ATTN: All Arizonians

I am not an Arizonian...but both my eldest kids are. They spent summers there growing up (my ex moved there after our divorce) They both moved there as soon as they were old enough to be on their own, even though they really didn't get along well with their dad. They absolutely love it. Neither of them would ever move back to "boring" Michigan. They both say there is always something to do there. They both had no problem finding jobs. My daughter's job is a security guard for an agency. She sits in her car, playing on her laptop and reading for 12 hour shifts watching unattended electrical stations under construction. Talk about a gravy job!

I live very close to Glendale. I'm in Sun City West with my parents. It's a *cringe* retirement community. Actually, it's not bad at all, except that I never see very many young people.

Tucson is nice too. It's just a wee bit cooler than Phoenix is. I adopted Nikko from a bird rescue there. I wish I lived closer to it, because I would love to be a volunteer.

I'm originally from Nebraska. I grew up in the western part of the state, where the humidity is low, but then moved to the eastern part of the state, where the humidity is quite high. In the summer, it was so hot and muggy that you had to stay inside with the air conditioning running full blast. Therefore, I don't see what the big deal is about Arizona summers. You stay inside while the sun is out (except to hit the swimming pool , just like in Nebraska. However, in Arizona, you can at least venture outside once the sun goes down. It may sound crazy, but when it's 90 degrees and dark, and a little breeze blows, you can get a little bit of a chill. In Nebraska, you couldn't even venture out at night with all that dang humidity. One other thing weather wise: when you see the high and low temps for Phoenix when watching the news, those temps are from the airport downtown, smack in the middle of all that concrete and asphalt. The temps here in the west valley (like Glendale) are generally 5 to 10 degrees cooler.

Last spring my allergies were terrible, but this spring has been great. Last year we had a lot of rain during the winter, which made lots of wildflowers and whatnot bloom in the spring. This year we've been in quite a dry spell. Everyone is complaining about the lack of rain, but I'm benefitting quite well from the dryness .

I wanted to move to Arizona since I was about 10 or so, and it's pretty much everything I wanted. I love palm trees, and there's no shortage of them. I hate snow, and the only time I have to see it is when it's on the mountains off in the distance. Our rose bushes are gorgeous right now, and a lot of people have snapdragons and petunias blooming. You'll never have to change your clocks again, since Arizona doesn't do daylight savings ;D.

The one thing I miss is grass. In Sun City West, there's grass on the golf courses and around the rec centers, but not a lot of people have grass in their yards. We don't . I wish we had a house backed up against one of the golf courses, but you pay out the nose for a location like that. There's a house not far from us that has a golf course behind it with a pond and swans, plus they have a fantastic view of the mountains. That's my dream location .

I also wish we had a private swimming pool, but my parents say we don't need one because one of the rec centers is within walking distance of our house. It has 3 pools: an outdoor pool, an indoor walking pool, and an indoor lap pool.

There is one drawback if you're planning on buying a home. Three years ago, my parents paid about $170,000 for our house. Now, it would sell for at least $270,000. Prices have finally leveled out, but it's still dang expensive to buy a house. It's a good thing we moved when we did, or else we wouldn't have been able to afford living here.