the state by state speak your mind about...alabama
Last edited Mon Jan 30, 2012, 01:45 AM - Edit history (3)
hi
welcome to this experiment
i am a floridian proudly
i am a southerner proudly
i am also a hard working democratic party volunteer proudly
in my red town,in my red county, in my red state
every day knowing that little to no headway will be gained put our heads down and run into a brick wall
i will be honest i expect no congratulations it is done with purely selfish motives
i want my world to be better
i have noticed a trend of what i can only describe as angry dialouge when the south is discussed
so i would like to propose a series of threads i will initiate each day the subject of each to be: the states in alphabetical order
this will allow us all to speak our minds on the values of each state
our first state is
Alabama
i have been there
the people were kind and the food was good
everyone i met at least pretended to make me feel at home in a faraway place
= new reply since forum marked as read
I was only there once as a 12 year old child, visited relatives who lived there. We had a great time.
I don't know enough about the state to comment further, however I really like your idea behind starting this thread.
But thinking about it, it would move better a little quicker 
I don't know, I wonder what people think about the rate? It's not like it's my decision or anything like that 
I would have to say it was prettier than I expected in the country.
. . . and I would be remiss as a fellow SEC fan not to congratulate them on their NCAA football national championship.
I don't see any reason to rehash all the terrible civil rights history, as we seem to get a pretty good regular dose of that here by others, and I'll let them own that negativity.
oh yeah . . and Go Gators 
I'm glad you have!
And that the people were kind and the food good...That means a lot when you're far from home.
Worked with guys from there. They loved their catfish fishing.
Alabama
Alaska
Arizona
If Arkansas didn't have that silent 's' added to the end there would have been four
Especially if he makes any mention about going to Louisiana...
<-- pretend that's a banjo
Why is that important?
Because private forestry is a BIG deal here. Every 2nd person I run into is a forester at one stage of their lives, or part time.
(Alabama's land consists of 22 million acres of forest, which is 67% of total land area.)
People LOVE the land here, and take care of it, value it.
Alabama is amazingly green year round.
Gardening here is more a matter of keeping the greenery at bay then of "trying" to grow something.
I love feeling like I am living in the woods even when I am living in a small town.
Alabama is mostly rural, actually, huge swaths of land with only 4 "big cities"
( plus that Gadsden/Anniston area over there on the Georgia line).
You can drive around for days and not hit any serious traffic, once you are out of the major city areas.
Miles and miles and miles of 2 lane roads with breath taking scenery.
Alabama ranks second in the area of its inland waterways.
and rates 2nd in the number of F-5 tornadoes in the country!
Pop. is only 4,800,000 thereabouts.
And people really are friendly and helpful.
I CHOSE to live here, had to move away for a few years, and chose to move back when I could retire.
Half of my life I lived on the West Coast, but this place is deeply home to me.
First thing my next door neighbor said when she welcomed me to our current neighborhood was
" Oh I DO hope you are a Democrat!"
Grew up in Birmingham and was there for the 60s civil rights movement.
I remember Bull Connor and the dogs and fire hoses.
Fortunately we've made a lot of progress since then, but we still have a way to go.
Racial prejudice is still deeply rooted, ingrained in some, especially among rural and poor/undereducated whites.
But I think it gets better with each subsequent generation.
I'm proud to serve as campaign treasurer for the first black woman to be elected to our city council.
Physically, Alabama is a beautiful state. Foothills of the Appalachians in the north down to the snow white beaches on the Gulf of Mexico.
I live on a lovely, almost pristine, bay just north of the Intracoastal Waterway.
Every day I see Great Blue Herons, cattle egrets, ospreys, pelicans, all manner of gulls, porpoises, deer, foxes, and yesterday a bald eagle roosted for a few minutes in a tree in my back yard.
People are generally friendly and helpful.
The day we moved in a couple showed up at our front door with a bouquet of fresh picked flowers and a bottle of wine to welcome us to the neighborhood. Never had that happen while living near Chicago or Boston.
I thought "Yep, I'm HOME again."
I left the state in my 20s to pursue my career.
I returned in my 50s.
We've made progress on many fronts, but there's still a lot of room for improvement.
Y'all come see us!
A warm spring evening with a fragrant and salty breeze coming off of Mobile Bay.
A huge marble floored, colonnaded, dance floor.
Young men in tuxes and pretty young women in ball gowns.
And the orchestra playing "Stars Fell on Alabama".
I'll never forget that night back in 1960.
I think I can smell the salty air . .
That was a few years before JB covered it.
Maybe it was a little more like this Billie Holiday version:
Thanks for sharing
Point Clear, Alabama.
Google it.
Yeah, yeah...I was a 'frat boy'.
Some of us moved beyond that.
. . and it's even got the lyrics.
It's singalong
My wife and I spent a year researching the best places in America to buy land for the purpose of Living as Sustainably as Possible.
Our search included a number of parameters such as:
*Bubble-Proof investment
*Available clean water,
*Fertile Land
*Inexpensive unspoiled property
*Low property taxes
*Long growing season
*Low Winter heating costs
*Adjacent National Forest and protected Wilderness
*Wild Game
*Low Cost of Living
*No close Urban Areas or Factory Farms
Alabama & Arkansas were two of the locations that came up frequently.
We eventually chose Arkansas because the property included a natural spring.
We moved here (Ouachita Mountains) from Minneapolis in 2006, love it,
and recommend it to those who wish to live as sustainably as possible.
Different strokes, I guess.
A couple of years ago, went to a great big hippie party there on a couple hundred acres in the woods. Saw a band named "Electric Codpiece" whose male members jammed on stage all wearing women's lingerie.
Almost got drowned in a cave during a torrential rainstorm in Little River Canyon many years ago.
Made it out.
A few years after that, got stuck in an icestorm accompanying a friend to his U of SA Medical school interview in Mobile. Made it home.
Alabama has some beautiful country. And as Clark Howard will tell you - cheap airfare out of Birmingham
Nothing like a big sweaty guy in a tight red bustiere jamming on the guitar!
AlAbAmA
A capital "A" looks a little like a ladder, I think.
Ladder-letter, skinny letter, ladder letter, fat-letter, ladder letter, crawling letter, ladder letter.
Well that's the best I can do on short notice. 
the esteemed Will Pitt grew up there.
It's also where the civil rights movement got its start, with Selma, Rosa Parks, etc.
And Mobile had Mardi Gras several years before New Orleans did. Plus, they throw Moon Pies at you along with the trinkets. Really.
