Lucianne.com links to a story in Portland's The Oregonian about a California couple who moved to Portland because his job was there. Someone in the neighborhood trashed their house and car with "Go Home" and "Don't Californicate Oregon" graffiti.
I spent 3 academic years in Eugene, OR, and I can confirm that anti-CA sentiment has been the norm in Oregon for at least 40 years. While there, I learned an interesting way to diffuse anti-CA bias.
I'd tell any Oregonian hassling me about screwing up Oregon that I didn't like their state and would leave as soon as I finished my degree. That was both useful and true. As long as I didn't plan to stay I was okay, that made me a visitor and visitors who go home are okay with most Oregonians.
You'd think some would have been mildly put out that I was sponging off the OR taxpayers at their state university. No native ever mentioned that flaw in my reasoning, and I failed to point it out to them. I guess relief that I wasn't a "settler" did the trick.
Eight months of the year, Oregon and Washington west of the Cascades Range are too wet and gloomy for people with a tendency toward Seasonal Affective Disorder or SAD. I have a mild case which leaves me sleepy and low energy, but not depressed, on days with no sun; I got through grad school in spite of it. Interestingly, the diaries of the Lewis and Clark expedition are full of complaints about the soggy winter they spent at Fort Clatsop near Astoria and the mouth of the Columbia River.
