We are all Slave now.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by ferrets_bueller

I actually put that in especially for you, since on your recommendation I picked up a bottle of Suntory at a closeout sale. It holds its own with all but the peaty goodness of Lagaluvin.

And if I'm not mistaken , there is no "e" in (Suntory)Japanese whisky.

I'm always putting an e where it doesn't belong.

I'm about to finish off a bottle of Hakushu 12 year I've been nursing for a while, and need to invest in some Japanese whisky so I have some on hand. I liked the Hakushu quite a lot, the little sweetness in it was very nice. But recommendations welcome, its time to try a new one.

[Did you just call me Coltrane?]

Originally Posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy

I'm thinking about picking up a Vineyard in Napa so we'll have a place with some room.

Make some burnt wine.

[Did you just call me Coltrane?]

=ThurgreedMarshall;514542]My ex moved out to the suburbs. I can honestly say that if I moved to the suburbs, I would kill myself.

When I lived in the city (pre-kids), I told my best friend to shoot me if I ever moved to the 'burbs. He hasn't shot me yet, but he constantly brings it up.

Some things that would lead me to this:
[LIST][*]Going to a "good" restaurant in a strip mall

Some suburbs in established cities (like NYC, Chicago and Boston) don't look like suburbs at all. They look like towns ("Anytown, USA Jerry - Oh you gotta mulch. You got to"), with a town center and independent restaurants. No strip malls. You know this.

I can walk to several bars and restaurants, and some of them are actually pretty good. Before I moved out of the city, I thought all suburbs looked like Atlanta's suburbs (which are truly awful).

That being said, I can't find good Chinese anywhere out here, and in the city I could fall down on the sidewalk and find myself in a good cheap Thai place. Same with sushi.

[*]Conversation with other suburban people--I manage to survive it at my daughter's games, but if these people were my only options, forget it

One of my neighbors is Australian. He smokes a pipe and wears a smoking jacket. He's basically the personification of a Wes Anderson movie. Talking to him is like being on another planet.

[*]Doing house and yard stuff

You will never understand the joy of using a powerwasher. It's very cathartic.

[*]Knowing which of my neighbors votes for Trump with their little yard signs

I don't know a single person in my 'burb who voted for Trump, which probably means I live in a liberal bubble.

[*]Car culture

I walk my kids to school every day. Sometimes we ride our bikes to the farmers market or local candy shoppe.

[*]Idle housewives power walking or whatever

This is annoying but some of them have fantastic asses.

[*]Malls--holy fuck do I hate malls

Malls are indeed terrible.

I realize people seek where they grew up. But the idea that I would want to design my life such that I don't have to interact with anyone who isn't like me is crazy. Leave my house that has it's own little play area for my kids and is in a neighborhood that no one who doesn't live there has any reason to visit, to get in my car so that I don't have to interact with anyone to drive to a mall to hang out or to some strip mall to have a drink would be torture.

TM

I interact with my neighbors so much more in the suburbs versus when I was in the city. There's a lot of sharing, borrowing and watching out for each other's kids. Some of the kids are dicks, but most aren't.

Now, we don't have a ton of diversity - I'll admit that. Well, we do have both protestants AND catholics.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy

Low quality cheese is the easiest way to up the grease level.

Semi-related, if you've not switched the cheese on your caprese salad (i eat a lot of those) from mozzarella to burrata, make the shift. Mmmmmmm. So rich.

[Did you just call me Coltrane?]

Originally Posted by ThurgreedMarshall

They don't deliver.

The burbs will never catch up. Your pizza and Chinese food sucks. Those are staples. And the fact that restaurants have to pay more people to cover more square mileage of fewer people means it will never work well in the 'burbs.

TM

Agree on Chinese but disagree on pizza.

[Did you just call me Coltrane?]

Originally Posted by Pretty Little Flower

One of my friends used to be kind of a hipster. She was involved in one of the early alt-rock radio stations in the area, and thought it was funny when I showed up at a dinner party she was throwing for her mom severely messed up on . . . stuff. Recently, at a party, she was drunkenly blathering on about how much bang for the property tax buck she got in her suburb. Eventually, I just stopped her and said, "If you say one more word about this subject, we will never speak again." She stopped, but was silently resentful.

Was it Neko Case?

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally Posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy

I'm always putting an e where it doesn't belong.

I'm about to finish off a bottle of Hakushu 12 year I've been nursing for a while, and need to invest in some Japanese whisky so I have some on hand. I liked the Hakushu quite a lot, the little sweetness in it was very nice. But recommendations welcome, its time to try a new one.

