Lifestyle envy

I have a raging case of lifestyle envy. I'm in the Seattle area on vacation for the second year in a row and last year's thoughts of "Wow, wouldn't it be great to live here?" have not faded - in fact, they've gotten stronger.

I've always loved the Pacific Northwest: the mountains, the coast, the clear air, the national parks, the hiking trails, the general outdoorsy-ness. I spent a lot of family vacations as a kid doused in mosquito repellent and scrambling through forests between Yosemite and Vancouver Island. Between that, the whale watching tours, the omnipresent coffee shops (hot chocolate for me, at the time) with endless delicious pastries and the incredible views, I always had a blast, but Southern California was unquestionably home, so I didn't pay much attention to the natives and how they lived.

Now, at 24, I'm incredibly envious of the way these people, particularly Seattlites, spend their lives. Yeah, the traffic is often terrible and commutes to and from work can be ridiculous. But Rainier National Park is a day trip from anywhere in the area, a plethora of summer fruits grow wild throughout every town in the region, one of my favorite wineries is a car ride away and Vancouver is just a ferry ride across the border.

And then there's Seattle itself, which I could rave about for approximately the next ten years, so I'll skip to my favorites: Pike Place Market, with its deliciously fresh (and local!) foods and unique shops, Beecher's Handmade Cheese, with the best macaroni and cheese on the face of the planet, Tully's Coffee, which is infinitely better than Starbucks and mass-produces compostable cups and sleeves, The Confectional, with its sinfully delicious specialty of cheesecake truffles, which, I believe, are bite-sized pieces of heaven on earth, REI's flagship store, which is the mecca of outdoor types everywhere and boasts a fantastic climbing wall that's visible from the freeway, Northwest Outdoor Center on Lake Union, where you can rent a single, double or triple kayak for as little as an hour or as much as a week, the Center for Wooden Boats, also on Lake Union, where you can rent a sailboat to glide around the lake in, watching the numerous float planes come and go... have I mentioned how much I love this place?

Not only is Seattle a great city, but its residents seem to actually take advantage of all it has to offer, something that Washingtonians are notorious for not doing. They'll work from 5am to 2pm, then jump in the car and head off to paraglide from one of the Issaquah mountains (which they run up on the way); they'll take a stroll through Pioneer Square and stop to spend half an hour sitting outside a coffee shop; they actually shop at Pike Place, rather than relinquishing it to the tourists. Then, they head home to set out their "trash" bins: the largest for recycling, another for compostable waste and the smallest for trash.

Where do I sign up, and when can I start?