The Happiest State in all of America

As I was driving home in the dreary spring rain this afternoon I began thinking about what the weather was like in other areas of the US. My stepmom, Lisa is in Florida right now and I know it's not raining there. And then I began to think about how in a little over a year from now Michael and I may be moving to another part of the US because of Michael's residency (we don't find out until March of next year, fyi). And then I became curious, what states in the US are the happiest?!

What do you think is the happiest state?
Well I decided to do some research

So I pulled the ol' Google move. I typed in "happiest states in the United States" and this little article came up, I mean, I realize it's not really possible to actually gauge an entire state's happiness but I found it kind of interesting. I would have assumed that all of the top states would be in warm, southern climates in the US, cause being warm makes me happy and I am basically miserable during the winter season unless it's a holiday, well that was wrong for the most part....well except for the number one state.

States that made the top ten part of the list include:Massachusetts, Utah, Connecticut, Colorado, South Dakota, Minnesota, Alaska, North Dakota, Wyoming...and drumroll please....the number one happiest, healthiest state is...surprise surprise...Hawaii! (very slim chance that we will be moving there). But I can understand why people are happy in Hawaii, especially when you see stuff like this everyday:


I loved having the chance to spend Thanksgiving on Maui in 2008. But Michael and were discussing the other day before this thought came into my mind that we wondered if people in the warm places didn't realize how good they have it all the time and just accept the warmth, sunshine, and vitamin D as the norm.

It's also is  sad to realize that NONE, I mean not one of the states Michael and I are interested in are in the top 20 that made this list...do we have poor choices of living locations or is this survey just wrong?
Also, Kentucky is a pretty good place to live, I'm happy here. And it's pretty and there are horses and bluegrass and bluegrass music and bourbon and Keeneland and so many other great things. But I guess there's also Appalachia and obesity and many other things working against Kentucky to keep us off of this list.

So what's your take on this ... are you surprised?
Do you think your state deserves to be on this list?
Defend your state or maybe convince me to change my mind about some of these states that I wouldn't automatically choose on my own.