Most Unfriendly Part of the USA?

[NW-Bound]

Could you overnight some of that white stuff; low 20's sounds so refreshing. We're suffering a heat wave here without air conditioning. Hope you take winter vacations.

San Francisco 89degF today. Without AC ->

Phoenix 96degF today! What spring? It's summer!

 

[bssc]

San Francisco 89degF today. Without AC ->

Phoenix 96degF today! What spring? It's summer!

96 is cold. Warm is over 110. We flipped on our evaporative cooler though since we like our little luxuries.

 

[jazz4cash]

I voted Northeast.........specifically NJ. My experience with New Yorkers and New Englanders has been a tad better. I am a Northeasterner (DC), lived in MI, CA, IN, and travelled to many other places in the US and NJ takes the prize, but I don't view unfriendliness as a bad thing, just a different attitude toward others.

 

[CuppaJoe]

96 is cold. Warm is over 110. ....

YMMV, it was so hot, I went out on the roof as soon as it got dark, half the residents were already there and I tried to be friendly without jeopardizing my curmudgeon candidacy.

 

[haha]

YMMV, it was so hot, I went out on the roof as soon as it got dark, half the residents were already there and I tried to be friendly without jeopardizing my curmudgeon candidacy.

I looked at the book recommended by AL, Younger Next Year. He says that older men often start to get crabby and easily irritated. The author says that we should resist this creeping crabbiness with whatever skill we can bring to bear. Today I practiced personal control by not yelling at people who almost ran me down in cross walks.

Tomorrow I will be very nice to everyone of this board.

My goal is to reverse curmudgeonhood before it is too late.

I don't know whether or not this sort of thing applies to women.

Ha

 

[kumquat]

I think it is the equivalent of two bored kids pinching each other in the back seat on a long car ride.

Are we there yet?

 

[REWahoo]

Tomorrow I will be very nice to everyone of this board.

My goal is to reverse curmudgeonhood before it is too late.

Sorry, but it appears your condition is much too far advanced to have any chance for remission....

 

[ratface]

Wow, lots of Chicago people here including myself. Although I work in this Sheethole I don't spend much free time around here. People are always in a hurry and the traffic congestion is deplorable. There is no trust of anyone probably for survival sake. I much prefer anything an hour or so outside the greater Chicagoland area where people are much more trusting. You can actually buy gas without pre-paying. Many places don't ask for ID when writing a check. (back in the check days) Get into the small towns and folks still leave their keys in their cars and the clerks at the motor vehicle office are actually human. I think friendliness stems from trust, the less we fear each other the more open we will behave toward one another. I have found Texas and basically the South to be very friendly. Perhaps it has something to do with population density, a nice climate, and rifles across the back of pick-up trucks which evens the playing field. Conversely I have found the Northern part of the US to be the most unfriendly.

 

[freebird5825]

I didn't vote on any region. People are people...
I'm a friendly person and have had good luck in many zip codes.
A smile and respect go a million miles.

 

[freebird5825]

I looked at the book recommended by AL, Younger Next Year. He says that older men often start to get crabby and easily irritated. The author says that we should resist this creeping crabbiness with whatever skill we can bring to bear. Today I practiced personal control by not yelling at people who almost ran me down in cross walks.

Tomorrow I will be very nice to everyone of this board.

My goal is to reverse curmudgeonhood before it is too late.

I don't know whether or not this sort of thing applies to women.

Ha

May I recommend a nice loud whistle for the drivers ?
Never put until tomorrow what you can easily do today.
I'll suggest a virtual box of chocolates to get you started off on the "nice" campaign.

Curmudgeonhood for women? Nah, I only get crabby when people torque me off.

 

[freebird5825]

...In contrast, the people in NY could not have been nicer on any of my visits. On one visit we took my FIL who was about 92 at the time. He was very excited about the trip since he had worked in NYC during the '50 and '60's. As he crossed the street near his old office he missed a step and fell. He broke his glasses and cut his head. The people on the street from the bystanders to the cab driver could not have been more helpful. We got back to our hotel and the staff was wonderful. They found a place to get his eye glasses repaired on Sunday and employees searched their lockers for bandages. Wow, and I had heard NY'ers were rude!

