HOME TERRITORY :

      the 'Cities, Minnesota.

PLACES I HAVE LIVED FOR A MONTH OR MORE :

      Yellow Springs, Ohio. School. It's a great reason to pack it all up and move to some other place, hundreds of miles away. The surrounding areas were explored : Clifton, Springfield, Xenia, Fairborn, Dayton. &c. It is such an old, strange place.

      Omaha, Nebraska. Internship. I'll tell you all about it. I worked as a docent at a museum, made a website for them, and dabbled in fund tracking for different museum.

      Savannah, Georgia. More school. Thousands of miles. This is the low country - it is hot, humid, and smells funny, but the seafood is great and boiled peanuts are available in many convenience stores. The... second most haunted city in the South. Founded in 1733 by James Oglethorpe, the earliest industries included trade in indigo, and mulberry trees were grown, for silk. This business did not catch on quite like cotton did, and by 1800, the silk trade was negligible in comparison to cotton, which flourishes in that sort of subtropical climate. Failure to diversify left the city devastated in 1922 The city was left intact in the midst of General Serman's "March to the Sea", and offered as a gift to Mary Todd & President Lincoln for Christmas in 1864.       As a destination in the south-eastern tourism circuit, the town has some shoppings, if nothing else about it holds any interest. The thrift stores are full of awful polyester clothing and some fabulous old vintage electronics, and the antiques are fun to look at but laughably overpriced. Conspicuously absent are record stores... those places we go to find recorded music, be it on CD, cassette tape, or vinyl record... The nearest store with decent selection and reasonable prices was almost two hours' drive, but now it is not clear if there is even there anymore (time to break down and shop online?) The stores there are, some very sweet boutiques and parlors, art galleries, and specialty shops. There are some very nice hair stores, selling real and synthetic hairs in all colours. By "all colours" I mean not only the four basic food groups (black, brown, auburn, & blonde), but gradients between these, and also colours not found in nature.

PLACES I HAVE STAYED FOR ONLY A SHORT TIME :
      Chicagoland. A few times, actually... A month or a week, never very long. More often . The whole place... hums. Not just in the city itself, even far out into the infinite outskirts of suburbia & dependant municipalities.
      Colorado. Several days at a time, or a week or so. I love skiing, in the winter, or walking around, any time of year. The residents are friendly to tourists, in a furtive way that makes me wonder if they are not also tourists, hoping not to be found out & sent back to whatever boring place they actually belong.