That sounds like it should be the city motto. Well maybe put it into pseudo Latin first , for a bit of authenticity.
I grew up in Houston (1972-1999), and moved to Dallas after college. My parents still live in the immediate Houston/Sugarland area (Meadows Place, on the border between the two), so I have some recent knowledge.
Houston and New Orleans summers are VERY similar- 90-100 degrees, very high humidity, occasional afternoon rains.
It sort of depends on when or where. I-10 is to be avoided at all costs, at all times, I’d say. 59 isn’t nearly so bad (the highway to Sugarland) most of the time though.
Public transportation is pretty much buses, except for that rail thing down the middle of Main that pretty much goes from downtown to southern Houston via the Medical Center & Astrodome area.
Can’t really say, although houses are generally cheaper there than up here in Dallas.
It’s not really a high-tech hub per se, but as such a large commercially important city, there’s no shortage of tech positions that support other industries.
You name it. Houston’s the fourth largest city in the country. It has it all, for the most part, if you’re willing to drive some.
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Not as much as you think; as for the Filipino part, the Alief area (just north of Sugarland and where I grew up) has one of the largest Asian communities in the country- Vietnamese, Chinese and Filipino are the big 3, I’d say, with Indians and Pakistanis bringing up the rear.
The suburbs (i.e. Sugarland, Woodlands, Kingwood, Katy, etc…) are generally like suburbs anywhere else, except that some of the ones like Alief and parts of Sugarland are not necessarily brand new, and are more ethnically diverse than the more outlying ones.
As for religion, it’s more relaxed in that regard than many other Texas cities, save Austin. I never really had it come up when I was younger, but it does come up more now that I live in Dallas.
And as for what InLucemEdita said, Houston isn’t Dallas/Plano, not by a long shot. Houston’s far more down to earth, less pretentious and less prissy.
Video games.
It would really take a lengthy pitting of Texas to do this justice and I haven’t got the time or the energy for it at the moment.
But the best I can give you is some generalizations (yes, they are generalizations people, based on experience, but they don’t apply to you. You are perfect specimens of individual greatness):
The place is absolutely soulless.
The entire state is physically ugly. Flat, brown, insect infested, trash everywhere.
Even the so called beautiful parts (Austin, Hill county, whatever) are about as pretty as the ugliest parts of California.
The people are physically repulsive. Enormous, yes, but also many appear to be porcine in nature…I don’t know how to describe it, but they just look like pig-people to me.
I have lived all over the country and I have never encountered a fraction of the homophobia, xenophobia, racism, and general intolerance that I found in Texas.
The people are truly stupid. I don’t know if it is genetic or a function of a horrible educational system, but as a teacher I was shocked at the inabilities of my students. When I left the state last summer I was shocked again when my entire class (graduate students) could write complete, grammatically correct (sure go ahead and search for my typos) sentences.
Everything is second rate. At best. The museums, the nightlife, the strippers, the restaurants, the shopping, the schools, the hospitals can’t hold a candle to what you’d find elsewhere. The Gingerman that folks have been talking about is a second-rate pick up joint. And it is a chain now, too.
And to top it off the native Texans think they are living in Paradise.
Sure the real estate is really cheap. Why do you think that is?
Hmm, there’s not a large game development community in Houston that I’m aware of. There are small independent companies but not the big guys. So, if you want to be able to switch jobs later and stay in the same industry, you may want to dig around and see if there are enough other companies around to ensure you’ll have a job.
There’s no shortage of software jobs, I’m just not aware of many involving gaming.
268,820 square miles and 23 million people, you’ve seen the whole thing and met them all, and it’s all hideous and they’re all fat jerks? 
Oh yeah, they are two totally different worlds. Snort.
No, I think they’re all stupid, fat, jerks.
See my discussion of Texan educational system above.
Generalize
1: to give a general form to
2 a: to derive or induce (a general conception or principle) from particulars
b: to draw a general conclusion from
3: to give general applicability to <generalize a law>; also : to make indefinite
Look, the guy asked my opinion and I gave it.
But I don’t want to make this a pitting.
I get the feeling you won’t be able to distinguish between a negative general opinion of Texas and Texans and a personal insult to you so I really don’t want to take this further.
