Southern California

Much more than simply the southern half of California. Southern California is the idea of a place which is noted for its smog, rampant urban sprawl, and a news media more concerned with police chases and celebrity weddings than things that matter. It is defined, of course, by Los Angeles.

Northern Californians have been know to refer to it as the evil empire while muttering things about water.

(Of course, these might just be the rantings of someone who is convinced the place was killing him.)

Follow-up to The Other Dan's "muttering about water." This is probably more of a Central California annoyance than anyone else's. In the early parts of the 20th Century, William Mulholland along with others, diverted many rivers in California and the vicinity. Of special note is the Owens Lake...um...what's left of it anyway. The Los Angeles Aqueduct was completed in 1913 and used the Owens River as its source. However, this caused the already naturally shrinking Owens Lake to shrink even faster. Today, it's pretty much nothing more than a lake bed with hazardous dust storms as the result of the rapid depeletion of it's only source of water. Although there are some interesting bacterial growth that causes the remaining water to turn red.