Out of place!

[Valiant Bandit]

Ever feel like you're the zebra striped stiletto-heel chair in a room full of Victorian-Era couches?

Okay, bad analogy. Please forgive me as I haven't had a good night's sleep in 2 months.

I've lived in Michigan, Canada, Florida, Rhode Island and now Nevada. Let me tell you something - I've never felt more out of place ANYWHERE than I do living here in Las Vegas. Sin City? Ahaha, try "Psycho City". I've been living here for 16 months and I've YET to meet someone out here who doesn't have something about them that makes me extremely uncomfortable. Since 98% of you TBers have probably never lived out here, let me try to paint a picture for you:

Driving:
-These people drive like they're playing a racing video game on their PS3 or XBOX 360. I'm not kidding. They stop at the last possible second for red lights, weave in and out of traffic like they're rushing to the hospital to save their dying child and they spend more time looking at their cell-phones than they do on the road. Don't believe in God? Come drive out here. It's by the grace of God these people are still alive.

Living Habits:
-Jerry Springer exists in real life. It's a common affair here in Las Vegas. Everyone at my work peddles drugs. (I'm not kidding.) Walk down any aisle and you'll hear employees discussing buying some form of illegal goodies. Their relationships? Lol...BABY MOMMA DRAMA LLAMA!! *This* guy has a child with *this* girl and another child with *this* girl and got his current girl pregnant but is sleeping with someone else. Oh it's the same for the opposite sex too.
I love how people in my Condo complex let their dogs freely urinate and defecate wherever they please. Done with your bottle of beer? Just throw it in the grass or the parking lot! Got a bag full of trash? Just throw it anywhere!

Friendship:
-Friends? What's that out here!? If you don't drink, do drugs, party or go to clubs, you're myself and my wife! The people we share the most things in common with are double our age. Like I previously mentioned, every person my wife and I have tried to befriend or even get to know has some extremely disconcerting part of them that sends up a huge red flag. (No we're not talking about them being slobs...We're talking warrants for arrests, meth labs...pretty much you name it, we've met it.)

Housing:
-Land? What's land? Apparently North Las Vegas was designed by a 5 year old. Houses are literally stacked on top of each other, roads randomly end or just randomly consolidate into 1 lane without any warning, and (my favourite.) about 80% of the houses in LOVELY North Las Vegas are within a 2 mile radius of a Pig Farm! YUM!!!!

Ever seen the movie, My Cousin Vinny? Yeah well I'm Joe Pesci. It seems like every night and morning, there's something that completely ruins me getting a restful sleep. Here's some examples:
-The neighbour's beagle barking for hours on end. (Sometimes all night too!!!)
-Cars going 5 times the speed limit (With those LOVELY mosquito-sounding exhausts.) down a road whose speed limit is 25.
-Drunken neighbours PARTYIN IT DOWN BABY! Til 4 in the morning.
-Neighbours slamming doors so loudly, it shakes the whole building.
-Ambulances, fire trucks, police car sirens shrieking throughout the night.

I think the last straw was when my wife called me while I was at work hysterical because she was watching one of our neighbours beating the living daylights out of his girlfriend in the condo parking lot. She called the police. They never came. How nice.

The point? Las Vegas is a nice place to visit. Oh, and we've lived in various locations in Las Vegas. It's the same everywhere. I'm going to miss the nice weather and the beautiful mountains, but we're saving our money to go back to Rhode Island!

Apparently just hanging out, listening to good music and talking is so passe in Las Vegas.

Las Vegas can take their casinos and shove it. I can't wait for a good night's sleep...But it won't be until June 2012.

[Vorago]

Move?

[EdHunter]

I know what you mean, except I feel out of place time-wise, as well. If I could be in late '60s London, then that'd be just grand for me...

[Muddslide]

Wow, that is a drag. I'm sorry you and your wife are having an extended negative experience like this. I love Vegas, but I can't imagine living there. Well, maybe if I was single and in my 20s again.

I really love the northern part of Nevada...Elko, Winnemucca...

Fortunately, my having moved and criss-crossed the country my whole life has made me pretty #@!% adaptable. I can live anywhere, in any situation and try to enjoy it as a temporary stop on life's trajectory.

However, since we moved to Oregon, my wanderlust has ended. I may still want to travel, but this is THE state for us.

Best of luck to you. I hope things improve until you can extricate yourselves from the desert Soddom.

[Muddslide]

Originally Posted by EdHunter

I know what you mean, except I feel out of place time-wise, as well. If I could be in late '60s London, then that'd be just grand for me...

Yes! This is something I experience more often and more deeply.

[Valiant Bandit]

Originally Posted by Muddslide

Wow, that is a drag. I'm sorry you and your wife are having an extended negative experience like this. I love Vegas, but I can't imagine living there. Well, maybe if I was single and in my 20s again.

