It’s easy to narrow to my top 20 choices.. From there? Not so easy…
[ul]
[li]Michigan[/li][li]Colorado[/li][li]Washington[/li][li]Delaware??[/li][li]Massachusetts [/li][/ul]
It’s easy to narrow to my top 20 choices.. From there? Not so easy…
[ul]
[li]Michigan[/li][li]Colorado[/li][li]Washington[/li][li]Delaware??[/li][li]Massachusetts [/li][/ul]
I can’t believe I’m the first to say New Jersey.
I live here now and while not a native, am continually discovering its pleasures. Taxes are high, true, but it’s worth it to me for the proximity to big cities, small towns, public transportation, beaches, mountains, and (mostly) rational people. The fact that more money would make it even more accommodating isn’t the fault of the state.
My list:
In our case, finances and taxes are not a major concern, so quality of life is the principal determinant in our decision. Parents are deceased, relatives are spread out and seldom seen owing to our expatriate life, and Miss DrumBum will likely stick around at university for a while, so proximity to family is not an overarching concern for us at the moment.
Hawaii
Vermont
Massachusetts
Oregon
California
Maryland
Alaska
Oregon
Montana
Maine
Texas
Alaska
Colorado
Montana
California
Assuming a career transfer/money to live is possible:
Montana
Wyoming
Colorado
Oregon
Alaska
You east coasters are crazy 
California (current home)
Arizona - northern
New Mexico
Utah
Colorado
The next 3:
Wyoming
Idaho
Montana
California(Ventura area)
South Carolina(Charleston area)
Florida(Naples or Sarasota)
Texas(Gulf coast)
Maryland(Baltimore area, I spent 46 years there and liked it)
South Dakota (home and current state)
North Carolina (specifically Wilmington)
Iowa (especially eastern around the quad cities)
Alabama (especially the gulf coast)
South Dakota (just because
)
Assuming family, jobs, and other considerations are irrelevant:
Hawaii
California
Ohio
Washington/Oregon (Seattle or Portland)
New York (specifically, NYC)
Virginia
North Carolina
New Mexico (and I’ve never even been there - I’ve romanticized it in my mind)
Hawaii (ditto)
Pennsylvania
Oregon (Willamette Valley – currently home)
Washington
Hawaii
Idaho (Coeur d’Alene)
Virginia
I was born in California and would never go back to live. I lived in Salt Lake City, Utah, for 14 months, which was exactly 13 months and 29 days too damned long.
Oregon (current)
Washington
Hawaii
California (State of Jefferson, only)
Idaho (Boise)
That’s having lived in the midwest and the south. No thanks and no thank you. I’ve never lived in the northeast, but I suspect I would not appreciate the high population: crowds, traffic, lines, lack of open space. I like the west.
California
Washington
Oregon
New York
Texas/Florida (yuck)
Compared to Idaho, yes. But once you get out of the Megalopolis, the endless sprawl that makes traffic unbearable in Florida and California is absent in the Northeast. Cities are compact and easy to get into and out of. Traffic is light once you get out of them. There is also plenty of open space in the Northeast even though it is usually pretty close to roads, so if your idea of “open space” is “a day away from civilization” then no dice (unless you’re talking about the hundred mile wilderness) , but if it just means you can’t see any signs of civilization then wilderness is pretty common.
Fair enough. To give you some perspective, I think Raleigh is too crowded and driving around the burbs sucked. I’ve lived in metro areas for decent part of my life: southern CA, Cincinnati, and Charlotte. I’ve lived in a high rise in a decent sized metropolitan city. I’m done with that. I like visiting big cities, but I’m not a fan of suburban sprawl, which is what all those places had in common. The northeast being even more densely populated, as a region, strikes me as mostly urban and suburban sprawl. I’ve no doubt there are some wonderfully small town places to live there, but it doesn’t help that the weather there is not my cup of tea. I’m done with redonkulously humid summers and too long, too cold winters. Boise is on the list only because I’m a huge fan of outdoor activities, – hiking, biking, snowshoeing, and such – and it’s a smaller big city with less sprawl. It’s beautiful summers are a plus, but the winters might get old after a few years.
Where I live now, I can be in the mountains in a half hour and within an hour, I’m in wilderness. The mountains are much more impressive out west, too. The views are spectacular if you’re into that sort of thing.
California (home)
New York (NYC)
Louisiana (New Orleans)
Hawaii
Illinois (Chicago)