Commentary
A person with common sense will approach any comparison of West Coast and East Coast of the U.S. with trepidation. Isn't any such comparison bound to elicit runaway cantankerosity?
Yeah, there's the tribal "we're better than you" that can come into play. Besides that, it's also clear that up and down both coasts in the U.S. are states that vary considerably in climate, foods, crops, musical tastes, outdoor activities, car choices, sports, businesses, etc. In fact, there can even be a lot of variation within a state (e.g. southern California vs. northern California). So...how does one capture the wide diversity on each coast in a list of only 10 items?
That's right—you really can't. As a result, some list-makers approach this challenge by comparing two cities that are deemed representative of each coast (like, say, Los Angeles and New York—i.e., big population centers). This can help facilitate a compare and contrast, as New York has all four seasons while L.A. winters just don't get that cold. However, the problem with compressing each coast down to one site is that it hides a lot of diversity, as (for example) Florida is the land of sunny beaches and alligators, while Maine is the land of cold, rocky beaches and moose. Also, note that the New York area isn't necessarily representative of the entire East Coast, as New York is aggressive and fast-paced while the rest of the East Coast is more low key.
Ok, ok, it's time to put a lid on the thoughtful discussion and just admit that this isn't a serious comparison list. Basically, we recently noticed some internet headlines about the muddy situation at the 2023 Burning Man festival in the Nevada desert, and instead of saying "Mud at Burning Man? That's unusual," we said "Er...what's Burning Man?"
Yes, you heard that right. Since we're an East-Coast-centric operation (or insert a different lame excuse here), we've never heard of Burning Man . (Or, more precisely, we hadn't heard of Burning Man before we published Top Ten Awkward Moments at Burning Man .) So...we decided to extrapolate that germ of an idea (item 10) into an entire list comparing West Coast to East Coast. However, we're more familiar with the South than the entire East Coast, so most of the items that we chose as representative of the East Coast are really more representative of the South (e.g., items 8, 7, 5, and 3). Awkward! It's an outrage, right? Omg you're going to hammer us in the (nonexistent) comments section, aren't you?
Yawn. Oh, and another thing: we're aware that this top ten list doesn't really qualify as funny, but the Klugness.com site has such a modest level of viewership at the moment that we don't think anyone will notice or care. Being largely undiscovered affords us a certain degree of freedom to create, edit, and publish South-biased top ten lists that aren't even funny. Woo hoo!