I really love the northern part of Nevada...Elko, Winnemucca...

Fortunately, my having moved and criss-crossed the country my whole life has made me pretty #@!% adaptable. I can live anywhere, in any situation and try to enjoy it as a temporary stop on life's trajectory.

However, since we moved to Oregon, my wanderlust has ended. I may still want to travel, but this is THE state for us.

Best of luck to you. I hope things improve until you can extricate yourselves from the desert Soddom.

Thanks. Nevada really is gorgeous, but there's really nothing here in Vegas once you get over the casinos.

I loathe not living near an ocean too...It's too weird for me.

[MakiSupaStar]

North Vegas is notoriously crappy. Have you considered moving somewhere a little more desirable. I have friends who live there and they love it. They live more on the California side of Vegas.

[MatticusMania]

Have you tried Valium?

[lowfreq33]

You should check out Phoenix AZ. It has all the best parts of Vegas and very little of the worst. If I ever leave Nashville that's where I'm going.

[fmoore200]

Originally Posted by Valiant Bandit

Ever feel like you're the zebra striped stiletto-heel chair in a room full of Victorian-Era couches?

Okay, bad analogy. Please forgive me as I haven't had a good night's sleep in 2 months.

I've lived in Michigan, Canada, Florida, Rhode Island and now Nevada. Let me tell you something - I've never felt more out of place ANYWHERE than I do living here in Las Vegas. Sin City? Ahaha, try "Psycho City". I've been living here for 16 months and I've YET to meet someone out here who doesn't have something about them that makes me extremely uncomfortable. Since 98% of you TBers have probably never lived out here, let me try to paint a picture for you:

Driving:
-These people drive like they're playing a racing video game on their PS3 or XBOX 360. I'm not kidding. They stop at the last possible second for red lights, weave in and out of traffic like they're rushing to the hospital to save their dying child and they spend more time looking at their cell-phones than they do on the road. Don't believe in God? Come drive out here. It's by the grace of God these people are still alive.

Living Habits:
-Jerry Springer exists in real life. It's a common affair here in Las Vegas. Everyone at my work peddles drugs. (I'm not kidding.) Walk down any aisle and you'll hear employees discussing buying some form of illegal goodies. Their relationships? Lol...BABY MOMMA DRAMA LLAMA!! *This* guy has a child with *this* girl and another child with *this* girl and got his current girl pregnant but is sleeping with someone else. Oh it's the same for the opposite sex too.
I love how people in my Condo complex let their dogs freely urinate and defecate wherever they please. Done with your bottle of beer? Just throw it in the grass or the parking lot! Got a bag full of trash? Just throw it anywhere!

Friendship:
-Friends? What's that out here!? If you don't drink, do drugs, party or go to clubs, you're myself and my wife! The people we share the most things in common with are double our age. Like I previously mentioned, every person my wife and I have tried to befriend or even get to know has some extremely disconcerting part of them that sends up a huge red flag. (No we're not talking about them being slobs...We're talking warrants for arrests, meth labs...pretty much you name it, we've met it.)

Housing:
-Land? What's land? Apparently North Las Vegas was designed by a 5 year old. Houses are literally stacked on top of each other, roads randomly end or just randomly consolidate into 1 lane without any warning, and (my favourite.) about 80% of the houses in LOVELY North Las Vegas are within a 2 mile radius of a Pig Farm! YUM!!!!

Ever seen the movie, My Cousin Vinny? Yeah well I'm Joe Pesci. It seems like every night and morning, there's something that completely ruins me getting a restful sleep. Here's some examples:
-The neighbour's beagle barking for hours on end. (Sometimes all night too!!!)
-Cars going 5 times the speed limit (With those LOVELY mosquito-sounding exhausts.) down a road whose speed limit is 25.
-Drunken neighbours PARTYIN IT DOWN BABY! Til 4 in the morning.
-Neighbours slamming doors so loudly, it shakes the whole building.
-Ambulances, fire trucks, police car sirens shrieking throughout the night.

I think the last straw was when my wife called me while I was at work hysterical because she was watching one of our neighbours beating the living daylights out of his girlfriend in the condo parking lot. She called the police. They never came. How nice.

The point? Las Vegas is a nice place to visit. Oh, and we've lived in various locations in Las Vegas. It's the same everywhere. I'm going to miss the nice weather and the beautiful mountains, but we're saving our money to go back to Rhode Island!

Apparently just hanging out, listening to good music and talking is so passe in Las Vegas.

Las Vegas can take their casinos and shove it. I can't wait for a good night's sleep...But it won't be until June 2012.

