Let’s keep this to ourselves, ok?

Niche has updated its “Best Places to Live” for 2017 and our hamlet of 20k is at the top of the list of Georgia locales.  Not to mention that it ranked #32 in the whole gosh darn US of A.  Here’s Decatur’s Niche “report card” to see where we stand amongst their key indicators…

Now I’m sure the overachievers among us are asking, what are these 31 places that are better than Decatur??  How is that possible?  Well, you’ll have to visit the fair communities of Rollingwood, TX or Carmel, IN, Wyoming, OH or Eden Prairie, MN to find out.

If you go, let us know and report back, ok?

Keep it real, DEC.

City rankings are at best entertaining and good conversation starters and at worst obnoxious.  I think this one falls in the former category.

A site called “Movato Blog: The Lighter Side of Real Estate“, has ranked cities across the country based on their appeal to self-described “nerds”, and Atlanta came out #1 ahead of Portland and Seattle.

What this ranker lacks in website name recognition, it makes up for in providing a detailed methodology.  Each city was rated on nine factors:

• Number of annual comic book, video game, anime, and sci-fi / fantasy conventions

• People per comic book store

• People per video game store

• People per traditional gaming store

• People per computer store

• People per bookstore

• People per LARPing group

• People per science museum

• Distance to the nearest Renaissance fair

How did Atlanta manage #1?  Well, apparently it has more bookstores, more video game stores, more LARP groups per person than any other city in the country.  Oh, and of course Dragon*Con didn’t hurt either.

Finally!  A city ranker I can get behind.

This morning The Daily Beast released it’s list of the 57 “craziest” cities in the United States.  The ranking was based on psychiatrists per capita (ATL rank: 46), stress (ATL rank: 33), eccentricity (ATL rank: 24) and drinking (ATL rank: 38).  Overall, Atlanta ranked 46th on the list, making us not all that crazy by comparison…though we were still nuttier than Charlotte and it’s 55th placing.

Atlanta’s token “crazy law” is: Crazy Law: “It is illegal to make faces at schoolchildren while they are studying”, which was pulled from this website.

If you’re wondering how you rank “eccentricity”, the Beast got the help of travel writer “and student of all things eccentric, Mike Barish”.

Cincinnati ranked as the nation’s “craziest city”, while Salt Lake ranked dead last at #57.

The very latest among Forbes’ overwhelming flood of city rankers is this surprise “win” for Atlanta:  “Most-Recession-Proof City for Retirees”! Their reasoning?

“Our list, compiled by crunching seven sets of statistics from sunny days to median home price, reveals that Atlanta has many trends working in its favor–low cost of living, plenty of sun and housing that is affordable and projected to rise in value over the next five years.”

Of course, once you can no longer operate a vehicle it’s near impossible to obtain groceries or anything else in most parts of this city, but hey, getting your daily dose of Vitamin D is important too.

GAK points out that Atlanta has ranked among National Geographic’s global list of 50 “Places of a Lifetime”.  In other words, it’s their 50 cities to visit before you die.

How can Atlanta compete with the likes of Vienna, Chicago and Paris?

NatGeo actually does a pretty good job of hitting the high points: trees, architecture, neighborhoods, food, shopping, arts.  (Emory prof does an even better job in a related Atlanta essay.) The big tourist spots like World of Coke, the aquarium and Turner Field are also mentioned in passing, but isn’t it interesting how most these “must visit” attributes really aren’t things you can buy tickets to, but must experience collectively?

Interesting.

For all the grief I give city rankings, I sure do spend a lot of time talking about them!  You might as well just add “hypocritical bloggers” to the list of things that apparently make Decatur an un-best place to live.

According to Money Magazine’s 2009 “Best Places to Live“, Decatur isn’t even worth mentioning.  While Peachtree City ranks 8th in the entire country (?!) and Suwanee ranks 35th, Decatur can’t even manage to be acknowledged as one of Georgia’s less deserving “Other Cities.”

Truth be told, Decatur has never registered, which makes me think it’s more an issue with how Money is classifying “places” (Atlanta and “North Druid Hills” register, but Decatur doesn’t) than an actual critique against the city.

But that sort of post doesn’t a good blog make.  So, cue my artificial exasperation.

Golly-gee!  Peachtree City?!  Apparently a horribly long commute doesn’t hurt your ranking.