I am originally from the Detroit area of Michigan myself. The Army put me here and its pretty cool. I have been here for about 7 years I like it down here, but I miss Michigan! I have lived in quite a few places in the United States, my favorite would be Maryland. But Texas is cool.

 

From what I'm seeing on Facebook, it seems that this weekend is the perfect time to visit Austin. A bunch of my friends and family will be there this weekend.

 

My wife the Mustang Pilot visited from Massachusetts two times and moved here.

The desert mountains in the southwest part of the state are amazing. The pine trees in east Texas are the tallest around, and the hunting is great in both areas.

The coastline has some terrific beaches, and lots of small communities that have great beaches and great fishing. (The oil spill is headed east.)

The history and food in San Antonio are first rate! We got married in the San Jose mission, a 400-year-old church. Had our reception in the Menger Hotel Bar, where Teddy Roosevelt recruited the Rough Riders. We've slept in two of the haunted rooms at the Menger, and yes, something "weird" happened both times. There's no place in the world like the Alamo, except maybe Thermopylae, where 180 guys stood their ground against 5000, said "Through us," and paid the price.

The hill country around Austin is stunning! Austin is, itself, amazing. An enormous variety of music, you can find anything you're in the humor for going on on any given night. The city is packed with family-owned restaraunts, all different sorts. Stubbs and the Salt Lick have incredible barbecue, and Stubbs usually has live music, too. Eat Tex-Mex on the roof of the Iron Cactus, and watch 6th Street go by, below. (Bourbon Street, Texas-style!) Iron Cactus has over 50 kinds of tequila. Or, eat your Tex-Mex at La Zona Rosa, then head out back to listen to Asleep at the Wheel or Jerry Jeff Walker. Eddy Vees has seafood better than any in Boston, and the European Bistro has the best German food I've ever had, and I spent over four years in Germany. Drive a little, not too far, and have dinner at the Oasis. Gourmet food and they've got tables built all over the hillside in terraces, where you can, and should, watch the sun go down over Lake Travis.

There's a whole string of lakes over a hundred miles long, made from damming up the Colorado River. Boating, fishing, skiing, or just renting a party boat and having a barbecue on the water.

Coming back from Germany, the Army offered me an assignment near Monterey, California. I love Monterey! Still, my answer was, "Can't you get me back to Texas?"

So, paint "GTT" on your front door, and head on over here!

 

I've lived in Houston all of my life minus one year where I lived in the Dallas/Fort Worth area. I can't imagine living anywhere else. The heat in the summer sucks, but you get used to it. If I had my choice to live anywhere I'd choose Ft Worth. Nice area, great down town scene, and still fairly spread out. However, my job, family, and most of my friends are in Houston and that is where I'm going to stay.

 

One thing to think about is Austin is NOT your typical Texas town. It is a very liberal city stuck in a very conservative state. I live just north of Austin (Round Rock) and love it. I personally don't like big cities and rarely go into Austin. If you don't mind driving, I would see about moving just north or south of Austin and try finding a job in Austin. Don't forget Texas has some great colleges and Universities and just about any type of weather/terrain you can think of. The only two drawbacks I can think of are allergies (just about everyone gets bothered by them at some point) and long, hot, humid summers. Other than those two things, Texas is perfect for me. I would get used to saying "y'all" and fixin - part of every Texan's vocabulary.

 

i have friends in wimberly (south of austin, almost half way to SA) and it is a very nice area if you want somthign outside of city life.

 

A good thing to a car guy about long summers is that means our racetracks are open longer than those up north.

 

True. Our track closes only for two weeks, Thanksgiving and Christmas. But cars are slower in 100 degree heat

 

Living in the Fort Worth area I can tell you it matters in what parts of forth worth you are in.

Down town is a nice environment, sky scrapers, nice places to eat, and other places to go and see. Quick entertaining in my opinion.

About a 3 miles radius outsides of down town you got little businesses and such. A LOT of used car dealerships. This is also where you can find the "bad" part of the fort worth neighbor hood. You can find some nice housing developments here and there.
Hurst, North Richland Hill, and some parts of Haltom City are great places to be and raise a kid. Good schools, lots of places to go. HUGE MALL! North East Mall

If anything, Dallas is a more of a "white" collar job pace as in Fort Worth has the Stock Yards and lots of country redneck types. But we do have places some very nice suburb areas like south Fort Worth has just outside of Loop 820.

Between Dallas and Forth Worth lies Arlington; Frys Electronics and Six Flags...no need to go on for me. If you like technology Frys is the place to go!! HUGE store, and they have several locations throughout DFW area.

Way north of Arlington you have colleyville, the colony, ect...rich people live here and you can definitely tell that. Went to a Marketstreet (rich person grocery store) and they have over 10 BMW's in their parking lot mixed in with other high dollar cars.
Also dated a girl from colleyville, her parents house was HUGE.

Like shopping at wal mart? won't have problem finding any around here. My dad's company does commercial refrigeration and they do most if not all the wal marts around here with other businesses.

DFW has a lot of places to live no matter if your poor, middle class, or rich

 

If you're a biker, June 10-13 will be the best time to visit Austin.

 

Thanks for the great info everyone! Austin seems to be very appealing. We'd definitely want to be 20 mins or so from the city. We'd like to live in a quiet, more open area around the area north of Austin. Any more suggestions?

 

Just north of Austin you have Pflugerville and Round Rock. A little further north you have Cedar Park, Leander, and Georgetown. Georgetown is old people, while the other cities have a mixture of all ages and races. I would say Round Rock and Cedar Park would be the top choices to move to while Leander and Pflugerville come in second. If you want to move a little further east, there are some smaller cities that offer larger amounts of land for quite a bit less money (Manor and Hutto).

 

Georgetown has some amazing, suburban developments around it. It's much more spread out than most people realize, and it's not just for old folks. Jason, you oughta contact a Georgetown realtor and ask.

 

Wow... DFW is anything but dry unless you went during the winter months? During the summer the humidity can match the heat and be painfully hot for days on end. I've lived in several states (including Colorado) for the last several years and I'd prefer Texas over any of them for several varying reasons As far as Texas pride goes, I'm not sure how it can bother someone who lives so far away, however I think it's great there are those proud of the state they live in.

 

Ill chime in here for ya later J... too tired right now.

Also, the whole texas pride thing... its annoyingly lame. EVERYTHING IS CATERED TO TEXANS HERE.. **** man, the kfc buckets have texas flags on them. The anheuser busch commercials DO NOT say St Louis MO, they ****ing say "houston tx"...

All of the pickup trucks here have some sort of texas special edition... all they are, are full size trucks with a special edition logo and a 3k package price.

People cant drive here... CANNOT! Its amazing what goes on on the highways, and sad at the same time.

The road layout is terrible.

And since I work in education I can say this... lots of people are ****ing stupid

I could go on for hours... and I will later.