It’s a shibboleth; it’s how you can tell the True Northerners from transplanted Southerners. And kill them.
From where I sit down here by the border, everything beyond Pendleton is “northern California.” It sounds very strange when people refer to Los Angeles as part of SoCal, even after I lived in Mission Viejo for quite a while as a kid. Nowadays I think of the whole area as a hellish and dirty gridlock that starts around El Toro and stretches all the way to Bakersfield. Afterwards you get the Bay Area, which in my brief acquaintance was what you got if you picked up San Diego and stuck it on the opposite end of the state.
Anything north of Sacramento? You’re in Oregon.
(I also say “the 5,” “the 805,” etc. And it boggles me when people call the 405 “the San Diego Freeway.” It ends in Irvine, for the love of…!)
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The Dodgers.
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the 101. Seriously, what’s up with that? Plus, and correct me if I’m wrong, but SoCalers seem to refer to freeways by name more often, rather than number, like “Hollywood Freeway” vs “101.” That’s just silly no matter who’s doing it.
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I remember visiting LA in high school. We were on Hollwood Boulevard, driving along. I remember thinking, “this must be the crappier part of this street, the cool part must be up a few miles.” One block later, I’m looking at Mann’s Chinese Theater.
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It’s so flat. There’s nothing cool about flat. I can get flat anywhere. I want my San Francisco Hills O’ Doom. Driving on flat land is boring as all hell. I think this is actually a big part of it. Vast, flat areas give me the willies for some reason.
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To get there, one must take I-5. shudder
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Too damn hot. Give me 60 degree foggy weather any day.
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My friends go to UC Riverside, so I visit there often. Need I explain more?
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Every weather report tells you how bad the smog is going to be that day, and no one seems to think anything of it. “Oh good, the air’s just gonna be a little gross today.” :eek:
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Y’all have infiltrated San Francisco and taken over Cow Hollow and the Marina. I can’t even drive down Union Street here without being blinded by bleach-blonde hair.
That said, I must thank you guys for Barry Bonds, No Doubt, and Tom Petty.
[Hijack]I never noticed state rivalries until I went to school in Colorado. I’m from TX and now live in CA (Southern for this thread’s purposes) and Coloradans really HATE both states! Not sure why, except that when you ask you usually get these answers. 1) That guy that skis down the mt with his cowboy hat. (I’m sure there never was a guy, but whatever), or 2) They can’t drive on our streets.
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Can’t we all just get along?
Grew up in the northern part of Southern CA, college/first married years in the Bay Area, and now in Northern CA, north of Sacramento (which is indeed the southern end of Northern CA). I guess I’ve sort of migrated. Maybe I’ll wind up in Yreka or something.
I wouldn’t want to live in LA, but then I wouldn’t want to live in SF either. I like it right here. My second choice would be SLO–if I was rich, anyway. I think my prejudice might be against huge cities rather than north/south, but I prefer the damper north, too.
Almost everyone I know from So Cal call it that.
Funny you sound just like Bay Area people I know who say the exact same thing…
Yeah, because we all know how gorgeous Hollywood, Compton, Culver City, and all of those other cities are.
Maye if you’re looking down Wilshire, In the more upscale parts, or out in certain parts, but actually So Cal is fairly uniform in climate and looks - coastal Mediterranean and desert compared to Northern California’s Coastal Med, Temperate rainforests, Redwood forests, Riparian woodlands, Valley Savannahs, etc. etc.
Oh but wait you’re talking about the typical landscape that everyone installs there? King palms, Fan Palms, Schefflera, etc.
Last i heard Santa Cruz was a city. And no Monterey and Carmel aren’t beaches, they’re cities. You know, because beaches have sand and ocean waves and stuff. Unless you’re looking at some weird dictionary.
And what’s a “real” beach? If you’re talking warm water and sand, I’d never swim in the water in LA. If you want a real beach visit Boracay in the Philippines. So Cal’s beaches couldn’t hold a flame to that one. And how much attention have you paid to the climate here? Redwood forests are a minority. We’ve got in Monterey alone:
Maritime Chaparral, Coastal scrubland, Riparian forest, Oak Savannah, Vernal pools, Pine and mixed coniferous forests. I’ve seen many places in California, but most of the north trumps any beauty the southland has. I’ve seen more variety in climate here in Monterey than I have between Redondo Beach and Irvine.
