Dear Snarky, I’ve heard you mentioned before that you have moved around the country a lot. My family is about to move to the West Coast and I was wondering if you had any Snarky tips on how to find the best place to live in the burbs. You know, the kind of information you can’t get from just looking at houses with a realtor.
Signed, Patricia
Dear Patricia,
How savvy of you to reach out to me. After moving 14 times and counting, of course, I have tips on how to find an awesome place to live and the best part is you never have to get out of your car to put these tips into action. I’ve found that there are three things that determine whether a neighborhood, suburb, or community is comprised of decent human beings.
Tip 1: Find a fast food drive thru that has two ordering lanes that then merge to one for food pick up. Hit that drive thru during a breakfast or lunch rush hour. Now, if you find that people (A) know how to handle the mental dexterity of merging from two to one lane and that (B) no one is aggressively thrusting their front bumper inches from you car in an attempt to cut in front of you to get their BIg Mac three seconds sooner than it is a good sign that the area you’re considering buying a home in has a median I.Q. that is above average.
Tip 2: After you’ve gotten your Happy Meal drive to a grocery store and take up surveillance in a parking lot. You’re looking for one thing and one thing only – Do people return their shopping carts to the “Cart Corral” or do they set them free so they can roam the range, so to speak, and begin a perilous journey of inflicting bumps and scratches on parked cars? If you witness a preponderance of free range shopping carts this is a very bad sign and I would recommend eliminating that neighborhood from your list stat!
Tip 3 is crucial if you have school aged children and is a must do. You need to go the elementary school nearest the place where you’re thinking of buying a home. Be sure to get there bright and early during school drop off. If you see a horde of parents honking their horns, rolling down their windows to shake their heads or middle fingers and a complete lack of any kind of general order or a school authority figure supervising the drop off than that is not a school you want to send your kids too.
Trust me – all of these tips speak to the basic intelligence and civility of a community and you want to find a home where people have the every day good manners of putting their shopping cart up.
For all things wonderfully Snarky go to www.snarkygear.com where you can find the new Spring/Summer Snarky line of clothing and accessories. Plus, there’s my book – Snarky in the Suburbs Back to School. Here’s a little ditty about it: The Spring Creek Elementary School PTA board (a coven of Mean Moms dressed in Uggs, yoga pants, and dermal filler) is up to no good. Wynn Butler (middle-aged, uncool, and not bringing sexy back) is determined to find out what’s going on. With help from her two kids, a Roomba vacuum turned mobile surveillance drone, and a few good friends, Wynn launches a covert investigation that leads to the “mother of all revenge capers” at the school’s annual Fall Festival. If you’ve ever fantasized about smoke bombing the idiot parent who has yet to master the fine art of the school drop-off lane, or standing up and shouting, “Liar, liar, Botox on fire” during a PTA meeting, then this delicious tale of payback is for you. To stay up-to-date on new posts and take part in my not so deep thoughts click on this Facebook link – http://is.gd/iEgnJ (That’s the abbreviated link to my FB page) or I twitter @snarkynsuburbs.
Snarky in the Suburbs 