Tell me more about your job interview, again? … Where in St. Petersburg was that?
Whenever St. Pete people complain, and they do - exactly like this, ad infinitum, I am reminded how nobody cares.
Yes it would be easy to point and laugh and say look, here’s another St. Petie who wants people to tell him he lives in a big, important city. But seriously, nobody cares. Here is the truth: it’s a big metropolitan area made up of many cities, Tampa and St. Pete being among them. I know my way around them all (though I fear Pinellas traffic the most).
Good on you for living in that very small, and what has in my life become obscenely gentrified, area of St. Petersburg. Hopefully you can find a job to financially support the flamboyantly cosmopolitan lifestyle of your choice, otherwise you’ll be just another broke-ass yuppie.
For the purposes of this rant, I, unfortunately, am married to a 3rd generation Tampa Native.
Fucking cesspool of a city. Culturally dead. Has the most MORONIC snobbishness I’ve ever seen. No, Really. There are people who proudly have never been north of Kennedy. They live in South Tampa, which they are even trying to mentally separate from actual Tampa. They can base their entire opinion of you by asking “Oh, where do you live?” If it is north of Kennedy, you are scum. It is surreal. My mother moved here, I tried to explain it to her, she didn’t get it. Then she was having a conversation with a woman who just loved Marshall’s stores. She sat there and lamented how there wasn’t one in Tampa. My mother said, sure there is, on N. Dale Mabry. The woman tittered and said “oh, I never go north of Kennedy.” Not even for a store she loves.
My first night in this town, after driving around trying to find evidence of a large city, I called my grandmother, who lived on Anna Maria Island for years and is familiar with the area and was told “Tampa never was a pretty city.”
Shitty little snobby cesspool. I’ve finally convinced my husband to move, although admittedly, not that far away. I’d love for him to experience a real, honest to god city.
That is exactly what my (Tampa) friends like to joke about…
[pretentious voice]
“Meh… I never go north of Kennedy… Do they even have Starbucks in that hell hole? Even if they do, I wouldn’t bother- don’t think my Saab could take it, you know. Just might refuse to run if I attempted to cross Kennedy Blvd.”
[/pretentious voice]
Yeah, and what the SoHos think of us Pinellas people is even worse. Buncha idiots.
Also, RedRoses, you can’t really get on Tampa for their numbering scheme – many of the cities in Pinellas are as bad or worse. Especially since we all run together over here. 24 municipalities, and at least 15 different addressing schemes, sometimes in the same city. Largo is centered on the intersection of East / West Bay Dr and Missouri Ave / Seminole Blvd and is divided into NE, NW, SE, and SW. St Pete is centered on Central and 1st St, and Pinellas Park, South Pasadena, and Gulfport carry these numbers on into their schemes. Clearwater is based on Cleveland and Ft Harrison (where the Scientologists are). Then you got Dunedin, Oldsmar, Palm Harbor, Tarpon Springs, Seminole, all the little beach towns, and some I’m sure I’m forgetting. Many of these have different numbering schemes and some have more than one.
I don’t much care for Tampa either (except Ybor), but there are a whole bunch of reasons other than the street grid.
Scientologists aside, Clearwater is my favourite. St. Pete below me, Tampa to my right and the beautiful Gulf to my left. I haven’t found anything too appealing north.
Oh, like Brooklyn is any better, where in Williamsburg, S. 8th street has nothing whatsoever to do with N. 8th. Most of queens has logically numbered streets. Just sometimes, they do need to squeeze in 30th road betwen 30th street and 30th terrace :o (hey, at least they’re all right next to each other).
I’d have taken you as my guest if I’d known. Seriously. It was a great time. There was a party the night before at MacDinton’s (in South Tampa) with a lot of jersey’s auctioned off for the Kolb family. We raised about $7k. Rob Stone was the auctioneer, with Eric Wynalda and Scott Garlick also there for support. A lot of fun.
