Despite wave after frantic wave of snowbirds, Florida remains, at its heart, a southern institution. If you think not, consider a locally bottled beer that says it is "like a California pale ale, except made in America." I wish I'd thought of that line.
You can tell how far south you are by the local expression for "you" (plural). If you live in the North, you say "you," and southerners are folks who say "you all." If you all say "you all," southerners are folks who say "y'all." And if y'all say "y'all," southerners are folks who say "all y'all." Real native Floridians are few, but they all say "all y'all." If all y'all are real native Floridians, however, southerners are those who say "all y'all" while barefoot.
Motorcyclists who get old and retreat to Florida promptly buy 3-wheel bikes. Old farts on tricycles are more common down here than old farts in new Corvettes, although not by much. I saw a Harley-Davidson the other day that looked like a 3-wheeler. Well, it happens, embarrassingly enough, that Harley does make such a bastard machine. But this guy had modified his 2-wheeler by adding a pair of outrigger wheels. Yup, training wheels on an H-D. I was embarrassed for him.
Speaking of embarrassed, I've always wanted to crawl into a hole when members of my supposed profession trumpet how great they are. One of the far-too-many such legal clowns down here - we'll call him "Peter Ticktin ," because that's his name - calls his website "LegalBrains.com." You could look it up.
Hereabouts, there is a hybrid retail industry that combines the ubiquitous gun shop with the ubiquitous pawn shop. I'm trying to think of something to say about this that won't piss off the wrong people. That probably wasn't it.
Newt
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Hey Newt,
ReplyDeleteI just found out I have a brother living near Orlando (see my latest blog post). Anyway, I asked him if he was a snow bird, this was his reply:
Snowbirds come for the winter and then return home when it warms up up north. We have two bumper stickers down here. One says, "Thanks for visiting. Now go home!" The other is, "If it's tourist season, why can't we shoot them?!" (we have those bumper stickers here in CA too).
I will be speaking to him for the very first time this Sunday, I'll let you know which ya'll he uses (he's originally from Chicago).
Thanks for explaining the difference :D
I suspect that your brother, ----, will be delighted with his new sister. Congratulations.
ReplyDeleteNever shoot a snowbird till he's spent all his money.
N