I grew up in New York City. When I started working I moved into Manhattan. I knew the city wasn't for me, but I never lived anywhere else. The crowds, the competitiveness, the commuting, the noise, and everyone trying to rip you off was making me become a person I didn't like.

So early one morning I realized I had no dress shirts to wear, so I threw on sweats and went downstairs to the dry cleaners to pickup my shirts. The guys hands me my shirts and says something like $45. So I had explicitly asked for the price per shirt beforehand and they told me a very different price. So I explained to the guy what I was told it would cost by someone else who worked there. He got annoyed and demanded $45. I offered again to pay him the amount I was told and he shouted "NO $45".

So I then said dude I don't have $45 and that isn't what you told me and I started walking out of the store with my shirts. The guy starts shouting "YOU CANNOT LEAVE WITH THOSE SHIRTS". I said dude I have to get to work and I offered to pay you the amount you said.

As I get onto Broadway the guy comes charging out of his store and tackles me into the street. We are rolling around on Broadway in puddles with me holding my shirts in the air to not dirty them. The guy is trying to strangle me with one hand and we are rolling around and ended up at a standstill laying down on the street with a crowd now watching.

With this guy laying on top, it just dawned on me "what the fuck is happening to me, I have to leave New York". All the time the guy was now trying to rip the buttons off one of my shirts.

Not exaggerating within 7 days of the incident I had quit my job downtown, and decided to try and start a company with my old boss who lived in Bethesda, Maryland. Broke my lease, rented a uHaul and moved to the DC Area. This was 1995. Since then I have lived in Maryland, Virginia, San Francisco and Seattle and have loved the shit out of all those places.