It's the water!
TY for telling that story.

 

[CuppaJoe]

....

Tomorrow I will be very nice to everyone of this board.

My goal is to reverse curmudgeonhood before it is too late.

....

This is a sickening development, worse than another rendition of Barbra's "People." OTOH, none of us have enough points to run against the incumbent, they say only one allowed per forum. NM, this is not an election year.

 

[unclemick]

When I was living in Boston I had a roomate who was an assistant professor of anthropology. He was from San José. He explained this stuff to me in a way that made total sense. He said that people are not the same everywhere; they actually differ quite a lot from one another. Some of this difference is individual, some family, some subcultural and some from the larger culture. Some groups are much more open to strangers than others. This doesn't necessarily mean that they are looking to become friends, only that they are not automatically cold with strangers.

One of his favorite things was to point out stuff at parties, such as how people stood together in groups. Most ethnic easterners other than Irish are bunched together practically touching, or in fact often taking hold of one another. Westerners were more likely to space themselves out in kind of a loose semi-circle.

I tend to be conscious of these things, and to interpret them as meaningful but not as simple indicators of a single trait such as "friendliness". This kind of knowledge can also be used deliberately as anyone who has survived as a sales professional knows in his/her bones.

I like to have fun with this stuff in some moods. Once a car salesman was giving me the hearty good ol' boy treatment as we were walking along in the lot. I put my arm around his shoulder and said "I am so happy to find you!" He practically fell over laughing.

ha

UW early sixties - cultural anthro, and the paperback 'The Silent Language' or something like that.

Distance and don't look em in the eye unless know them well enough to invade their privacy.

heh heh heh - I still vote Seattle. Especially in the 'grey' part of the year.

 

[deserat]

Berkeley, CA - I saw some of the rudest behavior ever there - especially at Monterey Market. Friendliest - Hill Country, Texas.

 

[Orchidflower]

I have to go with Moemg on this one. I found northern N.J. and NYC to be ultra-friendly.
When people vote for the NE being the least friendly area are they speaking of outside the NYC region?
Connecticut does have a cool reserve I heard, but New Hampshire is supposedly very friendly. So what exactly makes the NE area so unfriendly? Which States? Seems to vary by States/regions in the NE area.

And, yes, Texans are friendly; however, that does not mean it's an invitation to friendship. However, I found more assistance and help from "I hate Yankee" types when I got to Houston than I would have ever gotten from anyone in Chicago when I got there. And I was from Chicago. Go figure?
If I can truly say anything about the native Houstonian/Texan it's that they will extend a helping hand to others. Even their signs all along the roads say "Drive Friendly."

 

[Bestwifeever]

The 5 friendliest cities in America - TODAY Technology & Money said San Antonio, Denver, Davis CA, Nashville, and Madison WI are the friendliest.

Travel&Leisure's poll of travelers found this:
FRIENDLIEST PEOPLE
1. Charleston
2. Austin
3. Minneapolis/St. Paul

I'm seeing Miami, Washington, Philadelphia when I do a search for unfriendliest. I wonder if places with a transient population seem less friendly--outside of people in the service, people who move every few years are possibly less likely to invest in friendships with people they may never see again?

Also, people may treat tourists one way but behave the opposite to a new neighbors. Small towns can seem mighty friendly to someone passing through, but may have a social structure in place that outsiders will never crack (or even be aware of until they realize they have no friends if they move there).

 

[haha]

Also, people may treat tourists one way but behave the opposite to a new neighbors. Small towns can seem mighty friendly to someone passing through, but may have a social structure in place that outsiders will never crack (or even be aware of until they realize they have no friends if they move there).

This is certainly true. Although I have been away for a long time from my old home in the upper south, I still have instant connections there. Not that they wouldn't have all sorts of doubts and attitudes about me- some from my having been gone so long, some from problems I might have created for myself before I left; but I would fall back into a family and social structure that goes back into the 18th century. My Grandmother has been dead for 40 years, but she still has some local juice.