Feel free to state all the great things about Texas. I certainly won’t stop you.
We’re glad you left! Where do you live now?
(And I’ll repeat–the Metroplex is not the Houston area. And why the Hell would anybody live in Plano?)
There’s that famous Texas hospitality!!!
I guess we’re all happier now. Live and learn.
There sure are a lot of people drinking at the Gingerman. I live about a mile from it and go there now and then. I was just there last week, in fact; I wonder how many dopers I was unknowingly drinking with.
So, geez, InLucemEdita sure has a lot of issues with the place. Unfortunately, there’s some truth there. I’ve been here since the late '70s, and I can say the following:
- Texas is not a pretty state, for the most part. It certainly isn’t very good looking around Houston.
- A lot of the suburbs, as well as the newer subdivisions within the city proper, will suck the soul right out of you.
- The education system isn’t too great, nor is the legal system. Texas is way the hell too punitive.
- I don’t think the shopping is too good, either. You can get just about anything, but you won’t enjoy it.
- The really nice real estate is cheap compared to San Francisco, but that doesn’t make it cheap. You can get a place for next to nothing, but it’ll be in a sterile subdivision, or a dumpy neighborhood with bars on the windows.
- We don’t have a state income tax, but, to make up for it, Houston’s sales tax is 8.5%, and property taxes are high.
On the other hand,
- The hospitals are, in fact, first rate.
- The Gingerman is not a pickup joint. It’s mainly goups of professionals and Rice students who are unwinding. But there are better bars.
- I don’t find the “homophobia, xenophobia, racism, and general intolerance” to be worse than anywhere else. Actually, Houstonians seem pretty tolerant, to me.
I haven’t spent much time in Sugar Land, but what I’ve seen has never impressed me. It’s quite a way out SH59 (~20 miles), so it’ll cost you in gas and tolls to get anywhere that’s worth going.
According to GameDevMap, there are precisely three game companies in the Houston area… so if your gig falls through, you’ll probably have to move. Austin’s got quite a few companies- it’s basically the place to live in Texas if you’re in games.
One thing I don’t think anyone’s really mentioned yet- rain. You may think you know what a storm is… trust me, you ain’t seen nuthin’ yet. A good Texas afternoon thunderstorm is simply something to behold. Three or more inches of rain in an hour, with constant lightning, isn’t unheard of… or even rare. When you’re not in the middle of a five-year drought, that is.
I grew up not far from Sugarland (I was in the Pasadena area), and the storms are just about the only things I miss from Texas. Well, that and good tex-mex. You just can’t grow good fajitas outside Texas.
Not being particularly porcine, I’m not personally insulted, I’m just saying that that’s a pretty shocking and sweeping generalization to make about such a large place and large group of people. It’s a big and varied state, with a very large population. There are certain generalizations I can’t argue with; the educational system needs a major, major overhaul, as does the criminal justice system. But a generalization that the state is a blackened, soulless realm of xenophobic, stupid and repulsive pig people? That’s not Texas, that’s Mordor!
You’ll get no argument from me that there are certain parts of Texas that are brown, flat, and unpleasant to look at. I went on a trip to Plainview recently and it was, in my opinion, charitably named. No trees, no scenery, just a vast expanse of brown dirt that smelled like drilling mud. It wasn’t the whole state of Texas, though. There’s the Piney woods in East Texas, the aforementioned Hill country, the Davis Mountains in the West. Some of it is downright pretty. If I went to California and all I saw was the city dump in Bakersfield and a registered sex offender who works there, I might come away with an unreasonably negative generalization of California and Californians, but that’s hardly representative of the whole state.
I spent most evenings during the mid to late 90’s there, so depending upon when you were there…
Too bad I’m old and boring now. Although I do go down to McGonigel’s Mucky Duck for the Irish session.
Well bless your heart. :rolleyes:
You’re welcome to this as well as the rest of your opinions, obviously, but this particular quote makes me wonder if you ever actually stepped foot in the place. Is the rest of your assessment of Texas equally well researched?
I’ve never lived in Houston. But I’ve been visiting it every year for the last couple of decades so I guess I’m entitled to an opinion.
