain, but that means fires are going to be bad this year.

RC2006 says

She said traffic and roads were even worse

That's what high rates of EV ownership is going to look like anywhere it gets above 2-5%. Not sure how they'll extract the $$$ but it's coming. 95-97% of tax payers are not going to help finance a non-green toy. 2-5% drop in MFT is higher than the numbers would leave you to believe. Probably closer to 10%. Switching from ICE to EV is a 100% drop in those cars. $0 of revenue.

CA roads and most roads are going to eat shit until they figure out how to tax EV's. Everyone's golf cart toy is going to get more expensive. 2025. Not sure how they do it, but it's coming. No one has the balls to do it in an election year. I hope they don't do it in shipping/trucking. Inflation now will look like a joke. They need to tax EV's hard.

RC2006 says

She went to mall by our old house and said there were way more foreigners not speaking English,

Funny you should mention: after two visits to Miami my impression is that nobody fucking speaks fucking English there. :D It's wall-to-wall Español.

Hollywood:

https://www.newsweek.com/nevada-residents-want-people-california-stop-moving-1896103

Nevada Residents Want People From California to Stop Moving to Their State