29 Signs You’ll Always Be A California Kid At Heart

1. The minute anyone finds out you’re from California, they’re going to assume you mean “Los Angeles.”

2. And by “Los Angeles,” they think you mean “Hollywood.”

3. People constantly ask you if you know any celebrities — even if you live nowhere near the aforementioned Hollywood.

4. Or if you surf.

5. But you still have a sweet spot for Rocket Power, Brink!, Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure, and any other super-stereotypical movie that features street sports and sweet slang.

6. You call people “dude” far more than you’d like to admit. He’s a dude, she’s a dude, we’re all dudes, dude.

7. Chances are good you grew up in a house that recycled before recycling was cool.

8. Going to Disneyland during summer vacations wasn’t all that special — the really lucky kids went to Disney WORLD.

9. You are something of a Mexican food elitist. To you, there are three echelons of Mexican food: authentic Mexican food, artisan Mexican food, and cheap Mexican food (which you’ll still swear is better than anything you can get anywhere else.)

10. You are very deliberate in letting people know if you’re from NorCal or Southern California. Your allegiance to your half of the state is legendary.

11. But you’ll forget your differences when it comes to picking sides in the war of Tupac vs. Biggie.

12. At one point, you probably begged your parents to let you be a child actor.

13. You know more people in “The Industry” than you care to admit. (And that whether you consider tech or entertainment as THE industry says as much about where you grew up as anything else ever could.)

14. What do you mean, the rest of the world doesn’t consider flip-flops to be acceptable footwear?

15. You’re constantly scheming as to how you can get that much tanner.

16. Your entire childhood was set to the soundtrack of the Beach Boys, whether or not you lived anywhere near a beach.

17. Giving accurate, non-confusing driving directions is a virtue and a skill.

18. But nobody has ever figured out how to give an accurate ETA.

19. Iced coffee, to you, is something to be consumed year-round. And your coffee rivalry is not Dunkin vs. Starbucks, but Coffee Bean vs. Starbucks. (Really, there is something to be said about you and your rivalries.)

20. Every time anyone plays a Red Hot Chili Peppers song, you have an uncontrollable urge to genuflect.

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21. Your concept of acceptable weather, and indeed seasons, is within a very limited temperature range.

22. Chances are good you know as many vegetarians as non-vegetarians.

23. And you were introduced to kale and its juice at a farmer’s market when you were really young.

24. And everyone’s been taking yoga since… well, forever.

25. You have a basic understanding of Spanish, even if you never studied it in school.

26. Most of the people you went to high school with ended up going to college in-state, and if you left, you were regarded as slightly misguided. You’ll be back, they said. You’ll always be back.

27. No matter how many years you’ve been away, you have a sinking suspicion that they’re right.

28. Every piece of pop culture — from Kerouac and Bukowski to Clueless, Full House, and even The Parent Trap — will leave you with a mix of pride and nostalgia for your home city and home state.

29. And no matter how ridiculous or silly or weird people might think your home state is, you know that all you need in life is an In’n’Out burger, and suddenly everything feels like home.