Joe Stump: Your city sucks (And so does mine)

They don't. The sadder part about Belltown is that without the annoying fratbros it's completely lifeless. Walk down 1st or 2nd on a weeknight to see what I mean. Compare this with, say, Granville/Robson in Vancouver, St. Catherine in Montreal, or Yonge/Queen in Toronto and the patheticness is magnified more.

It's part of why I moved up to Capitol Hill - despite the hipsters, at least people are out and about throughout the week. There's life on the streets, as opposed to Belltown and downtown where shops close at 5-6pm, and there's nary a soul to be found walking on the sidewalks (well, unless you count the coked out hobos and their dealers).

There is no energy in this city. It's as if everyone is constantly in an opium-induced haze, lazing about in the coffee shops, or at home. When I lived in Belltown I felt like a reverse Omega Man - in the daytime the streets would be full of people coming and going, but at night they'd slink back indoors as if the night is out to get them. This is part of the "antisocial" thing I complained about in an earlier post - but what can you expect when you stuff a neighborhood full of antisocial, overworked, overstressed hackers? Of course they just shut down on weeknights after work. Foot traffic in even the hottest neighborhoods is essentially zero except on Fridays and Saturday nights. The entire city is utterly lifeless throughout the week, and explodes into a flurry of sudden activity for a few hours (hilariously enough, mainly driven by people traveling in from the burbs... since when are the suburbs known for more activity than the city?), only to continue being lifeless as soon as Saturday rolls past.

Heck, the restaurant scene is the same. Take the hottest restaurants in the city in Vancouver, Toronto, or Montreal, and they'll be packed no matter which day you go. Here? On a Tuesday or Wednesday night you can waltz into almost any restaurant, no matter how well-regarded or hip (the ones you can't hope to get into without a reservation on the weekend), and just plop your ass down because it's practically empty. It's as if life stops on weekdays. Goes extra for Belltown - I am unsure what Belltown residents do all day, because the only people seemingly taking advantage of their copious restaurants and entertainment are people from elsewhere.

In fact, take a look at your local restaurants - and see how many specials exist on Sundays. Sundays! In any (other) major city Sundays are still prime for going out, and business is still booming as everyone gets their last bit of fun in before returning to the grind. In Seattle the city's shut down even worse than weekdays on Sundays.

> "I also disagree on the antisocialness of the town; if the only people you know are hackers that's your problem."

Are you sure you're not a local? ;) I've seen this argument a million times over, but the result is the same: the vast majority of people I've met here (and not all hackers, but most) have a huge amount of trouble meeting varied people. If this sort of effect is isolated, I'd be more willing to blame the victim - but it's so pronounced that it's made our city infamous to the rest of the US, and there's not a single transplant I've met who doesn't acknowledge the problem is real.

Hell, the only people I've seen deny it are the locals - which is understandable, because they don't feel its effects daily.

Which isn't to say meeting people - non-hackers even - is impossible in this town, there are some interesting hacks around Seattleites' antisocial behavior. The problem is that it takes a huge amount of effort - never in my life has socialization required so much conscious and continued work. In other cities it just flows - people are always up for meeting new folk, and going someplace after work to maybe make a new friend or two is second nature.

This is exacerbated by the fact that Seattleites are notorious social flakes. I host a party in Vancouver, or Toronto, and almost all of the RSVPs will show. The ones that don't will probably text me at some point. Here in Seattle, your show-rate is well below 50%, and not a word to be heard from the flakes. I've seen this in multiple contexts: I'm involved in a volunteer group that constantly struggles with getting people who sign up (and get reminder emails the week before AND the day of) to show (don't take socialization seriously - possibly because most people aren't terribly arsed to expand their circles. It's the infamous Seattle noncommittal waffle.

Hell, we had a photographers' social a few weeks back. 15+ RSVPs and 4 showed. This is depressingly typical for Seattle.

> "a hacker has to do something else to stand out from the 40,000 other people who are just like him/her."

Agreed. It's what you get with a monocultural town with insane domination of one industry and no representation from any other. Seattle is software, and if living with an army of other nerdy hackers is your thing, it's great. If however you desire your social circles to be filled with diverse people doing different things, this city is a poor choice overall. Better off in a city with significant representation from multiple industries.

Not only are they less interested in interacting with us because of the city's already-insular culture, but we're also pretty old-hat, and there's really not that many people from other fields to begin with - there are no other industries with a huge presence in Seattle (a case may be made with biotech).

We, The Pizza is brand new and has some good slices. Good Stuff Eatery burgers next door are really good.

I think the best meal I've had in the area, yet, though, has been a burger at Ray's Hell Burger in Arlington.