This weekend should be a pretty amazing weekend. I am heading to my house in Charlotte with two great friends, Sarah and Paige, and I will be showing them the good side of Charlotte for two days. They’ve pretty much only seen downtown Charlotte at night, which is a shame because the best part of Charlotte is, in my opinion, South Charlotte. It’s the residential area of Charlotte. The interesting thing about South Charlotte is that it is unlike anything I’ve ever seen before. It’s not like there’s one city and around that city is strictly housing and the occasional strip mall and other things like that. Each living community has been divided into its own sub-community. Each sub-community has office buildings, residential areas, strip malls, other commercial spots, and each sub-community has its own culture and style. It’s really cool to see. You’ve got Ballantyne, South Park, Myers Park, Quail Hollow, Gleneagles, etc. I live in Ballantyne, which is very far south of the city. In fact, I live maybe 3 miles from the South Carolina border. Words can’t express how great it is to live there.
Anyways, this weekend I will be taking my friends to a bunch of different breweries in Charlotte. Charlotte beer is great, and the people are pretty cool, too. On top of that, the weather will be great so we’ll be able to get in some much-needed pool time to relax. We sort of have a bunch of things planned out, but who knows if we’ll actually be able to do everything. We may just wake up and say “screw it” and sit out at the pool all day.
Charlotte is a rapidly expanding city. People are flowing in every year. In 2013, 100,000 people moved to Charlotte. I can see why. It is the second-largest finance city in the country right behind New York City, and with Pat McRory decreasing the state’s corporate tax rate, Charlotte will continue to seem like an attractive place for people looking to expand their businesses. The cost of living is also significantly less than in the North, the houses are all much more new, everything is so prim and proper, the people are nicer, and tax rates are much less. What’s not to love, right? Between 2000-2010, Charlotte was the fastest growing city in the country. It even earned the nickname, “The orange cone” because there was always some sort of construction going on somewhere. Even still, there is construction everywhere. It causes a lot of traffic sometimes, but that just happens.
I am extremely excited for this weekend, though. I’m looking forward to being able to take a few days off and not worry about anything. I need a breather.
cpoore10 