"Cleveland is the City"

It's true.  Bone Thugs told me.

Ruth Reichl is the newest convert to that sweet Midwestern city on the lake.  Welcome to the team, Ruth.

I can honestly say that there is no other place like Cleveland, Ohio.  I don't live there, and I haven't for a while, but there is something about Cleveland that is hard to shake.

The truth is, it is hard to talk about Cleveland (though I've written about it before).  It has a feeling--a comfort in imperfection, almost--that you don't understand without being there. The most thoughtful and accurate representation of the pleasantness of Cleveland's diverse and unusual landscape was a truly heartfelt piece written by Anthony Bourdain after the death of Harvey Pekar in 2010.  Bourdain's tribute to Pekar becomes an homage to the city that Pekar loved, a fitting ode to a man who, like the city, was beyond simple description.

Bourdain describes Cleveland:

A place so incongruously and uniquely…seductive that I often fantasize about making my home there. Though I’ve made television all over the world, often in faraway and “exotic” places, it’s the Cleveland episode that is my favorite–and one about which I am most proud.

Another great (and actually oddly accurate) portrayal of Cleveland was on 30 Rock.  Watch it.