Sounds like the neighborhood I grew up in in the Bronx, lol

Edit: except the pig farm. Lol but there were lots of chickens if you knew where to look

[Papa Dangerous]

Yeah.. L.A. sucks, but than again, I am a bored and raised New Yorker. The only thing I can even kind of understand is the driving. I obviously think NY drivers can be buttholes, but we are just very aggressive. We have almost 9,000,000 people here in NYC. We need to be a little nuts to get around. However, for the most part, we are all great drivers in regards to being able to get around millions of people daily. If you can drive here, you can drive anywhere. Other than that, NY is much better than L.A.

I mean, you will find a bunch of similarities within in any major city, but NY... we keep it a bit classier... in my opinion lol

Sounds like you need a simpler place to live, so RI might be a good place to journey back too. It is not easy going into a very dense city area unless one is really used to it. Just the opposite is true as well, going from the city to country is a hell of a change. Since moving, I feel there is nothing to do out here except work and shop.

[Stumbo]

Ear plugs, white noise machine and possibly a bit of melatonin. What's the downside? Might help.

After trying several things, I've settled on a fan lamp with a remote(thermostat and 3 speeds) to keep the room a bit cool and a volume adjustable white noise machine with a constant river sound to help me sleep. My white noise machine has a line out if you want to run it to a bigger speaker. If I don't want the overhead fan on, I use an oscillating table fan.

Based on my experiences, you can't wait for a year to get a good night's sleep. You'll be pretty messed up by then.

Good luck.

[Valiant Bandit]

Originally Posted by MakiSupaStar

North Vegas is notoriously crappy. Have you considered moving somewhere a little more desirable. I have friends who live there and they love it. They live more on the California side of Vegas.

Yeah it's called Henderson. It's gorgeous over there. But it's still way too rural/urban? (The one where it's really city like lol) for me.

Originally Posted by MatticusMania

Have you tried Valium?

Yep I have. I don't want to be on something like that for longer than a week...Sorry.

Originally Posted by lowfreq33

You should check out Phoenix AZ. It has all the best parts of Vegas and very little of the worst. If I ever leave Nashville that's where I'm going.

I've been there, visited numerous times. That has to be the single hottest place I've EVER been.

Originally Posted by Papa Dangerous

Sounds like you need a simpler place to live, so RI might be a good place to journey back too. It is not easy going into a very dense city area unless one is really used to it. Just the opposite is true as well, going from the city to country is a hell of a change. Since moving, I feel there is nothing to do out here except work and shop.

You hit the nail on the head here. I'm extremely overwhelmed out here at the density of people. I'm used to just hearing the wind blowing through the trees and owls screeching
.

Originally Posted by Stumbo

Ear plugs, white noise machine and possibly a bit of melatonin. What's the downside? Might help.

Based on my experiences, you can't wait for a year to get a good night's sleep. You'll be pretty messed up by then.

Good luck.

I actually do take melatonin. That stuff makes me so groggy though! I don't want to use earplugs just in the freak occurrence that the smoke detector goes off and I don't hear it..... =/

Eh I get a mediocre "night's" worth of sleep. I usually fall asleep by 3AM and get woken up continually until 9AM. So from 9AM-1PM is when I sleep...Isn't that crazy?

[MakiSupaStar]

Well, personally, and I might be at a different stage in life that you, I'd prefer rural and sleepy to tweakers and domestic violence.

[Count_Blah]

I got about halfway through your post and was thinking to myself "NorthTown".

I used to live off Nellis over by the base, and moved out to Green Valley after about a year of hearing sirens and gunshots most nights. It was much better in Green Valley, but couldn't wait to get the hell out of that place. Back in Texas and all is right with the world.

[dozicusmaximus]

Get a job working nights.
I lived in a garbage town near Reno. I worked nights as a security guard in a casino. Wasn't to bad. The tweekers hide inside during the day... most of them.

[Stumbo]

Originally Posted by Valiant Bandit

I actually do take melatonin. That stuff makes me so groggy though! I don't want to use earplugs just in the freak occurrence that the smoke detector goes off and I don't hear it..... =/

I gave up Melatonin due to grogginess. Maybe taking a 1/4 tab might help. I also gave up ear plugs because their too uncomfortable. My wife doesn't use earplugs so I would depend on her to hear the smoke alarm.

What does work for me is placing my sound machine on the window sill, using a constant sound(no waves breaking) and adjusting the volume just loud enough to drown out the exterior noise and not loud enough to wake me up. It's easy to get used to it!

This is the one I've had for over 10 years: Amazon.com: Sound Oasis S-550-05 Sound Therapy System: Health & Personal Care Lots of others to choose from.

[MatticusMania]

Originally Posted by Valiant Bandit

Yep I have. I don't want to be on something like that for longer than a week...Sorry.

I just wanted to follow this up with letting you know that I was not seriously recommending you take Valium to cope with your surroundings.