I can complaina bout the smog in So Cal because Monterey has some of the cleanest air in the state.
What rock are you living under? They know the north exists, they just don’t pay much attention to it, being self absorbed and all. Oh and actually most people I know don’t pay much attention to So Cal, unless it’s someone like you extolling the virtues and bragging about how much better is is down there.
Note: Most of this post is being sarcastic to Bill. For the record, I actually LIKE both places. I want to live in both San Francisco, and then retire somewhere in Southern California so I can grow a wider variety of things than I can here. The only people I know who hate So Cal tend to live in Berkeley or San Francisco. There’s plenty of people here witht ies to So Cal and Nor Cal so they go both ways.
There’s about 15 miles of sandy beach with sand dunes behind it between Monterey and Capitola. Places you can hang out without anyone around to bother you. And surprisingly in some spots it can be fairly warm. There’s also lots of hidden coves north of Santa Cruz where you can sunbathe naked and the cliffs block the wind.
I’ve rarely seen any beaches in So Cal where you can actually get AWAY from people.
There are hills in SoCal. You just can’t see them because of the smog! 
(But what do I know. I’m from Cleveland!)
I say we put our differences aside and all agree to hate the I-5 corridor.
Fuckin’ Fresno, man…
Ignore my location, I’m Bay Area born and raised. And I hate LA.
My parents are both native Angelenos. My mom’s from Pasadena, my dad’s from East LA. They both grew up thinking they lived in the BEST. PLACE. EVER. My dad went to Berkeley, and never looked back. My parents are like fervent converts to a new religion, one that I was raised in. Most of my extended family still lives in LA and I have been there many, many times. And I’m not talking about Disneyland and Hollywood, I’m talking about the “nice” neighborhoods my family lives in, in Orange County (absolute hell on earth, seriously, it’s ten times worse even than LA county proper), Santa Monica, and South Pasadena. Could these places be any blander and more boring?
That’s not even taking into account the horrible traffic and allergic reaction-inducing filthy air. You can’t really compare people v. people though, people are nice and jerks in pretty much equal numbers everywhere.
(There are horrid bland neighborhoods in the Bay Area, and especially in San Jose, the air can be lousy, but it’s on such a much smaller scale than in LA as to be incomparable.)
Plus, the Dodgers. Ew.
Oh, and there’s the beauty of the chapparral! Can’t forget that. (I know it’s natural, it’s just UGLY.)
Oh yeah, Fresno. Bleh. And you know what place really sucks? Bakersfield. I think we can all get behind that.
I was born in San Diego, and lived there until age 13. Then we moved up north – to Ukiah, in Mendocino county, north of San Francisco. I don’t recall there being a lot of hatred for San Diego in Ukiah, or vice-versa – more a friendly rivalry, similar to that between the Army and the Navy, maybe. Frankly, I noticed it more once I left the state. When I lived in Rhode Island, for instance, I found it irritating that New Englanders seemed to think of California as all palm trees, starlets and beaches, with a few Rice-a-Roni trolley cars and Chinatown thrown in. When I told them I was actually from quite north of San Francisco they’d grow slightly puzzled and say, “Well, what’s up there – redwoods! Have you ever seen a redwood?” and you could practically see them mentally sketching a redwood in between a starlet and a palm tree.
Whether I was in San Diego or Ukiah, though, most everyone hated Fresno – not to mention Bakersfield, and fucking Barstow.
I don’t hate southern California. I lived there for 6 years, and here in the Bay Area for 11, so I think I’ve got a fairly good idea of what both are like. I just like the Bay Area a little bit more.
On the other hand, almost nothing could convince me not to hate Van Nuys.
I’m originally from Bakersfield, and I’d rather live there than Fresno. Or Taft. Or Delano. Or Barstow, especially. Bakersfield is pretty bad, but it’s not that bad.
