WARNING: Another Dallas fanboy post.

Having lived most of my life in one of the most expensive areas in the US (outside of maybe Alaska, Hawaii and parts of California) most of my life, I'm blown away by how cheap stuff is here in Texas.  Many things are literally HALF the price of the Northeast.  I think the average might be like 20-25% less.  I mentioned my experience at the Lexus dealership a few weeks ago, bu here are some other examples:

* A gallon of milk is only $2.  In CT, it was $4 - at least.  Two pints of strawberries were $1 last month and peaches are like 79cents a pound this month.  It must suck to be a farmer.

* D's preschool is 50% less than in CT AND they serve him two snacks and drinks AND lunch every day, AND it's a nicer school!!!  I think the class sizes are a little bigger tho

* We just went to a second run movie theater and it cost 75 cents per person.  No - I did not leave off a zero.  Yes - there were somewhat comfortable seats and had air conditioning.  It was a real movie theater (slightly run-down, but clean).  And they had reasonably popular movies like Thor and Fast Five.  We saw Rio with the kids - it was a meh to slighly above-meh movie, but for 75 cents who is going to complain?!?  It probably costs me more to rent a DVD and watch it in my own house.

* We went to a local pizza buffet chain and the whole family ate all the salad, pizza and dessert we could, and the total bill came out to UNDER $16, including BEVERAGE!  WAT?!?  The pizza was actually decent.  Not great tho - but c'mon!  I'm a lifelong new Yorker.  Most places in NY, you can't even get a cheese pie for under $16.

* We took a neighborhood kid to dinner at one of the better local chain restaurants and dinner for 5 was $32 (after I left a 20% tip).  I had a very good chicken friend chicken with two sides.  A meal for 4 for the family at McDonald's probably runs us close to $30.  McDonald's prices are about the same as in the Northeast tho... maybe only a touch less in Texas.

What kind of bizarre-ass time warp am I in?!?  I feel like I'm paying prices from when I was a kid... and that was a looong time ago.  Not Norman Rockwell long, but pretty long.

The only thing so far that is more expensive is the health care.  Like 35% more expensive.  After living here a few months, I suspect it's because of all the illegal immigrants and large numbers of uninsured here.  So I'm probably subsidizing part of the "free" care that the hospitals have to give around here.  This is just wild-assed conjecture on my part.

But when I pay like $5 an hour to have a group of Mexican ladies to clean my house, I figure I'm getting that back in the end.  Not... getting it in the back end, like Arnold the governator.

Hmm...  I wonder how much *that* costs?  Como se dice "rear guard action" en espanol?