Ray

We can't all afford dogs and cats as pets ...

Janek66

3 Weeks after my daughter was born we went on a road trip to CO. We stopped overnight in a hotel in Tuba City. The hotel had a courtyard that had brick planters in it and my mother and I decided to take a walk and look around. Resting half on a planter and half on the ground was a tarantula, waving its front legs about. My mother decided to poke it a little with a stick. My husband shouted "watch out! They jump." With that, something landed on my head. I leapt up screaming and promptly wet myself......it was a cricket! We were all creasing up over it afterwards.

geeandtee

Our former airport manager/IT genius was wandering around our office one morning with a jar. I made some smart remark about his choice of coffee cup and he said, "Have a look, I found this out at the airport."
He set the jar down on the desk and there was this stonking great hairy tarantula sleeping peacefully at the bottom of it. He was taking it home to turn it loose on his 40 acres of desert.
That was as close as I ever want to be to a tarantula.

OiOi

What color is the dirt and the sky where you live then
Its not always hot, 4 months of the year can be tough depending on your attitude, but for me the summer is no worse than a long hard winter.
Also no tornadoes, hurricanes or earthquakes here.

OiOi

Apparently a lot of people like the sodding dirt lot. Phoenix is the fastest growing city in the US and has recently moved up to 6th place in population rankings.

Janek66

The dirt is red. The sky changes colour all the time, probably due to all the pollution being blown in from northern Virginia.

englishinfl

I don't understand the attraction to living somehere like that, but different people, different tastes. One thing is for certain, it definately won't be adding me to the apparently ever swelling numbers of its population.

Janek66

Bits of Phoenix are alright like the Arcadia area but the new bits, all you see is miles and miles of terracota roof tiles. Really boring.

englishinfl

Same as living in milton keynes then?
I'd find the desert boring, period.

Janek66

Phoenix was alright but after a while I missed the trees and the wind, seasons.
Having said that, in the middle of a WV winter I could do with some Phoenix sun and good mexican food.

Steerpike

There´s lots of beauty in AZ; Sedona, for one ... and the Grand Canyon of course. The area up near Flagstaff gets snow in winter and there are huge forrests. I used to have a customer in the ´four corners´area (NE Az), and chose to drive instead of fly from Phoenix along the salt river - fabulous scenery.

tonrob

I'd miss our pet chipmunk.

Kaffy Mintcake

My parents live in Sedona. If you're ever in the visitor's center, say hi to my Dad for me, he volunteers there.

englishinfl

Ok, I'll ammend what I said... I'd find the desert boring, to live in.
I wouldn't mind visiting it. that would be interesting, but to live there? No thanks, it wouldn't be my idea of ideal

Steerpike

My point was more along the lines of, don't assume that all of AZ is a desert. Sedona, AZ is a very high-end, cultural place, with fabulous scenery and lots of artsy-fartsy stuff. Here's few pics I've taken around Sedona that counter the 'desert' image (third pic is more 'desert-like', but still rather pretty - houses surrounded by red-rocks in Sedona. Second pic shows snow surrounded by trees, taken on the drive from Sedona to Phoenix. First pic is taken on the approach to Sedona).