We are all Slave now.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by Did you just call me Coltrane?

Most of my conversations with my fellow suburban parents about travel teams revolve around how expensive they are and how it's just a way to make $$ off our kids. And what a weekend waster it is for all involved. A lot of these programs have 3 or 4 teams from the same town for the same grade(s) based on skill, so your child is either on the A,B or C team. Maybe the A team kids get to play lacrosse or soccer in college, but those B and C kids likely won't and are basically subsidizing the A teams.

Translation: my kids didn't make the team at tryouts{sad face}

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

Marie Kondo is largely right. You don't need that stuff, so get rid of it.

Nah, some of that stuff is precisely what we work for. The joy of sitting with a book in a nice nook with a good cup of tea, listening to your daughter creating something in the workshop, that's nice.

I'll confess, there is one thing I like about 'burbs that I don't have, which is a porch. I've always liked a good porch.

But getting down to 2000 shouldn't be too hard, even with a little room of one's own for each occupant.

[Did you just call me Coltrane?]

Originally Posted by ThurgreedMarshall

The problem with ethnic food (even Chinese) in the suburbs is that it has to be completely de-spiced to appeal to the overwhelmingly bland suburban palate. The number of suburbanites I've been exposed to who cannot stomach any form of spice is enough to make me never want to move to the suburbs by itself.

TM

This just depends on the area. We have a local middle eastern place and a pho place, and when I get take out from each I'm always the only white guy in there. I'm usually the only one speaking english. Both rival any urban counterpart. Also, we (Chicagoland) have much better mexican food than the NYC area - simply because we have a lot more people of mexican descent. Spicy!

But again, you're right on Chinese. The best we can do is Doordash P.F. Changs, and that's usually just several orders of the chicken lettuce wraps.

[Did you just call me Coltrane?]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

Translation: my kids didn't make the team at tryouts{sad face}

Ha! Haven't tried out yet, but that may be the case.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

Not in a neighborhood full of ethnic food it doesn't. DC is fucking DC. Per square mile NW has more really strong ethnic food than anywhere.

Happy to talk specifics here, but not sure what places you have in mind. I lived in NW. There are certainly places to go in NW where you can get good food. I heart Two Amy's, for example. But Chinese food not so much -- there are better places in Rockville alone than in all of NW. It's not a close call.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

Happy to talk specifics here, but not sure what places you have in mind. I lived in NW. There are certainly places to go in NW where you can get good food. I heart Two Amy's, for example. But Chinese food not so much -- there are better places in Rockville alone than in all of NW. It's not a close call.

I never went to Rockville even when i lived there. How did you? To be fair, the best Vietnamese food back then was at the second Orange line stop after Ballston- Clarenton maybe? But I think the whole neighborhood got torched for office plazas.

Anyway DC and its suburbs are different as I said several posts ago.

[ThurgreedMarshall]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

Even a little isolation/space can be damning.

So i live in a tiny little suburb that is heavily white, 90% easy. And it votes 70% liberal dem. But we are part of a very diverse school district. So if you have kids, and certainly kids in sports, you know black kids. And it is less than a square mile, so there are very diverse streets within a quarter mile of almost everywhere in my town.

The worst thing I've seen was a Next Door thread. The HS football team sends players out to sell stupid coupons. Some old lady writes, "3 young black kids were on my porch, ringing my doorbell. I peeked out the window, but didn't answer. Anyone else see them?"

Someone else, who I know, wrote, "umm, they are just nice kids trying to play football for the HS. Safe, perfectly safe."

So far the thread was bad, but it wasn't too bad. Now understand, ND is open to kids from the HS, white and black kids.

After the first exchange there were a dozen follow up posts by people I know have kids in the school that were generally, "I bought tickets, and introduced myself. They were seniors, one plays CB, one RB and one LB."

After a couple the tone was "I'm brave, look what i did!' which might actually convey how they felt, but boy was it an ugly thing to see, especially given the schools their kids were in.