OTOH, corporate transferees are intersting, perhaps entertaining, but never really "one of us".

ha

 

[bbbamI]

IMO, I think everyone is friendly. If they don't appear that way, then perhaps they have gas....

 

[CuppaJoe]

.... Small towns can seem mighty friendly to someone passing through, but may have a social structure in place that outsiders will never crack (or even be aware of until they realize they have no friends if they move there).

Mom solved that problem by befriending people who arrived after she did.

 

[Midpack]

Chicago is exempt . It is more the rural areas that bred unfriendly people .

Interesting again. I actually live about 50 miles from downtown Chicago and people are far friendlier in the smaller towns than the big city. Like the other poster above, my experience is that city folks are generally less friendly to strangers than small town folks. I have never been anywhere that people were more rude than New York City itself, but I don't doubt there are millions of wonderful people there.

And how people treat strangers is not a good indicator of how friendly they are once you get to know them...

 

[Orchidflower]

Have 14+ years of living in Chicago, and I found that if the Chicagoan knows you somehow (even if you are a friend of a friend's family) they are really friendly. However, if you are a stranger they might treat you like poop.
But me? I love Chicagoans because they talk direct, straight and say what they mean totally. But I am sure some of my Southern brothers and sisters would interpret them as totally rude. Different strokes.

 

[haha]

But me? I love Chicagoans because they talk direct, straight and say what they mean totally. But I am sure some of my Southern brothers and sisters would interpret them as totally rude. Different strokes.

Southerners say what they mean also. It's just that it sometimes needs to be translated. If your woman friend says "Oh Dearie you look gorgeous where did you get that darling dress!" She may mean "You old hag you must shop in Value Village- and by the way, you had better get a face lift pretty quick!"

Ha

 

[MichaelB]

Places I’ve lived in the US: NY, NJ, CT, FL, IL (chicago area) , Cal (northern), Tx, WVA and Oh.

My limited experience is that if you are friendly to folks they respond in kind. They are also mostly polite – as long as you agree that politeness has some cultural differences around the country. Especially in the NY area.

I don’t think people are particularly rude anywhere. Anyway, rudeness is usually misunderstood politeness.

Folks are most withdrawn in WVa. Polite, courteous, friendly but distant – and will embrace any stranger as one of their own after only 2 or 3 generations.

 

[youbet]

I'm from rural Indiana...

I'm leaving Chicago for a long weekend and heading for Brown County State Park in Indiana just to rub elbows with some of those friendly, outgoing folks from rural Indiana!

Personally, grew up in inner-city Chicago, Chicago Public Schools from K -12, and live in the near-in Chicago burbs today. Inbetween, I lived in rural Indiana and semi-rural Tennessee. People, in general, were different. But broad brush categorizing one group as friendier than the other is silly. People aren't friendly or unfriendly, rather one's ability to get along with folks differs. When one says he or she thinks folks in an area are "unfriendly," that just means the speaker has yet another character flaw and lacks the personal people skills to get along with certain others. Too bad.......

Frankly, I don't like anybody very much!

 

[haha]

I'm leaving Chicago for a long weekend and heading for Brown County State Park in Indiana just to rub elbows with some of those friendly, outgoing folks from rural Indiana!

Going to take the sulfur baths?

The first summer I was in in college we went a huge weekend Jazz Festival down there. Duke Ellington, Gerry Mulligan, Miles Davis, Count Basie, MJQ, Stan Kenton, George Shearing- I don't remember all the headliners but it was a very big event right there in rural Indiana.

When I was a child my parents took us to Brown Co. State Park for summer vacations. I remember a very nice big lodge, likely built by the CCC and a lot of nice cabins. I think we stayed in a cabin and ate at the lodge. We swam in a pool and also went horseback riding. We liked to bomb one another with hedge apples, huge sticky knobby things that I guess were the seed pods of some tree.

One year we went up with an Uncle who had a 1951 pea green Caddy convertible with red leather seats. I remember that is was very softly sprung and he would go fast on those rural roads that had lot of little dips and rises. The car kind of floated up and gave a feeling similar to a fast elevator. We thought it was like a roller coaster.

Ha