Oh, if the tourists and tourists to be would only know all the crap that goes on in Orlando they’d go to California for a bit of calm. When I lived in PA we’d have a saying that all the schisters live in FL and the farther south in FL the more schisters. Then I moved to FL. Like all places there are some really great people in FL and some (many) not so nice people, just more of them than in most places. I’m glad I left FL.
Much of it is also an architectural abomination—strip malls and strip malls and roads on a grid. Some spots have some personality—Key West, Sarasota, St. Augustine, and even Tallahassee—but its concrete commercialism everywhere else on the coasts.
I’ll confess to a perverse wish that the mail bomber had been found to be a member of the administration.
As for Florida, yes, it does seem to have a bad case of the crazies, and I don’t know why that is. (Everything Carl Hiaasen writes to satirize the place seems to be essentially true.) As an occasional visitor to the state–not Orlando, but the gulf coasts, the park at Flamingo, the keys, even North Beach in Miami–I’ve had a grand time. Maybe the trick is to find a place that seems to have remained somewhat “real,” settle there, and try your damndest to keep it that way.
Also a born and raised New Englander, the Navy saw fit to drop me in the great state of Florida for my first duty station. That was a long time ago and the only denizens of the state were the crazy drivers from everywhere else. Now my children live there as adults and I worry about them pretty much all of the time.
Loved your diatribe and can compare it to the above mentioned author who also can see the satire in the things around him.
Thank you. North Florida is less frenetic, but that’s because it’s really Georgia. Entirely different issues. Some argue Florida should be two states. What part of New England are you from and where are your kids?
Born in Boston, raised in NH. I miss it, especially now when the foliage turns vivid, the air is crisp and the smells of burning leaves and wood fill the atmosphere. Then we would be buried to our eyebrows in that white stuff until April.
Kids are in Central Florida now where the temps are perpetually in the 90s.
The Untimely Typewriter:Daily Writings Against the Tides of Distraction 
Oh, if the tourists and tourists to be would only know all the crap that goes on in Orlando they’d go to California for a bit of calm. When I lived in PA we’d have a saying that all the schisters live in FL and the farther south in FL the more schisters. Then I moved to FL. Like all places there are some really great people in FL and some (many) not so nice people, just more of them than in most places. I’m glad I left FL.
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Much of it is also an architectural abomination—strip malls and strip malls and roads on a grid. Some spots have some personality—Key West, Sarasota, St. Augustine, and even Tallahassee—but its concrete commercialism everywhere else on the coasts.
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I’ll confess to a perverse wish that the mail bomber had been found to be a member of the administration.
As for Florida, yes, it does seem to have a bad case of the crazies, and I don’t know why that is. (Everything Carl Hiaasen writes to satirize the place seems to be essentially true.) As an occasional visitor to the state–not Orlando, but the gulf coasts, the park at Flamingo, the keys, even North Beach in Miami–I’ve had a grand time. Maybe the trick is to find a place that seems to have remained somewhat “real,” settle there, and try your damndest to keep it that way.
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Also a born and raised New Englander, the Navy saw fit to drop me in the great state of Florida for my first duty station. That was a long time ago and the only denizens of the state were the crazy drivers from everywhere else. Now my children live there as adults and I worry about them pretty much all of the time.
Loved your diatribe and can compare it to the above mentioned author who also can see the satire in the things around him.
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Thank you. North Florida is less frenetic, but that’s because it’s really Georgia. Entirely different issues. Some argue Florida should be two states. What part of New England are you from and where are your kids?
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Born in Boston, raised in NH. I miss it, especially now when the foliage turns vivid, the air is crisp and the smells of burning leaves and wood fill the atmosphere. Then we would be buried to our eyebrows in that white stuff until April.
Kids are in Central Florida now where the temps are perpetually in the 90s.
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Disney World: the original meaning for “drain the swamp.”
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And to hunker down in a bunker of typewriters.
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