I have been savagely misled. Visited Cocoa Beach; it is ordinary sand! Doesn’t faintly resemble cocoa and makes a lousy hot beverage. Have not been so disappointed since visiting the Gold Coast. Geographers are a dishonest lot.
Otherwise, in all fairness, I must report that Florida is an awful place. It’s no wonder that the inhabitants thereof are so surly; I would be, too, if I were condemned to a life there. Did you know that it is possible to drive for 15, maybe 20 miles, down a road and see nothing but strip malls? I had no idea a place needed so many fast food chains, tattoo parlors, and knick-knack shops. There seems to be no end of Floridian appetites for such merchantilism. As an urban designer, I have to admit that it leaves me…depressed.
On the other hand, Florida has achieved an epic level of discourtesy and rudeness. I’m not talking about the customary insolence of what passes for wait staff in these parts. I hope you have never had to endure what I about to describe; the more sensitive may wish to resume watching cat videos. Entities, masquerading as people, pull into a gas station, occupy a pump, wander about the grounds, complete their Christmas shopping at the truck stop store, feast on government approved food products from the roller apparatus, take a nap, squabble with their spouse, all with complete indifference to the queue of people waiting to fill their tanks. An extraordinary display of callous disregard for others. As you might imagine, I’ve patronized many gas stations on my journey; these folk live exclusively in Florida.
I’m happy to report there is one redeeming quality to this (thankfully) vanishing part of America: song birds. The place is full of them, singing the songs of their people all day long. Bright red cardinals, pretty bluebirds flashing their colors, drab little brown birds…all of them singing their hearts out. Delightful.
Oh my! What a picture you paint! 😱
I will imagine the lovely bird songs and avoid the rest.
You needn’t go all the way to Florida for song birds. They actually have plenty of them here in Boston. Even in winter. Now gators, that’s another matter. Another of the surly Florida residents.
The strip maul joke in Orlando goes something like: “4 miles, repeat. 4 miles repeat. 4 miles repeat.”
Delighted to know that you are having such an enjoyable and enriching time on your Florida sojourn!
I spent my gap year working as a Playboy bunny in Miami, living in a hutch on Biscayne Bay. The most impressive sight was finding what I thought was a cigarette butt in a book, The Story of O. It was a roach, put there as a book mark. The second was a hutch mate coming home in the morning after a night out with a handbag full of $100 dollar bills.