It’s also great for parties. It’s inoffensive, anyone who’s good for pizza can default to it. It’s often the only meatless option ordered (though I prefer something with as many veggies as I can get)

Squats and bicycling!

I’m so American I thought she’d been pepper sprayed and her eyes were still red while in custody

Also the genocide and wars, though idk how much of that was on mountains rather than in valleys

In the sexual sense a fetish is delineated from a kink in that with a fetish it’s often considered necessary for attraction/sexual satisfaction to the haver. So strictly a person with a sadomasochism fetish can’t get off without receiving or administering pain, whereas a person with a sadomasochism kink will sexually enjoy it, but can also get off from vanilla sex.

But they’re often used interchangeably. Also within bdsm kinks can be nonsexual, with some folks not getting off on it, but still enjoying it.

Oh yeah there are a ton of bdsm conventions, major cities will often have multiple a year. And there are issues and drama for certain, but we generally try to police our own and our problems tend towards being that well established members of the community who do a lot sometimes utilize the trust and respect they have to be predatory, especially to new people, just like every other community.

Foot fetishists’ misbehavior is the stuff like you described, though they’re really outshone in awfulness by body type fetishists, who do the same stuff and so much more

And tbh I think foot fetishists’ big problem is their misbehavior comes from the shame and awkwardness they have about it. And i bet you can find similar stories with far more common body part fetishes like breasts and butts. Like, I’m a breast fetishist for sure and don’t get the appeal of feet, but I know some folks who are all about feet and are totally respectful people and I know plenty of folks who can’t act properly about tits.

I think Virginia food just sucks dude. Clam chowder, Maryland crab cakes, Old bay on anything, Philadelphia and their pretzels and cheesesteaks, DC’s international food, Maine’s lobster, New York’s bagels, New Jersey’s wafer thin crispy pizza (yeah I think it’s better than an NYC slice), sub sandwiches in the northeast, atlantic lox, atlantic cod, new england aged cheddar… Also are we counting bourbon country to be east? Because internationally renowned whiskeys.

Also a California burrito just looks like it’s basically a Pittsburgh sandwich but in burrito form, and I’ll tell California what I told Pittsburgh, the fries are better on the side.

Tbh the food of the west coast has failed to impress me. Is it better than the Midwest? Of course (except for fried dairy), that’s not a high bar. There’s plenty good, especially in Asian and Latin cuisines, but there’s not even much weird local foods like Cincinnati chili, it’s just “ah yeah this is grown/caught nearby and so it’s fresh and popular”. It is much better as a pescatarian though.

It’s a Pittsburgh sandwich but burrito form and with guac. I had to look it up and am not impressed, just like the Pittsburghers failed to impress me. The fries are better on the side dang it

The eternal enemy of Minnesota

Yeah the elevation makes driving in snow scary. People in the PNW also can’t fucking drive on flat snow, but I get it, I learned to drive under the lake effect. But yeah this is easy mode rain driving. The wind isn’t pushing you, there’s no surprise rivers, it’s just wet ground with your wipers on and it’s like that for half the year. You don’t bother using an umbrella, why can’t you drive in this rain

Oh yeah folks out here can barely handle snow unless it’s on a mountain, even up north where it snows. Meanwhile my Ohioan ass can’t deal with ice + elevation, but I kinda love driving on ice about once or twice a year. Give me a blizzard that cuts the power out over a heat wave with no AC.

I also miss windstorms, thunderstorms, and tornadoes. The sky should try to kill you from time to time. It keeps you sharp. Fuck noreasters and hurricanes though, that’s too much.

I think it’s similar to how the US as a whole is. We’re a young country so we felt we had to prove ourselves for a long time, but eventually everyone got the message and we held prestige, but we were still insecure and bragging which wound up making us look worse.

Within the country, the west coast had a similar experience. California had to prove it’s worth against established and respected places like Philadelphia and New York. But we all get it now. Everyone knows it’s awesome out here, and the Eastern prestige largely just remains in the coastal cities, and it’s not like people are moving to Hartford to make it big anymore. And it feels like rubbing it in when you’ve got places like the Rust Belt that continue to struggle.

I’ve found they’re a double edged sword, they do great until your bar is stuck in her ring…

They also have the only empire we know of that used mountains as its imperial core rather than as internal boundaries. Even Rome which was located in the famously mountainous Italy and was a land power treated the mountains as an inconvenience. But the Inca were just like “fuck you, we’re mountain people”

Well yeah there were machine gunners at the battle of Blair mountain

Yeah, the difference is really stark. If we weren’t being awful I’d recommend folks check both out because our three major mountain ranges (in the northwest we have the cascades which are volcanic and just kinda near the Rockies) are all super cool.

The Appalachians are over a billion years old and gorgeous, largely covered in deciduous forests and range from bumfuck nowhere (great for campers and stuff like whitewater rafting) to abutting major cities in the east coast that tourists wanted to see anyways, like a day trip from New York City or not that long from Washington DC. Ultimately though yeah they’re very small mountains because of their age. If you’d like to visit them without coming to the US a bit of the Scottish Highlands are somewhat part of the same range

The Rocky Mountains were raised during the cenozoic and as such are really tall because they’re pretty young, but also have a ton of dinosaur fossils. They’re majestic purple mountains and home to a major city (Denver) located a mile above sea level. They’re also home to the famous Yellowstone National Park, where we’ve got geysers, extremophilic archea mats, and wild bison and bears. If you like geology or paleontology they’re a great range to check out. They also reach well into Canada for anyone interested in checking them out without visiting the US

Of course a great lakes person would say that, nobody gets to compete with y’all on your lakes

As someone who’s been in cascadia for over a year now, cascadia is almost as haunted as Appalachia. But the whole catastrophic end thing is just a catastrophic end. It’s a slasher flick type of scary. Appalachia is more Gothic horror scary. Cascadia’s got both, sure, but walking through a west Virginia mountain or driving across a few mountains in Kentucky and you feel like old gods slumber there.

The rockies are just majestic and dangerous. Yeah driving through them is terror, but it doesn’t feel like something is there. Maybe it’s just some folks, maybe it’s your worst stereotype of hillbillies, and maybe it’s someone or something from all the blood that keeps soaking those hills.

And bicycles

I love my Cascades and the Rockies are majestic and impressive, but the Appalachians are basically the wizened old crones of mountains. They’re weird and mysterious. They’re full of forests and traditions and stories. They demand respect.

Also, listen, folks from the eastern Midwest are barely used to hills then having to drive through them is scary.