I live on a residential street in a small town. There’s a park next door. An elementary school and sports field within a block. Two 24 hour convenience stores, a hospital, a good video store, and a police and fire department within three blocks. Downtown with a library, movie theatre, a used book store, a post office, and several good restaurants is within easy walking distance. I’m also within three blocks of the expressway so I can get to work in about ten minutes.
300 yards to the East - rows of small white spruce in my tree nursery, then a field of barley, followed by a 150 foot cliff down to the North Saskatchewan River.
300 yards to the North - Horse Hill Creek - a ravine with a campsite, large mature spruce trees and lots of critters.
300 yards to the South - more trees, and a view of the river valley from the top of the bank, with the lakes and natural reserve below the bank.
300 yards to the West - Scot’s pines in the tree nursery. - and then the neighbor’s tree nursery.
I live right by a Joint Forces Training Base/Armory and a race track. I’m also relatively close to a university, a small gambling establishment and a couple miles down the road, the beach.
I live by Lake Meridian, which is small but provides enough open space to allow a terrific view of Mt. Rainier.
The Pacific Ocean, Golden Gate Park, Three Hundred Restaurants (20 different kinds of food) all within blocks.
Oh Yeah, and the schools, churches, community centers, playgrounds, and libraries are also within blocks.
Only thing we’re missing is Disney World.
…my neighbors. I just live in a subdivision in a small town in the middle of nowhere. The neighbor to my right appears to be a middle-aged divorced man, fairly well off. Drives a new SUV, has a nicer manufactured home than ours, his kids–in their teens–come spend the weekend every now and then and help him in the yard. Very quiet man, except for when he’s yelling at our dog or yelling at us to shut up our dog.
The neighbor to the left appears to be a middle-aged divorced woman. I’m pretty sure she had a husband when she moved in, but either he’s been hacked up and buried in the backyard (which could explain why she hasn’t done her landscaping–wouldn’t do to have him accidentally exhumed), or he’s left her. She has an undetermined number of children (somewhere between 3 and 5 children, I’d wager, ranging from Kindergarten to High School ages, but I can never tell how many she actually has and how many are school friends that are always hanging out there), and I think she works nights. Her kids are often up until the wee hours of the morning yelling, screaming, laughing, crying, cursing, running around the exterior of the house, and upsetting me, my husband, and my dog.
You think I don’t know our next door neighbors very well, I know the people across the street even less. In fact, I’d swear about a half a dozen different families have occupied those 2 houses in the 2 1/2 years we’ve been here now.
Other than that, there are no grocery stores, convenience marts, churches, schools, or anything else I’d say I “live by,” though the Tyco plant where my husband works is visible from our house, so I guess we live by that.
… nothing.
Really. On one side, my neighbor’s house is set back to my rear lot line on an alley. To the other side is a vacant lot whose owners have a garden planted.
It’s kind of cool, because I don’t have neighbor’s right on top of me. It’s like a I paid for a triple lot, but I didn’t.
Also, in the aforementioned garden, the owners have planted sunflowers, which make for a nice view out of my office window during the day. Particularly when the goldfinches flock on them to eat the seeds.
The Atlanta branch of the CDC. I wonder why no one visits?
I live in suburbia; houses, houses and more houses. Did I forget to mention houses?
There is a small cluster of shops and fast food about 3 minutes from here. 7-11, a car wash, Firestone (hehe their grand opening was last week) Papa Johns, Subway Sandwiches, Block Buster and King Soopers – along with a few other shops.
I live close enough to retail and service central for the north end of our city. Other than going into my client’s office, I have everything I need within several minutes of home.
North Academy Blvd. is filled with all the large chain restaurants, a mall, strip centers that include Best Buy, CompUSA, PetSmart, Sam’s Club, Walmart. Barnes and Noble, etc.
One side…F14 Fighter Pilots… One side… Navy Seals and in the middle… The Deep Blue Sea, Think I’ll stay…
Brick walls.
Look out the window in the bedroom… brick wall.
Look out the window in the guest room… brick wall.
Look out the window in the kitchen… brick wall with a slice of the sky split in two by a rather large TV antenna.
Look out the window in the computer room… brick wall with a dark window in it.
Look out the window in the bathroom… brick wall with somebody else’s bathroom window in it.
Go out onto the front porch… the street and houses across it, made of brick, naturally.
Back porch… the garage (brick) and the alley (paved with brick) and the church across the way (brick).
I live by a lot of brick.
Certainly not by bread alone.
There’s a Thai restaurant in my building, plus 2 delis and a newspaper stand. Across the street is an espresso place. I’m 4 blocks from the Hudson River, 10 blocks from Greenwich Village and about 20 blocks from the Empire State Building, which I can see from my corner (the top of the Empire State is visible from alot of places). There’s a very small, very old cemetery 2 blocks from me where Spanish Jews are buried. My office is 2 blocks from the Empire State Building, 10 blocks from Grand Central Station and about 6 blocks from Kalustyan, the best asian/middle eastern spice shop in Manhattan.
Also, I live very near my husband. Sometimes he’s actually in a different room than I am, but we’re still very close.
Houses, houses, and more houses.
Really, there is a hospital within 1.5 miles, garbage incinerator 3 miles, airport, 5 miles, U of Michigan-Dearborn (where I go to school) 5 miles. Plus a lot of other things I couldn’t possibly mention.
That’s a complex question – I have several places where I live, and I’m moving one of them.
The place I call home is by one of the only sandy beaches in the Puget Sound. I’m moving from there to a place right on an inlet of the Sound, so it’s by the water.
The place I live in when I’m at work is by work. It’s directly above the office, actually.
When I look out the window next to my computer I see Spaanse Water & Tafelberg:
http://img6.webshots.com/photos26/267/15/2671596bjRGXFCaaB_photo.jpg
(a picture is worth 10,000 words)
I *used[/] to live next to Chicago’s O’Hare Airport. It sucked. Hard. But it was pretty cheap.
Now that I moved, I live next to a lake.
There is a mall in my back yard. Pretty convenient, but the Christmastime traffic is the source of most of my misanthropy.
Right across the street is Bear Creek Ski Area, formerly known as Doe Mountain Ski Area. (Which is a pretty good laugh considering its more like a small hill than a mountain.) The first property going up the hill is Dora’s Restaurant. A german american restaurant. It used to be the Red Lion Tavern. It had the best cheese steaks. Dora’s sucks. On the other side going down the hill lives a family of white trash. They keep buying dogs and when they finally realize each dog can’t live inside their little house they move the dog outside with the growing pack living in one of those chain link kennels. The dogs live in filth cause they never clean inside the kennel. Its a damn crime.
Italians above me, Italians to the right of me, Italians to the left of me, and a great Italian restaurant around the corner. Oh, and Italians in front as well.
Laguardia Airport is a 30 minute walk from my front door, Rikers Island 20 minutes, and The Tri-Borough Bridge about 10.