The word is “egregious”, or “extraordinarily bad." 

I was trying to post a tweet this morning and, as usual, I rather quickly eclipsed the 140-character limit, hence I’m writing this here. Had I been able to post it, it would have looked something like this: 

"I need to live somewhere in the middle of nowhere, maybe the Midwest. What I hate most about NJ is the egregiously high costs of living." 

I lived in the Midwest for two years - it wasn’t

terrible

 but it certainly was different. The pace of things is a lot slower, people seem to be more mellow and they just do what they do. I’ve always noticed an "angst” with many East Coasters, a certain “gotta get there, gotta do this, gotta go” anxiousness that doesn’t seem to exist as you move farther away from this area. When I lived out there, people told me they could see it in my behaviors and actions, they could tell I “wasn’t from around there." 

I think I know why those Mid-Western farmer folk are so pleasant: they don’t have to pay an arm and a leg, and the other leg, a kidney, half their brain, a nostril, and an eyeball for a roof over their heads. They get to keep their limbs, and even use them from time to time (I wonder what that’s like.) Maybe I need to pick up another 4 jobs and work 500 hours each week to be comfortable…. looks like that may be the secret to the truth of a reality I was hoping wasn’t actually a reality.

Oh, and one more question… why do most employers pay their workers every two weeks instead of every week? I’ve never understood that.

Okay, I’m done now. Rant over.