Oh my god could that place get anymore confusing!! Had to go to Springfield to do a drug test (hair follicle) and got so turned around and confused it was actually quite humorous. And not to mention the place is hidden back in some freaking complex behind a neighborhood somewhere. Or at least that is what Ahkmed told me so now I get to drive back up there Monday and search again some place off backlick road which splits in numerous places.
ETA:I mellowed myself out with a return trip to VA Arms and bought some ammo to calm the nerves.
I know, I know… I lived and worked in several areas of northern VA for about 5 years. Luckily I never had to go into DC, and most commutes were against traffic.
Thinking about traffic and the logistics of how you get somewhere, at what time all hell breaks loose, and where not to be are all consuming. It doesn’t help when the same road changes names three times.
That’s how I felt driving from the Richmond Airport to the Richmond police academy last weekend.
How can I be heading both south and west on two different interstates at the same time. One minute I’m at exit 183 four miles up the road I’m at exit 79.
I’m not sure what dealing with congestion has to do with being “sheeple”?
Things that come to mind about why I stay here:
My parents.
My maternal grandparents.
All of my other maternal relatives.
A lucrative job.
A lucrative job market.
Rich in history.
Equidistant from the beach or the mountains.
I was born here.
I grew up here.
I own houses here.
If a few 1000 of the jackoff congressional hangers-on would vacate the area, we’d be fine. It’s not the area that’s the problem. It’s the people who bring their bad driving habits from small town “Nowhereville”, and deploy those same bad habits here.
Yeah man I would have said hello but I didn’t want to interrupt the whole movie theater conversation. You better show up for the Marine Day Mark Larue is rumored to have a booth there.
Wow, I guess I’ve been here long enough to nearly qualify as a native. I only use the “old school” map for this area. I’m here because of my job. I met my husband here, but neither of us have family here. We do have a lot of really good friends here. There is a lot to do here, pretty much whatever you want.
My fantasy is that one day I can find a way to work from home.
Trust me, I don’t really give two shits what you think. No really, I don’t.
I just thought your contention was asinine. Valid reasons do exist, even if they don’t for you. I also wanted to illustrate that staying here doesn’t make you “a sheep”.
It may make one crazy, stressed out, high strung, and road weary, but those things are fairly easily overcome with a vacation.
That’s kind of like saying “if Leprosy didn’t make your body parts fall off, it wouldn’t be that bad”.
Living in SE Florida I have to constantly remind people that it used to be a nice place, if the people from further north and further south hadn’t come and ruined it.
I stay here now for one reason, my girlfriend. She has a son, and the father is here, and as such we’re stuck. Besides an immediate SO, however, I wouldn’t let any amount of family or money keep me anywhere. But then I suspect that SE Florida is a much worse place to live than NOVA.
All I can say is get out! Having lived in the VA Beach area from 95-06 and drove the “tunnels of death” on a dailey basis, all I can say is that I am glad I left.
While I do miss my friends in VA, I don’t miss the cost of living, traffic, rude people that the law says I cannot shoot and last but not least, car taxes (which I understand are almost gone by now).
I live out in the country where two cars at a stop sign is a traffic jam. The local town has two stop lights in it. There is no fast food or gas stations for 15-20 miles. There are deer and coyotes roaming my land and all my neighbors like guns and shoot in their backyards. I walk to work and drive no more than twice a week (once to the local gun club and once to church).
