# How California Are You? **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [July 10, 2014, 1:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-california-are-you/692762 "2014-07-10T13:53:44Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Marion\_Wormer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d07c76/32.png) [@Marion\_Wormer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marion_Wormer)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2014, 10:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-california-are-you/692762/81 "2014-08-16T22:54:55Z")
77% When my mother visited me in Monterrey, she hissed, “There’s a man with his hair in braids.” I glanced over and said, “Yeah?” to be polite. Really, you know you’re a Californian when you see a blond guy with his hair in braids, with silver concho earrings and feathers on the leather braid ties and you don’t think it’s unusual. You don’t even think it’s _interesting_. ---
**Author:** ![James\_Toothpaste](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e56c9b/32.png) [@James\_Toothpaste](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/James_Toothpaste)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2014, 11:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-california-are-you/692762/82 "2014-08-16T23:01:34Z")
48% ---
**Author:** ![Bullitt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bullitt/32/5725_2.png) [@Bullitt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bullitt)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2014, 11:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-california-are-you/692762/83 "2014-08-16T23:19:16Z")
100%, and I moved here for college. > [@Infovore](#): > > If it’s 101 or 5, it just as easily could be northern or southern CA. If it’s NorCal, it’s ‘I-5’. If SoCal, it’s either the Santa Ana Freeway or ‘the 5’. > [@pohjonen](#): > > 87 percent. I left in 1989. After the earthquake? ---
**Author:** ![pohjonen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pohjonen/32/423_2.png) [@pohjonen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pohjonen)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2014, 11:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-california-are-you/692762/84 "2014-08-16T23:52:02Z")
> [@Bullitt](#): > > After the earthquake? Ha - before. I always thought the quakes were exciting once I grew up and learned the earth didn’t usually open up and swallow you. I remember the Sylmar one distinctly. I lived in Azusa. I left a trail of blankets from my bed running into the hallway. ---
**Author:** ![guizot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guizot/32/3636_2.png) [@guizot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/guizot)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2014, 11:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-california-are-you/692762/85 "2014-08-16T23:52:30Z")
> [@Johnny\_L.A](#): > > L.A. was just hot and sunny _all the time!_. > [@Johnny\_L.A](#): > > And you can laugh when people in other places complain about the wind blowing (only!) 20 mph and say, 'Wind? What wind? 😃 ’ Now you should know better–you’re just buying into the stereotypes. You know about June Gloom, and you know about Santa Anas. You know you do. These quizzes are just Buzzfeed/Facebook chaff–for whatever place they address. I could get 100%, because I knew the simplistic answers they wanted. (It helps that I’ve lived in both Northern and Southern CA, too.) The problem with this particular one is that–while everyone expects a place like NYC to be complex–few outsiders realize how complex California actually is. ---
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2014, 2:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-california-are-you/692762/86 "2014-08-17T02:24:59Z")
> [@Amateur\_Barbarian](#): > > It’s all more about vague stereotypes than reality. I could easily write a quiz that separated the natives from the poseurs, and socalians from real Californians. > > (Hint: it’s not and never “the” fucking Five.) Correct. It’s the Santa Ana Freeway. Even in Northern California. ---
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2014, 2:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-california-are-you/692762/87 "2014-08-17T02:27:42Z")
> [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](#): > > Out here in Phoenix the numerous LA refugees have corrupted the language, but not completely. It’s not called “the 10” here, they call it “the I-10”. What a horrible abomination! The Santa Monica Freeway. All the way to Jacksonville, FL. ---
**Author:** ![gwendee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/35a633/32.png) [@gwendee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gwendee)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2014, 2:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-california-are-you/692762/88 "2014-08-17T02:48:43Z")
I got 90%, which surprises me because I only lived there for 5% of my life. We moved away 15 years ago. ---
**Author:** ![Ulfreida](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ulfreida/32/8014_2.png) [@Ulfreida](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ulfreida)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2014, 2:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-california-are-you/692762/89 "2014-08-17T02:58:53Z")
> [@Johnny\_L.A](#): > > You ain’t from around here, are ya? :dubious: > > If you’re on I-5, you’re in NorCal. If you’re on the 5, you’re in the real California. We think differently, up here. ---
**Author:** ![Ulfreida](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ulfreida/32/8014_2.png) [@Ulfreida](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ulfreida)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2014, 3:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-california-are-you/692762/90 "2014-08-17T03:01:20Z")
> [@Infovore](#): > > … > I refuse to call San Francisco “The City,” though. That’s where I draw the line. It WAS the city, the only real city in a hundred miles, when (and where) it was called The City. But those times are past. It would be an old person who called it that now. ---
**Author:** ![Ulfreida](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ulfreida/32/8014_2.png) [@Ulfreida](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ulfreida)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2014, 3:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-california-are-you/692762/91 "2014-08-17T03:03:51Z")
> [@MacTech](#): > > If we could choose negative numbers, I’d be negative infinity percent California, sure the weather might be nice, but it’s too much of a Nannystate for my tastes > > I will admit to being 100% Vermont/Maine/Alaska type, the antithesis of California > > The quiz rated me at 20%, that’s 20% too high for me… No, that would be the antithesis of “California”, not the real state. There are many hundreds of square miles where you’d be right at home. ---
**Author:** ![thelurkinghorror](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7c8e57/32.png) [@thelurkinghorror](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thelurkinghorror)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2014, 8:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-california-are-you/692762/92 "2014-08-18T08:53:12Z")
> [@Ulfreida](#): > > But those times are past. It would be an old person who called it that now. Cite? ---
**Author:** ![Ulfreida](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ulfreida/32/8014_2.png) [@Ulfreida](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ulfreida)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2014, 3:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-california-are-you/692762/93 "2014-08-19T03:15:29Z")
> [@thelurkinghorror](#): > > Cite? My parents call it the City. They’re in their late eighties. I never hear young people call it that. I’m of the generation that calls “Silicon Valley” The Santa Clara Valley, which is its real frickin name. I was born there. And, by the way, you’re standing on my lawn. ---
**Author:** ![Derleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Derleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Derleth)\ **Post date:** [August 19, 2014, 4:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-california-are-you/692762/94 "2014-08-19T04:41:06Z")
83% California: > [@](#): > > You are as California as they come. You know your body is a temple, and that temple is full of carnitas and organically grown kale. No. I’m from Illinois, Missouri, Minnesota, and (primarily) (Western) Montana. (It’s complicated. Let’s just say that Missoula has long been my pole star, the one fixed point in my personal geography, regardless of where my mail was actually going.) I’ve spent a total of less than a week in California (San Francisco) and I can’t say I’m especially immersed in the culture. More personally, I’m in favor of good-tasting food with novel ingredients, but morally opposed to the anti-GMO anti-vaccine anti-science Greens I see selling it. ‘Organic’ is not _quite_ an insult in my lexicon, but its coloring is morally ambiguous. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-california-are-you/692762.md?page=4)