I have gotten on more than one occasion the well-meaning exclamation: "Have fun in Louisiana!" Let me take this chance to explain some things to some poor, geographically challenged Californians. Louisiana is a state (one of fifty) in the continental United States of America that has a boot-like shape and is know for it's thriving coastal city, New Orleans, as well as its gumbo and jazz. In contrast, Louisville (pronounced Looavull, Luhvul, Lewisville, Looaville, or Looeyville) is a city in the state of Kentucky which boasts of its horse races, bourbon, Muhammad Ali, fried chicken and of course the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. Please note the picture to the above for reference.
Louisville is in fact Kentucky's largest city (in second place would be Lexington followed by the capital of Frankfort) with a population of about 1,268,323 which ranks is as the 42nd largest city in the US. Comparably, Sacramento is ranked at #25 with 2,109,832 people and San Diego is at #17 with 3,001,072 beach combers. Although it is considered part of the "South" (most likely due to allegiances during the civil war in which I am proud to say that Kentucky was claimed by the Confederate States without formal secession/control meaning it wasn't one of those "bad states" that seceded willingly.) Louisville is actually called "the northernmost Southern city" or the "southernmost Northern city" in the US. Geographically speaking it is located at a latitude of 38°13′44″N while Sacramento is located at 38° 31' N which actually makes it more north of Sacramento! It is located on the famous Ohio river immediately across from Indiana while the state of Kentucky borders the states of Ohio, Illinois, Missouri, Indiana, Tennessee, West Virginia and Virginia. Concurrently it is within one day's road travel to 60% of the cities in the continental U.S which means we may do some traveling!
Despite its geographic location, Louisville still retains much Southern culture including artery clogging foods (can we say fried chicken?), conservative politics, a good ole Southern hospitality. The population is broken up as follows: 77.38% White, 18.88% Black or African American, 1.78% Hispanic or Latino, 1.39% Asian, 0.22% Native American,0.04% Pacific Islander, 0.68% from other races, and 1.42% from two or more races. Looks like we're still the minority (unlike our UCLA days!). Nonetheless, I'm sure we can find some edible Chinese food somewhere. If not, our kinda friends must ship us some rooster sauce and boba!
That's enough of our Louisville History lesson for today, but if you are still craving to know more on this terribly interesting subject, click here.
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