. . . and you have Vancouver! Comix scene! Good music! Socialist healthcare! The sea! Fish! The Grouse Grind (more on that later, heh, heh!)

an nba team!

You're answering the wrong question, that's something LA has that Seattle doesn't.

Anyway, I don't know about LA, but one thing Seattle has that SF doesn't have is a rational street layout. Here in SF my building number is 45. If I head down the street and go one street over, suddenly the building numbers are in the 1700s. No rhyme or reason other than just tacking numbers on buildings from where streets start. Seattle on the other hand, is built on a grid plan, so if your building number is in the 1700s, one block over will be the 1700s, etc, etc. You'll almost never hear a Seattleite ask for a cross street after being given an address because the address tells us what we need to know.

...from myself and all Seattle cartoonists. When you do move up, I'll buy you a coffee.

Uh, what's your sister got in her hands?

...head for Vancouver or Montreal. You've been Canadian this whole time and just haven't realized it.

You want a comics scene? How about Heather McAdams and Chris Ware with Lynda Barry just up the road in Wisconsin? And what we lack in seafood, we make up for in just about every other type of food there is.

Check it out.

you've been out west too long if you think seattle is a small city...

dave in New Orleans

310,000 strong and still shrinking

I believe those are actually tea bags in his sisters hands. Now try to make some perverted joke about that!

"Seattle on the other hand, is built on a grid plan, so if your building number is in the 1700s, one block over will be the 1700s, etc, etc."

So all addresses in Seattle are in the 1700s? :)

Also, "Seattleites"? That's pretty cool, but were the first European-types in the area called "Seattlers"?

Sorry.

You were here last weekend - and the weather was GREAT! Smaller than Seattle, no MicroSmurfs, better beer, better bookstores, less traffic, cheaper, closer to actual BEACHES and MOUNTAINS and the Columbia Gorge! (Ooops, I'd better quit, never mind, we're full..... ;-)

Ah, Portland. The only city in the only state that actively discourages people from moving there. Is it true they once had a 'welcome to Oregon' sign on the California border than encouraged visitors to enjoy Oregon and then go home?

Having said that, if I had been offered the job I interviewed for, I would have moved there in a heartbeat. From Cleveland, not LA.

Has the second wave of invasion from California intensified?

Having said all that, Vancouver is Seattle with better health insurance. Both cities are can't miss IMO for creative types.

Seattle has an NFL Team.

But the hipnocitude of Seattle is so 1990's.

...poorly-dressed people. Do I win?

How is this a comic strip? I'm just seeing an out-loud decision-making process with humorless observations. With illustrations!

Vancouver's much bigger than Seattle and has poutine and a clothing-optional beach. But, it's foreign.

Seattle is great -- I lived there car-free for 8 years*, but I was childless. It's got nice culture, nice people, and is pretty much always a comfortable temperature -- it'll snow once or twice a year, and 90 degrees is considered a scorcher.

It is, of course, overcast a lot -- the second February I was there was the first month of my life I didn't see the sun. Peppermint oil, St. John's Wort, full-spectrum lighting it all eventually wasn't enough. But, if you can take that, you should consider it.

Note that housing prices have dropped precipitously, but are likely to continue going down for at least four more years (in real terms.)

*well, I had a car for a few months, but it wouldn't start on demand

"Come visit us again and again....But for heaven's sake, don't come here to live." - Governor Tom McCall on CBS Evening News interview with Terry Drinkwater - January 1971.

You can get your "Welcome to Oregon. Now go home" bumper stickers at Amazon.

http://www.amazon.com/Welcome-Oregon-now-home-stickers/dp/B000FEDQAW

SSSHHHHHHHH!!!!!

Lot's of rain. Or at least mist.

On the plus side, the rain means Seattle has something else that LA does not: clean air.

You were here last weekend - and the weather was GREAT! Smaller than Seattle, no MicroSmurfs, better beer, better bookstores, less traffic, cheaper, closer to actual BEACHES and MOUNTAINS and the Columbia Gorge! (Ooops, I'd better quit, never mind, we're full..... ;-)

-- Quatermass

Sorry quartermass. The Beaches are 2 hours away from portland, while Seattle is right on the water. From Seattle, you can get out to either the Olympics or the Cascades in hour. Seattle has more bookstores per capita than any other city in the US. Any beer you can get in Portland you can get here in Seattle as well [we have Mcminemins[sp?] too].

While I don't particularly like Microsoft- I use Liux- I'll take them over slave labor employer Nike any day. And while you may like the smaller size, Seattle's larger population means that there is more going on.

Plus, Portland is ugly compared to Seattle.

As for Seattleites, I didn't make that up, that's always been the term. On a side note, if you're ever unsure of how to spell a Seattle area word, just open Microsoft Word and type it in. Not only will it recognize the correct spelling of "Seattleite", but it also recognizes the name of a major Japanese supermarket in the Seattle area, Uwajimaya. My thinking is that the developers of Word got sick of seeing the little red squiggly lines every time they sent an email about getting lunch.

As for the 1700s thing, I know you're joking, but in case anyone else is confused, house or building numbers are referenced by the cross street. So, if you're on an avenue and the cross street is 65th Street, your house number will be in the 6500s. If you're on a street and the crossing avenue is 35th Street, your house number will be in the 3500s. It's a little more complicated than that because the cardinal directions (N, NE, etc.) figure into it too, but that's the basics.

If there's a named street, it will take the place in the grid of a numbered street and the house numbers will reflect that. So Broadway on Capitol Hill replaces 9th Avenue E and addresses on the blocks just to the east of it will be in the 900s.