So I was posting "Please delete this thread!" Over and over, hoping no kids saw how ugly/stupid people are.

It's such a sad thing. The fact that almost every single white person, no matter how sheltered and closed-minded they are, changes their mind as to the individuals they actually meet and know and somehow views them as exceptions to the most ridiculous stereotypes as opposed to the norm, is really very depressing.

TM

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

I never went to Rockville even when i lived there. How did you? To be fair, the best Vietnamese food back then was at the second Orange line stop after Ballston- Clarenton maybe? But I think the whole neighborhood got torched for office plazas.

Anyway DC and its suburbs are different as I said several posts ago.

When I moved there, we lived in short-term housing near the White Flint Metro while we were looking for a place to live. So places in Rockville were close. More importantly, my Bible for finding good places to eat was Tyler Cowen's ethnic dining guide (not then in this format). I was often up to go check out a place in the suburbs if he liked it, and he steered me to all sorts of good places I never would have found on my own. The best Korean fried chicken I've ever had was at a counter in the back of a Korean grocery out in the Virginia suburbs somewhere.

[Replaced_Texan]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

RT!!! Have you seen Ugly Delicious? A series with David Chang (momofuku) looking at different foods. It is where i got my Naples Pizza info (episode 1). But episode 3 or 4 is called "Shrimp or Crawfish." it contrasts N.O. and Houston food. Especially focused on a Vietnamese area (Crawfish and Noodles is a featured place for location). it looks amazing- but you're East side and that's West?

Yep. Chris Shepherd is our local go-to guy to explain the crazy that is Houston food. I'm waiting patiently for whatever is taking Underbelly's place to open.

Viet-cajun crawfish is amazing. It started on the west side, but it's all over town now. There are a few places you can get it outside of Houston, but it's really a truly Houston food thing. I usually go to LA Crawfish on Richmond for it, but Houstonia put together a list that is probably accurate enough. Crawfish and Noodles is where it started.

My brother had a more traditional crawfish boil on Saturday, and the bugs he got were HUGE, so I'd say we have at least a month to six weeks left of the season. It started late because of a cold winter, but apparently most of the crawfish made it. If you're in town, lemme take you to eat. You can get it year round at LA Crawfish, but who wants frozen crawfish imported from China?

[ThurgreedMarshall]

Originally Posted by Did you just call me Coltrane?

Most of my conversations with my fellow suburban parents about travel teams revolve around how expensive they are and how it's just a way to make $$ off our kids. And what a weekend waster it is for all involved. A lot of these programs have 3 or 4 teams from the same town for the same grade(s) based on skill, so your child is either on the A,B or C team. Maybe the A team kids get to play lacrosse or soccer in college, but those B and C kids likely won't and are basically subsidizing the A teams.

We all have these conversations. This is the first layer.

Try talking to them about the kids who can't afford to play for any travel teams that are awesome at soccer and how you can get them to play with your team if you all agreed to pay a bit more. The conversation will shift once they realize the advantage they inherently have by paying all that money. Everyone who has kids on a travel team complains about the money. But the reason they exist is to give them a leg up on the kids who can't be on a travel team.

We've discussed here before why the men's and women's national teams look the way they do here in the US. It's not because there are no people of color playing soccer. It's because the whole system is set up to feed talented, upper middle class athletes into college programs and elite travel squads. This is the only country in the world where soccer is a rich man's sport.

Originally Posted by Did you just call me Coltrane?

Shut up, fool! Where are the current generation's Mister Ts?

TM

[Pretty Little Flower]

Originally Posted by ThurgreedMarshall

Suburbanites feel superior about how they live, city people feel the same. We just value different things.

But the things city people value are objectively better in every single way than the things suburban people value.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by Replaced_Texan

Yep. Chris Shepherd is our local go-to guy to explain the crazy that is Houston food. I'm waiting patiently for whatever is taking Underbelly's place to open.

