For those contemplating retirement, some useful info...

While there no perfect place, there is something for everyone.... I can validate the Midwest portion. You can meet famous people, but you have to go somewhere else to do it. Of course, you can also buy an expansive demesne nearly the size of Central Park for what half a duplex will cost you in California.
Where to Live After Retirement
You can live in Phoenix, Arizona where.....
1. You are willing to park 3 blocks away because you found shade.
2. You've experienced condensation on your butt from the hot water in the toilet bowl.
3. You can drive for 4 hours in one direction and never leave town.
4. You have over 100 recipes for Mexican food.
5. You know that "dry heat" is comparable to what hits you in the face when you open your oven door.
6. The 4 seasons are: tolerable, hot, really hot, and ARE YOU KIDDING ME??!!

You can Live in California where...
1. You make over $250,000 and you still can't afford to buy a house.
2. The fastest part of your commute is going down your driveway.
3. You know how to eat an artichoke.
4. You drive your rented Mercedes to your neighborhood block party.
5. When someone asks you how far something is, you tell them how long it will take to get there rather than how many miles away it is.
6. The 4 seasons are: Fire, Flood, Mud, and Drought.

You can Live in New York City where...
1. You say "the city" and expect everyone to know you mean Manhattan.
2. You can get into a four-hour argument about how to get from Columbus Circle to Battery Park, but can't find Wisconsin on a map.
3. You think Central Park is "nature,"
4. You believe that being able to swear at people in their own language makes you multi-lingual.
5. You've worn out a car horn.
6. You think eye contact is an act of aggression.

You can Live in Maine where...
1. You only have four spices: salt, pepper, ketchup, and Tabasco.
2. Halloween costumes fit over parkas.
3. You have more than one recipe for moose.
4. Sexy lingerie is anything flannel with less than eight buttons.
5. The four seasons are: almost winter, winter, still winter, and construction.

You can Live in the Deep South where...
1. You can rent a movie and buy bait in the same store.
2. "y'all" is singular and "all y'all" is plural.
3. "He needed killin'" is a valid defense.
4. Everyone has 2 first names: Billy Bob, Jimmy Bob, Mary Sue, Betty Jean, MARY BETH, etc.

You can live in Colorado where...
1. You carry your $3,000 mountain bike atop your $500 car.
2. You tell your husband to pick up Granola on his way home and he stops at the day care center.
3. A pass does not involve a football or dating.
4. The top of your head is bald, but you still have a pony tail.

You can live in the Midwest where...
1. You've never met any celebrities, but the mayor knows your name.
2. Your idea of a traffic jam is ten cars waiting to pass a tractor.
3. You have had to switch from "heat" to "A/C" on the same day.
4. You end sentences with a preposition: "Where's my coat at?"
5. When asked how your trip was to any exotic place, you say, "It was different!"

OR, You can live in Florida where..
1. You eat dinner at 3:15 in the afternoon.
2.. All purchases include a coupon of some kind -- even houses and cars.
3. Everyone can recommend an excellent dermatologist.
4. Road construction never ends anywhere in the state.
5. Cars in front of you are often driven by headless people.


ADDENDUM:

In Phoenix, instead of an umbrella for rain, you have to carry a pot holder to open your door.
Instead of running your car for 15 minutes with the heater on to warm it up, you have to run it for 15 minutes with the A/C running just so you can sit int he seat, touch the belt buckle or steering wheel.
and, don't touch the windows or lean against the car because you can get 2nd degree burns. (personal experience)


Or you can live in Southeast Alaska where:
1. Summer high temperatures above about 70 degrees absolutely require A/C.
2. Eleven straight days of half to an inch of rain daily is just eleven days.
3. You measure distances by ferry hours or Alaska Air mileage plans.
4. You don't mind sharing the streets of your small town (pop. 14,000) with 870,000 visitors off of cruise ships.
5. You can live in a real community, with real people, with all the problems, and still feel good about it.

Then there is the weather shifts.
70 degrees one day, then a blizzard, then back to 70s.
I celebrated a white Christmas in Denver while on leave after my first deployment. My leave started 15 May, yet I had 72 degrees for my birthday on the 21st...
In the neck of the woods my Arkansas relatives live in, Grim, "y'all" is multi-purpose, singular and plural, and "all y'all" is only plural.
Where I grew up in Texas, y'all is always plural, never singular. "All y'all" is bad grammar...
Well, John, that's because, despite being populated with rednecks, Arkansas is not deep-south. :-)
Heck, West Tennessee doesn't count in my book. When you order Tea and they don't just assume you mean Sweet Tea, you can no longer claim that you are a part of the South.
Now that was funny y'all. I've lived north-central, Midwest, south, Florida, Texas, CA, and I was raised in Philly and on the Jersey Coast. There is just so much truth there that it’s amazing...

But I would like to point out to Idon Wannano that to me, everywhere below Wilmington, DE is the South, and the 'deep' south is everything in a box roughly cornered by Kansas City, Beaumont, Jacksonville, and Alexandria. Everything left of Kansas City and North of D/FW is "The Blank Spot States" until one gets to "Out West," which starts at New Mexico and Ends at the CA Border (all of it). And of course, I live in what I consider the Texico Plains (San Antonio)....

P.S. One could also live on Oahu (done that, hated it),where your county is all the land there is and where if you drive more than 20 miles in a straight line, you need scuba gear (but they have THREE interstate highways and a loop!!); where directions are often given in terms of wind-direction; where flowered shirts, shorts, and the good flip-flops are semi-formal wear; where everyone is a brudda, even us haolis; where everything is imported, but there are NO snakes, just mongooses (it's an odd story); and where people eat this stuff called poi that makes first grade craft paste seem downright tasty by comparison.