Driving, shopping and such

For the first time in 18 months I am experiencing driving on multilane roads, freeways, more than a handful of cars on the roads, stoplights, and left-turn lanes. It's a really odd and almost frightening experience. Fortunately, like riding a bicycle, the dormant skills, senses, and intuition do come back. But I think I better understand now the fear that someone whose never been exposed to a place like this might have. And as we head down to California and the even bigger cities, the traffic will only get worse. This is one major reason for living in a nice, quiet place.

Today I got a look at a bit of the fire damage to the rental property. Tomorrow I get together with the contracter to go over some things.

After that we headed off to do some shopping. One thing I've noticed is how clean everything is. There is a benefit to living in a concrete jungle -- even if the Portland area is much less so than many other cities. Pavement and concrete sidewalks do a lot to cut down on dust, dirt, and mud. So I suppose this might be a positive thing for cities, though I can probably think of many other negatives.

We went to a strip mall type place with a large collection of discounters. Competition is good for consumers. This single strip mall is bigger than the entire city of Petersburg. Put together a large Safeway and a large Target, and you have the entire commercial area of Main Street Petersburg.

Now having too many stores and low prices is also a bad thing. How is that? A person can spend too much. "It's on sale!" often means, "Let's buy it, just in case we need it." In Petersburg, substantial sales happen a couple of times around the year-end holidays. At other times of the year, merchandise is pretty much full price. Even if there is temptation to purchase, it's difficult to go through with it. Even stuff that might fall into the "need" category, I often consider for a long time before finally making the purchase. Here, I can see how it would be very easy to subconsciously purchase everything that might someday fit into the "need" category. IMO, this is not a positive aspect of cities.

We had lunch at Subway. Our first fast-food-ish foray in a very long time. All four of us ate for under $20. That's less than half what we would end up spending for four sandwiches, drinks, and chips in Petersburg.

The weather certainly has been interesting here. We must have brought down Alaska weather with us. Portland has been getting snow, hail, rain, and sun -- sometimes all in one day. While taking out some purchases to the car this afternoon, I was hit with a torrential downpour. By the time I had finished and was back under cover, my coat was rather soaked. I don't think we get rains like that in Petersburg. If we do, I'd never been in it. I hear though that Ketchikan gets rains like that were a person can get utterly drenched from their car to the store entrance.

The background stress level just seems to be higher here. Everyone is busier with things going on all day long, from morning and well into the evening hours. There is a lot more that can be done, and so people opt to do more things. I don't necessarily see that as being better, though. After 18 months away, I like the "forced" rest that comes around 7 p.m. each evening when the entire city, except for a handful of places (e.g., bars and the hospital), shuts down until the morning. I can see how someone like me could experience regular migraines living somewhere that is going 24/7. So I'm pretty certain I will welcome my return to Petersburg in a couple of weeks.