Obviously, don't develop a habit of buying this. But when your spouse's business partner offers this at a dinner, drink half of it.

https://www.masterofmalt.com/whiskie...ar-old-whisky/

[Did you just call me Coltrane?]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

Obviously, don't develop a habit of buying this. But when your spouse's business partner offers this at a dinner, drink half of it.

https://www.masterofmalt.com/whiskie...ar-old-whisky/

If we are doing this then I recommend Casa Dragones for sipping tequila. Even the blanco is good.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by ferrets_bueller

It is literally...not figuratively, literally...child abuse to send your children to the DC public schools. This isn't really open to discussion. The schools are wretched, with no improvement in sight.

This is false. It depends on the school.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy

I live in the burbs. I live in the town my wife grew up in, and near a lot of her family, and that's why I live in the burbs. But there is one thing that will never be fixed in the burbs.

They are full of suburbanites. Everywhere you look, there is another fucking suburbanite.

These people do their kids homework for them, because they care how they do not what they learn. They compare shit endlessly. Homes, cars, snowblowers, boob jobs. Who they know. Who they want to know. What they watch on TV. And they all seem to have been made at the same factory.

I suspect that TM is the only person here who lives in a city larger than the one I do, but like Adder I live in a part of it that is almost all zoned for single-family homes with yards, which means that the population density is suburban. I'm no fan of it. I move to where I am because it was super convenient to a job that I no longer have, and now I'm stuck there because I don't want to move my kids to another school unless I have to. The thing I like the least is that the suburban population density means you have to drive everywhere, and makes for less interesting businesses and restaurants. So much of what other people are saying flows from that. Everyone wants their own little yard so their neighbors aren't next door, but when everyone has that little yard and the zoning doesn't permit the construction of apartments or other denser housing, then there you are. I don't think suburbanites are inherently boring, but (particularly when you have kids) it gets harder to figure out how to connect withthe interesting ones. As TM said, spending time trying to make conversation with other parents on youth sports teams is one of the lower circles in Dante's Inferno. That was similarly true when I lived in a city, though.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

ETA: This reminded me of one more maddening thing about the suburbs: Food wasting.

Every party must involve twenty different dishes, many brought by guests. All portions are huge (the shrimp tray has it own zip code, and the crudite eats up half the kitchen island). And nobody eats any of it (I believe, paralyzed by the paradox of choice: "I'd like a donut hole. But I can't decide which coconut variant of the 17 offered is the best choice, and I don't want to look like a neophyte. Maybe I'll just take a bite of one of the fourteen plates of Humboldt Fog. But... which one is the best?")

Because every children's party needs to have 740 crab claws. And a 1/1000th size Mayan pyramid of melon balls. Like edible assortments? Well, there's one in every room. Nothing like a houseful of kids running around on cream carpeting with massive genetically engineered franken-strawberries covered in chocolate.

And we haven't even ordered the 37 pizzas for the kids yet!

Would you like a craft beer? You look like a craft beer kind of guy. There's a metal bathtub in the gazebo filled with a six pack of each of the 48 varieties of Sam Adams... and something called Landshark. Looked like fun! Drink up. The wife and I are wine drinkers. We're just going to throw away what's left... Or at least what'll fit in the front-end loader we use to clean up after these things!

It's weird how parties in the city (and the country) always have exactly enough food and drink. No wastage. Weird.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by Did you just call me Coltrane?

If we are doing this then I recommend Casa Dragones for sipping tequila. Even the blanco is good.

Thanks. With kids just turning 21 now I'm starting to pick up more stuff I don't drink for them and their friends. I need to add a tequila to the bar.

[Adder]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

The economics of delivery work better where you can get around well by car.

Or bike, e-bike or scooter, and the travel distances are shorter.

[Adder]

Originally Posted by Hank Chinaski

All that said, for me my favorite place to stay is the UWS. I can get to the street and walk to almost everything I want to do every day. If not there is the subway. And the best part of every day's experience (and ofter the worst) is that walk/ride.

The single worst policy decision we ever made in this country was to lead our cities away from being designed around mostly walking and taking the streetcar/subway and toward accommodating car trips (to and from the suburbs). Cars have their uses, but they absolutely kill cities.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally Posted by Tyrone Slothrop

It's weird how parties in the city (and the country) always have exactly enough food and drink. No wastage. Weird.

I always thought some of that we have to bring the biggest pot of chili stuff was midwestern/rural rather than suburban. I remember pot lucks in the country where everybody was careful to make enough so we'd be ready just in case everyone in the county showed up, even those half-wits who live in the trailers in onion-town and haven't left the mountain in 20 years.