We're worried about the economy like everyone else, but at least we're not miserable.

By miserable, I mean we're not Detroit, New York, Los Angeles, Flint, Mich., Stockton, Calif., or Charlotte, N.C., all deemed "miserable" by Forbes Magazine which crunched some numbers and worked its editorial magic to produce a Misery Score for numerous major metro areas.

Seattle and Puget Sound are nowhere to be found on the list, at least not as far as I looked (hey, I can only take so much misery). If you made the list then you had an unfortunate cocktail of bad things: high income tax rates, long commute times, lots of superfund sites, high unemployment, high violent crime and, even, poor weather. (OK, I don't know about you, but I'm a tad miserable about our weather)

It is somewhat comforting to know that, given the gloomy national economic picture, we're not a "miserable" region. Certainly, hard-charging companies like Boeing and Microsoft help, a more stable real estate market doesn't hurt and we've got plenty of other emerging industries.

Of course, I can't help but think of one or two things that could trip us up into Miseryville. Traffic congestion. I know I harp on it, but I'm going to keep harping on it: It's a big deal (for Microsoft, it's tied with education as the software giant's top concern) since Los Angeles, which is often a harbinger of things to come for other West Coast cities and which has largely failed to solve its traffic problems, is a misery city. If we're not careful, we'll be headed the way of L.A.

Education. I recently talked to a commercial real estate broker who, while extolling the virtues of our job growth, office construction and general economic invincibility, mentioned education as one potential problem. The broker told me our intellectual capital, as measured by the quality of our high schools and universities and community colleges, isn't as great as, say, San Francisco's. Our region depends on science and engineering brainpower; that brainpower is what makes our pools of labor attractive to companies. It makes sense to deepen those pools.

Of course, these are long-term problems. They're not as immediate as some problems, including rising mortgage defaults, tightening credit markets and shrinking consumer spending. But long-term problems become immediate ones when you neglect them. And misery loves company.