It's got about a million people in some 500 square miles. Its landscape ranges from densely urban to wooded and rural. Traffic is notably bad. Parking can be either ample and free or virtually non-existent and outrageously expensive.

It has the skinniest people in Maryland and the most highly educated, with the highest percentage of residents over 25 with post-graduate degrees in the country.

Bethesda and Silver Spring have urban cores that rival those of major American cities, yet they aren't especially well-known outside Maryland.

For example, when actor Richard Belzer visited hip Bethesda Row recently, the "Law & Order: Special Victims Unit" star appeared unimpressed.

“Here we are in Bethesda, Maryland,” Belzer said, according to the Washington Post's Reliable Source column. “What is Bethesda known for, beyond the hospital? Is that it?”

But Montgomery County has stars of its own in other realms, including government, politics, business, journalism and literature, due in part, at least, to its close proximity to Washington, D.C.

The First Family is sometimes seen at area restaurants and the county has a veritable army of Pulitzer-prize winners.

Most residents live in unincorporated areas, with Rockville, Germantown and Gaithersburg also large population centers.

Data from the 2011 American Community Survey showed that Montgomery County checked in as the 10th wealthiest county in the United States, with a median household income of $93,373.

It's also said to be the epicenter for biotechnology in the Mid-Atlantic region. And, it's home to government agencies, world class medical research centers, communications companies and institutes of higher learning.

The county is said to be aging and having trouble keeping its young people. The way the blog just up the pike put it, Baby Boomers arrived and "found life so good here that they never left."

But if you live here, you probably know all that.

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