Viet-cajun crawfish is amazing. It started on the west side, but it's all over town now. There are a few places you can get it outside of Houston, but it's really a truly Houston food thing. I usually go to LA Crawfish on Richmond for it, but Houstonia put together a list that is probably accurate enough. Crawfish and Noodles is where it started.

My brother had a more traditional crawfish boil on Saturday, and the bugs he got were HUGE, so I'd say we have at least a month to six weeks left of the season. It started late because of a cold winter, but apparently most of the crawfish made it. If you're in town, lemme take you to eat. You can get it year round at LA Crawfish, but who wants frozen crawfish imported from China?

The UD show paints NO as a place that refuses to change anything- they went to Vietnamese places where crawfish is made traditional cajun, no one wants to vary, supposedly. then they contrast the changes made in Houston. Underbelly guy was a big part of the show too.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

my Bible for finding good places to eat was Tyler Cowen's ethnic dining guide (not then in this format). I was often up to go check out a place in the suburbs if he liked it,

that is foreign to me, and I think really not the way to explore restaurants in a city where you will spend time. Walk along a street, walk in and try what looks good. i can't imagine handing off my experience to someone else's choices, though I suppose it explains the ability to say the entire city of DC has no decent Chinese food.

[ThurgreedMarshall]

Originally Posted by Did you just call me Coltrane?

This just depends on the area.

No argument here. But you actually need a nearby neighborhood full of the people who will actually support such a business. That's not necessarily common for a whole lot of suburbs.

Originally Posted by Did you just call me Coltrane?

Also, we (Chicagoland) have much better mexican food than the NYC area - simply because we have a lot more people of mexican descent. Spicy!

These are hard facts. It's improving here. We finally figured out what tacos actually are and places have been popping up. But the lines are too damn long at the few places we have still.

Originally Posted by Did you just call me Coltrane?

But again, you're right on Chinese. The best we can do is Doordash P.F. Changs, and that's usually just several orders of the chicken lettuce wraps.

I used to complain about the 150 Chinese food places that delivered to us because it seems like you have to ask for your food super spicy to get it the way it should be (or go with an actual Chinese person and get the real menu that only they can read). Of course it also depends on which region in China the restaurant focuses on. But I soon swallowed my complaints after eating Chinese elsewhere. You people are deprived, even of the good Chinese dishes created for Americans.

But we got a Sichuan place near us recently that is just ridiculous. I shovel their dishes into my mouth while sweating from the spice levels. So damn good.

TM

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by ThurgreedMarshall

We all have these conversations. This is the first layer.

Try talking to them about the kids who can't afford to play for any travel teams that are awesome at soccer and how you can get them to play with your team if you all agreed to pay a bit more. The conversation will shift once they realize the advantage they inherently have by paying all that money. Everyone who has kids on a travel team complains about the money. But the reason they exist is to give them a leg up on the kids who can't be on a travel team.

We've discussed here before why the men's and women's national teams look the way they do here in the US. It's not because there are no people of color playing soccer. It's because the whole system is set up to feed talented, upper middle class athletes into college programs and elite travel squads. This is the only country in the world where soccer is a rich man's sport.

I think the idea that kids are getting an advantage by playing on a more competitive team in a program is not quite right. The more competitive teams are better, and they have better coaching. But the kid who gets to play on that level and isn't starting is not necessarily improving as much as s/he would have playing all the time at the next level down. What I see at somewhat younger ages is parents who think their kids are the next Messi and keep pushing them higher, switching programs to do it if necessary. A little later, the kids switch on their own, usually because a friend in another program tells them how much better it is there.

You're right that it's so much easier for affluent kids to get into the system. For the program, the two costs are coaching and fields. (Especially fields. In my area, there is a huge shortage, and the club rents fields from the school districts, which cover their budget shortfalls by (essentially) making it harder for poor kids to play the sports they can't play in school.) Kids whose parents can pay for these things will find someone willing to take their money. Kids whose parents can't are less likely to find a spot.