Rotting From The Big Apple: 57 Signs You're Completely Over New York City

New York City is a truly special place: Where else can you see gorgeous skyscrapers with homeless people camped out underneath? Where else can you stuff your face with the best-tasting pizza and be denied a jumbo-sized Diet Coke?

When I first moved here many years ago, I, like most young NYC hopefuls, fell in love with the constant commotion and amazing culture.

But, as they say, all good things come to an end and soon the reasons I loved this city became the same ones that make me now want to leave it.

Sure, there's a lot this city has to offer, like quirky jobs and great food, but there's so much this city lacks, too, like a sense of community and trash cans in between buildings.

You know you're over NYC when it's no longer your escape. It's no longer the place you dream of going to when the rest of the world doesn't get you. Instead, it's become the place you need to escape.

Perhaps you came, saw, conquered and never want to return. Perhaps you just need a break, some time off. But that's the great thing about leaving the city that never sleeps: It'll always be up, waiting for you when you're ready to come back.

Here are the 57 signs you are over New York City:

1. Dog sh*t isn't the worst thing you can step into. There's also a 5th Avenue parade in Midtown at 6 pm on a Friday.

2. You fantasize about reclining in a lawn chair on your very own small square of grass. Also known as a "backyard."

3. The only people willing to be friendly to you are the crazy homeless people on the street. Comforting.

4. Public bathrooms aren't actually free to the public — unless you steal the entry code.

5. You've seen it all: Anti-semitic Elmo. Girls without pants. Billy Joel in concert. Underground burlesque shows. Drug-dealing naked cowboys. Medieval-drag bikini waxers who come to your apartment. Perhaps we're jaded... or maybe we're just looking for something a little less loud.

6. Bread costs $6. I repeat; bread -- the unofficial food of plebeians -- costs $6! Splurging on carbs is the great equalizer. We are all paupers here.

7. Walking The High Line or visiting the Met doesn't excite you like it used to. And no, it's not depression.

8. You're sick of paying the same amount for a glorified dorm room as you would for an entire house in Colorado. With a garage. That's been renovated. And is managed by a landlord who actually cares if you die there.

9. You're tired of having to fight human traffic and dodge endless swarms of people just to walk down the block to use the ATM.

10. You're over the every-man-for-himself mentality. Remember lower Manhattan when Hurricane Sandy hit? Yeah.

11. The idea of living in a fast-paced, busy city that never sleeps is no longer thrilling to you. You'll gladly take those eight hours at the office and call it a day -- especially after working straight-through for 20.

12. When you come back to NYC after a trip elsewhere, you don't think, "It's good to be home."

13. You have to worry about being assaulted by a guy with hit-on-me word vomit every time you leave your apartment.

14. If someone's not trying to stab you in the back, a cab is trying to run you over.

15. Because you could be doing the same thing with a better quality of life and less stress elsewhere.

16. You know you can make it here. You've made it here. The allure and challenge are gone.

17. You hate knowing that in the event of a really serious emergency, you're trapped on this island. Some call this paranoia. We call it preparation.

18. Because everyone feels proud of the fact that they are their own brand of assh*le.

19. People treat the sidewalk like a parking lot for their oversized bodies.

20. That melting garbage smell? That's called the "air."

21. When people's hair touches you on the subway. If you're not clean, there is no way that they are either.

22. It's $112 to ride the subway for a month. That's half of what rent costs in Kansas or, at least, a one-way trip to GTFO.

23. Because you want to get married someday.

24. Rats are f*cking everywhere with 18 kinds of diseases not even recognized yet by science.

25. The minute you walk outside, you feel like you need to shower. It doesn't matter how short your walk is, by the time you arrive; you will be uncontrollably sweating from the humidity just sitting on your perspired face.

26. Black ice is especially deadly on an NYC sidewalk that hasn't been salted since the pretzel stand left.

27. Men don't give up their seats to pregnant women on the subway here.

28. Effing tourists. For once, you'd like to live some place where people aren't taking pictures posing next to street signs.

29. At night, feeling about as safe as a used condom with a hole in it.

30. People communicate with each other by shoving, specifically on the subway.

31. You can live in a multi-million dollar apartment and still wake up to beggars across the street. Can't we just, like, enjoy the good life?

32. You're pissed every time you get side-swiped by a 10-pound leather Hermès bag on Park Avenue.

33. No one is ever happy to see anyone, yet you're in the most populated city in America.

34. You always run into your ex-boyfriends when you look like cat piss.

35. We're famous for always dressing in black, like living here every day is a continuous funeral.

36. The amount of people cursing you is greater than the amount of people smiling at you on a daily basis.

37. You want to move to an actual jungle, not a concrete one.

38. Knowing that people have great weather year-round, are less stressed and can actually take the time to enjoy their $7 coffees in other cities (San Fran, we're looking at you) is starting to really get to you.

39. Living in an apartment that actually receives natural light sounds way more appealing to you.

40. You're tired of hearing that you live in the Greatest City in the World and not really feeling that way.

41. Peanut butter costs $14 at bodegas, but the thought of waiting in the Trader Joe's line is way worse.

42. The neighborhood character and charm you once lived for has become replaced by Whole Foods and Forever21 stores.

43. Remember when Soho was still an artist community and not a breeding ground for cupcake stands?

44. Winter lasts an extra two months because that's how long it takes to clean up all the dirty mounds of snow from the sidewalk.

45. You're sick of people-watching people watching their dogs take sh*ts on the street.

46. The buzzing sound is always present.

47. There's no such thing as absolute silence, unless you include the steady tunes of construction in your definition.

48. Adjectives used to describe NYC: gritty, tough, boisterous. Adjectives used to describe Florida: sunny, relaxing, balmy. Hmmm...

49. The caste system is always in your face.

50. You want to be able to trust your mailman.

51. You wonder what it's like to live in a world in which the men actually step aside for women, instead of just charging right into them.

52. Fifteen dollars gets you a pitcher, but here it only gets you a drink.

53. Old men in other places are sweet and homely. Old men here are creepy and want to purchase you like a Russian mail-order bride.

54. By the time you actually get off work to make it to Happy Hour, it's a Happy Five Minutes.

55. Because every time you walk out of your apartment you immediately see someone you hate.

56. Every bar looks the same come 1 am.

57. Three words: bridge and tunnel.

Photo Courtesy: We Heart It