The most general thing I can say about the city is that it doesn’t feel like a city (outside of a small area in the downtown). Houston is 99% suburbs. Suburbs that go on and on and on.
The weather is hot and humid - in mid-winter, which is when I visit. The rest of the year it gets hotter and wetter.
I’m from New England and I live in the Hudson valley; to me the landscape in Texas is flat and boring. But that’s probably just a personal preference. (Well, the boring part anyway - I don’t think anyone’s going to dispute that east Texas is flat.)
Housing, from my second-hand experience, is cheap (admittedly I, like you, live in an area where housing costs are well above average). There is pretty much continous construction of new housing developments - Houston is not an old city. I think any house that predates 1945 is considered a classic.
Traffic doesn’t seem that bad for city driving to me. But then again, I drive in places like Manhattan, Boston, and Montreal. There’s definite crowding and slowdowns during rush hours. Public transportation is fairly limited - there’s not all that much of it and the city is spread out so lots of areas aren’t covered.
As for the porcinity of the city’s inhabitants - well, I’m a big man and I fit right in. When they say everything’s bigger in Texas, they’re including themselves. Texans love to live life to its fullest, which includes plenty of good food and beer and the results show over time. Those good ole boys and gals who look fine in Houston was be huge in Manhattan or LA.
Been to both the one in Houston and the one in Dallas. I thought they sucked…hope you have a great time there.
I lived in the Dallas area for 5 years and had many trips to Houston, San Antonio, Austin, Waco, El Paso, Natchadogches (or however the fuck you spell it), and lots of little places in between. Spent more time than I’d like to admit in a little place called Iredell. If living there for 5 years isn’t enough research then I’m simply not willing to do the required research.
I knew it wasn’t home when I landed for the interview. I will never ignore that feeling again. I thought I would get used to it over time. Instead, with every passing day, I felt more alienated from those around me. I’ve lived in dozens of places around the U.S. and one in Europe and I’ve never had this reaction to any other place. I still have fond memories of every place I’ve ever lived except Texas. I’d like to spare others the same trouble I put myself through…and so I posted to this thread.
You know those of us who find ourselves trapped together in Texas sometimes talk to each other about the situation. We usually talk in low voices because we don’t want to make the loud, angry, pig-people mad…but we talk about what we’re going to do when we get out…like prisoners.
I’ve seen these exchanges on the dope before…“Texas sucks.”…“Then git out.”
Quite a few times, in fact.
Don’t remember any “Pennsylvania sucks.” threads.
Can’t think of any “Iowa sucks.” diatribes.
Do the Texans ever even consider that there might be something special about Texas that some other people find I don’t know…repugnant? Do you wonder about what generates this reaction?
Just because you don’t like a place doesn’t mean there’s something wrong with it. It rubs you the wrong way, that’s fine. That doesn’t mean Texas is entirely populated by assholes.
I abso-freakin’-lutely hate Texas for its prejudice and the like. But seeing as how I was born and raised here (and am now in my fourth decade around the Dallas metroplex), I feel sort of stuck at this point. Plus, I even did the requisite move to Austin to finally entwine with our (liberals, that is) version of the Mother Ship. Unfortunately, I couldn’t stand that either because it felt like they were stuck up on being so tolerant. Anyway…
All that said, I figure my opinions are because of me. I grew up with people much like what I chose to see in others, therefore meaning I needed something 180 degrees different. When I didn’t find it, I assumed that say, Austin was at fault. Now I understand that wasn’t true and undoubtedly (I’m agoraphobic) due to my small sample size. And I finally grasp that, no matter where I live, the same problems can be inherent. If I allow them to be.
So I now look at places like Houston as having that melting pot that isn’t completely stirred and I think I wouldn’t mind being a part. I mean hell, they had Ikea first and that funeral museum looks awesome.
However, I concede as a porcine port of the establishment that I may not know of which I speak. Regardless, if you can get past the heat (brutal), traffic (insane enough) and the still prevalent small mindedness, you’ll probably be interested in tapping the good housing market, the Gulf and interesting differences than what you see in the Bay area.
No matter what, good luck sturmhauke. I hope you find the perfect place for you and your family.