defend the indefensible: new jersey

Holy shit, Dan Selzer, are you sure you're not related to me? My brother has not one, but TWO Ruts Hut t-shirts. My dad used to take my mom there for dinner when they were dating. Hot, eh? I love that place, damnit.

I was born in Passaic County and raised in Bergen County, home of the most malls per sq. mile. I love Jersey. It will always be home.

Yes! I went to school in Morris County, and you could walk all over town, and also catch buses or trains to either nearby towns or the city. Now I live in a suburb where you have to drive EVERYWHERE, yuck.

I have never been to the Princeton Record Exchange.

Adding to the contradictions that is NJ, disregarding the request to not discuss proximity to NYC, yes, while a portion of NJ is a suburb of NYC, another portion is a suburb of Philadelphia, and people who live in south Jersey do not in any way identify with north Jersey or NYC, despite it not being that long a drive. My family was split in two, my cousins were all in Cherry Hill.

this was a good summary of my undergrad days, when i met students from north jersey. north jersey might have been the northside of mars!

this book is kinda cool, one of my local libraries has it

That's about it...

isn't that enough?

YES

i'm not even from new jersey and i love it.

First: All the italians who made NY pizza what it was when it became an institution and all the jews who made NY bagels what they were when they became an institution almost all live in Jersey and Conneticut now, which is why you have to go to Livingston to get REAL bagels.

Second: Also in Livingston, there were these weird fenced off areas of the woods with empty fields on them heavily guarded for most of the 60s/70s/80s etc. Only later did I realize what they were...missile silos! To protect NYC...

they have crazy sandwiches called 'fat moons' that have chips, burgers and mozzarella stix fillings.

I like old dead creepy seaside places. I guess thats why I like St Kilda too (or well - St Kilda how it was before the damn yuppies moved in and tarted up all the old dirty charm).

there are many!

ihttp://plainparade.org/thesis/NJ-01.jpg

Really, I do.

"Born to Run" by Bruce Springsteen -- who really enjoys this overproduced crappy glop?

yeah the sopranos accent exists, but what i hear most of is a slightly jewishy northeasty variant on a standard american accent -- the way jon stewart speaks is exactly like most of my jersey friends speak.

More recently: it turns out to have surprisingly great places to go salsa dancing.

A lot of what Dan says is on the money.

I would seriously consider moving there.

x-post: Is there a Philly-Suburban accent? I wonder if I have it. I've moved around enough that I have a mixed accent, though it's clearly Philadelphia-centric, without necessarily being Philadelphian. I guess. I slip in and out of a real Philadelphia accent though.

i think they're pretty nice! but then i'm used to brooklyn beaches.

princeton and trenton are roughly the dividing lines betwixt north and south jersey, for what it's worth. there are more than a few iggles fans in and around princeton.

newark's bark may be worse than its bite, but its bite can still be pretty bad. though REAL jerseyans know that newark ain't shit compared to camden -- camden is HARDCORE bad-ass.

thanks,going to watch that one again tonight!

:(

http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2018/06/trenton-arts-festival-mass-shooting-leaves-20-injured.html

Today, I signed historic legislation to protect reproductive freedom in New Jersey – codifying the right to choose into state law and expanding contraception coverage.

In New Jersey, we trust each individual person to make their reproductive choices for themselves. pic.twitter.com/5fOb6azXIa

— Governor Phil Murphy (@GovMurphy) January 13, 2022