Pornlandia

Back in early April of this year, my girlfriend, best friend (Danielle) and I took a trip to Portland, just cause. I had been wanting to visit that state ever since my very good friend, Ryan, left LA and moved there. Throughout the years, Ryan had teased me with gorgeous photos and long amazing, descriptive emails as to the beauty and serenity Portland had to offer. He constantly urged me to make a trip up there. I never purposely put off the opportunity to go and visit. I just wasn’t  “feeling” it yet.

I had to move back to San Diego in 2009 after living in “The OC” for 7 and a half years. I had some health complications, and I had a great friend that lent me a space to be able to recover with ease. Needless to say, fast forward to 2015. I’m doing much better health wise, but the next thing I knew, it had been 6 years and unhappiness while living in the “best city in the nation” had set in.

Most people think and say, “San Diego has the best climate to offer.” And those people are right, if one truly enjoys nothing but two seasons; summer (hot!) and Dante’s Inferno (balls hot!). When I originally moved to San Diego in 1998, we had two other seasons (AND RAIN, for more than 10 minutes out of the year), spring and fall. I enjoyed the climate and the people I shared it with. Somehow in the time I was gone living in various parts of Orange County California, San Diego began to expand and swell. Some of the swelling expansion was positive for the city, such as an increase in tourism and housing prices rising (before the housing bubble burst).

Yet, there were many things that didn’t necessarily change in a more positive direction that I had hoped it would. The cost of living sky rocketed, while the pay stayed the same (per most of the country). Also, so did the complacency in the attitudes of those that live here. It was hard to come from a city like Newport Beach, CA where it too was pretty expensive to live, but since everyone was constantly motivated to make money, they compensated pretty well for that drive and motivation. San Diego is CRAZY expensive to live in! I’m not making this up either. I’ve purposely attached a couple articles as links in these sentences to help support my empty pockets.

Also, the people here aren’t what they used to be. I mean, we were ranked the 19th rudest city back in 2012. If the tourists that have visited here felt it, one can only imagine how it feels to be here on a constant basis.

And defensive driving, no no no. It’s called, “Survival of the Driving Hunger Games” here. God forbid if you leave half a car’s space in front of your own because just watch how fast that Suburban will show you his clown car trick by shoving itself in front of you. Oh and that lane you’re driving in, it belongs to the asshole next to you. So be ready for shim to take it at any given moment. Blinkers are a sign of weakness, so use them ONLY once you’ve made into the lane as a sign of victory.

In order to not have this turn into a San Diego bashing, cause I could so easily go there, and no I have not even started yet; I’ll move this drawn-out story along.

While FINALLY making the trip to Portland, a place where YES they have RAIN (LOTS AND LOTS), I found that my happiness had somehow moved up there without me. Our trip was only four days long, but long enough for us to make the decision to move there. So, if all goes well with pending job interviews, we are hoping to make Portland our final destination by September of this year.

I promised to family and friends that I would post all the glorious waterfall, green scenery and even those rainy Pornlandia moments within this blog. So, as a kick-starter, here are some of our awesome moments from April 2015 in Portland.

Slice of humble pie… Cheese