WANTED: New hometown

Obvioulsy not an expert, but I have lived all over the country. Growing up, my dad moved us (no, not military) all the time. Lived in OKC, Denver, Charleston, Atlanta, DC, San Diego (briefly), Tampa and Richmond, just to name a few. I left college in DC, trying to figure out where I wanted to land. It was actually pretty easy. I moved back to Richmond. Cost was involved. Family was involved. But there's enough to do here that you never get bored. It's diverse and educated with character, colors, rivers, an underground, a snob sector, an art community, an Edgar Allan Poe Museum, parks, breezes, easy roads, winding roads, pretty trees, horses, and if you want the mountains or you want the ocean or you want monuments, depending on your mood, drive no more than two hours. I love it here. Somebody brought up Annapolis earlier, too. Small, but beautiful. Worth a look.

 

You've got to be kidding me.

 

Just an aftertought, and you have not mentioned Richmond as a place you were even considering, but the airport here is easy and accessible. But I believe JetBlue just substantially raised their airfare. However, I did just book a last second flight to Charleston, SC for two people, and it cost me $425 round trip. Not a bad deal.

 

Con man?

 

Uh, no? I think Dothan's a nice town. What's wrong with it?

 

Yes. He was in television sales.

 

Plus you have the train to NYC.

$77 bucks one way.

The airport is solid.

For a city as mid-sized as Richmond is, it does have distinct areas with their own flavor (Bottom, Fan, Carytown, Short Pump and some others).

 

Glad you like it. I spent a year there and didn't care that much for it. But more directly, it flunks just about every criteria that was laid out in the start of the thread.

Temperate climate Hell no. All the heat of Florida with none of the seabreeze. Insanely humid in the summer.
Safe You don't want to hang out "inside the Circle" after dark.
Preferably near water, but not necessarily 90 minute drive to Panama City Beach, assuming no traffic. A shorter drive if you want to hang on Lake Seminole.
Easy access to a good airport with lots of flights Paying hundreds of dollars extra to Delta to take a creaky turboprop to Atlanta is no fun.
A place where inspiration might strike more frequently than tornadoes Well, there's the peanut statue out by the Chamber of Commerce. Otherwise, not much of an artist's colony, and no real college nearby to to provide an intellectual core.
Not too Christian (i.e., not a dry county) Houston County's plenty wet, but hardly secular. (Personally, I don't mind that mix.)
Decent, family-sized homes -- but not cookie-cutter suburbia; downtownish -- available for $500,000 or so. He'd be reduced to buying cookie cutter here, although for that kind of coin he could buy two houses and still be flush.
Good schools Nope. He could move all the way out to Rehobeth and get in a decent district, but nothing overwhelmingly strong.

Sorry, I just think there are better options available, even within Alabama.

 

I've driven through Dothan several times and have never seen any reason to get off the accelerator. Plus it's almost oppressively hot in the summer.

 

Sure. There are better options in Baltimore, too.

 

Don't move to Kansas. It fails every account.

 

and home of what was once the best fucking pizza in the country ... leonardos.