Oh, c’mon! What’s not to love about orange sky?
There’s good and bad in both places. I grew up in SoCal then moved to NorCal (not “NoCal”).
SoCal
Many people in NorCal think all of SoCal is “LA”. I don’t care for any of the LA area. Its a dirty, smoggy, clogged, disorganized, swath of boring stucco single-family homes and freeways stretching from The Valley to Capistrano and from Santa Monica to freakin’ Arizona. Well, not really Arizona (yet), more like Victorville, but you get the idea.
Riverside, San Bernardino, Kern, and Imperial Counties… blech. The only saving grace may be southwestern Riverside County.
Outside of that, you have Ventura, San Diego, Santa Barbara, and SLO Counties. All very nice… especially when the Santa Ana winds clamly blow in the dead of winter.
I never realized until I was older that nobody else in the whole USA says “the” in front of the freeway numbers. I have since dropped the habit and hearing “the 405” now grates on my nerves a bit. It’s just 405 or I-405, people.
BTW, the name “San Diego Freeway” does not end in Irvine. I-405 may end in Irvine, but the name “San Diego Freeway” applies to I-5 from Irvine to San Diego. Freeway names and numbers do not always coincide.
NorCal
Central Valley is mostly flat and boring, except Sacramento, and maybe Chicoi, which are nice. Fresno and Bakersfield are on the SR-99 Corridor, not the I-5 corridor, BTW.
I like the old Victorian homes and turn of the Centruy construction in NorCal that is harder to find in SoCal. There is more of a historic preservation in NorCal, whereas SoCal tends to bowl over its history with stucco, concrete, glass, and plastic.
I prefer mountains and forests to beaches, so NorCal gets the nod there. Plus, the craggy NorCal “beaches” are wonderful, just not for playing volleyball.
The people in NorCal seem less plastic and superficial. It’s not as important what kind of car you drive, etc.
SF, Monterey, Berkeley, Bodega, Mendocino, Eureka, Shasta, Napa, Sonoma, Yosemite, and the Sierras are great. Modoc, Redding, Stockton, Yuba City, and Fresno are not so great.
As far as the rivalry, I don’t take sides. I like SoCal and NorCal in different ways. It does seem that people in SoCal are more oblivious to NorCal than the other way around though.
I think it might be because every time we leave California, people assume we’re from LA. People in Chicago have asked me if I used to see celebrities in California all the time. That sort of thing. Hello, I’m from Sonoma. We get annoyed and defensive about it, like “yes, there is a whole giant state north of Hollywood!”
I grew up in SoCal but have lived in Berkeley/Oakland since college, and if it weren’t for my mom (and some occasional business), I would never go back. I hate that you need to drive everywhere. I hate that all the exits, malls, and plazas look like every other exit, mall, and plaza. I hate that (for the things I’m interested in), there’s nothing to do or it’s not worth the trouble and effort doing it. I hate the weather. I hate that I’m bored out of my gourd down there, when I never am here. I hate that it’s generally more conservative. I hate that whenever I go back, another wave or level of tract housing has arisen that never used to be there, with all the houses looking exactly alike.
But I completely understand why people like it there; they just tend to be people I have nothing in common with.
I don’t think I know anyone here in SoCal that doesn’t like NorCal. I find the hatred from some NorCalers pretty baffling.
We’re pretty much raised that way. We know we are superior, yet you get all the attention… Kind of like Jeb and George 
Seriously though… I don’t hear nearly as much socal bashing as I did when I was a kid… I think at that time a lot of it had to do with the water wars, peripheral canal, etc… I recall that being a big issue at the time. Mostly environmental concerns. Also, souther california, specifically orange county, tended to be more conservative than the north, and state government would skew a bit too rightward for most northern californians. That has just been my observation though, and as I said, I don’t see as much of it anymore.
And I’ve also heard grumblings from those further north than the bay area (I live in San Jose), that they lump us in with you guys down south 
I’ve not spent enough time in southern california to form an opinion one way or another. I’ve been to San Diego a few times and found that one of the nicest areas I’ve visited, and it would probably be my first choice should I ever re-locate.