It’s True, I Want to Leave Florida

Hey Kids,

It is true.  I want to leave Florida.  This is not something I have determined lightly.  Most certainly not.  I have spent many a day considering this.  There are so many reasons why and today I will name a few of the main ones.

Now I know what you are saying and/or thinking.  You’re thinking that I love Florida and how can I survive being away from my second home, Walt Disney World.  I was born in Florida.  I have lived in Florida for most of my life.  Oh sure I spent a few years in Texas and a few more in Illinois, but Florida has been my home for the vast majority of my days.  And for the record I have no plans to leave any time soon, but I relish the day that I take off for someplace else.  I do realize that there is no perfect place to live.  However I feel that I have lived in Florida as long as I have needed to live and there is a new place just waiting for me.  Will I be happy there?  Sure.  Will I have troubles there?  Of course, but the pros outweigh the cons as far as I am concerned.  Why do I want to leave?  Let me count the ways.

The heat!  My god the heat!  It’s so damn hot.  The older I get the hotter it gets (again, thank you climate change) and my tolerance to the heat has gone way down. In fact I find the heat and humidity completely intolerable.  This is the main reason I want to escape.  I find it difficult to even walk outside for most of the year.  Thus it is difficult to enjoy myself.  Yes I do like going swimming to cool off, but even then the pool is sometimes close to boiling so it is really not that refreshing.  I keep saying that I will enjoy the beach more, but the fact of the matter is I hate getting sand all over myself and I am just way too lazy to get up and go there.  As I sit here I have the a/c blasting and a fan running to keep me cool.  If I go outside I will be a massive ball of sweat in seconds.  Not minutes, seconds.  As much as I love Walt Disney World the heat makes it so much less enjoyable for me.  When I was at Disneyland and there was no humidity and the temperature was in the 70’s I could spend the whole day there.  I had taken Adam to Universal Studios Orlando shortly before I left and we were there about four hours before I was ready to pass out. I want to get away from the damn heat.

So many damn people, especially the wretched “know-it-alls”.  The amount of humanity here is astounding.  And I realize that wherever I go there will also be a lot of humans. I’m okay with that, but Florida seems to bring out the worst in people.  Those that move here from out of state are generally obnoxious.  I do not know how many times I have heard some idiot tell me “that’s not the way we did it up north”.  Well then go back up north bozo.  Or when someone says something like “Everything is so much better in Ohio”.  Well go back to freaking Ohio if it was so damned great.  Get the hell out of here!

Hurricanes.  I hate hurricanes, but even more so I hate the way people react when they know one is on the way.  As I have mentioned before they go bonkers and start buying water, filling their cars up with gas and generally become annoying.  You see these people waiting in the rain outside of Publix just to get some damned bottled water.  As if they do not have indoor plumbing at home.  Then you see a hundred people at one gas station while one just down the street has plenty of gas and no line.  Pure stupidity.  Hurricanes do not scare me per se, but I hate being without electricity.  I really feel for the people of Puerto Rico and that shithead in chief that will not do a damn thing for them other than throw paper towels.

And speaking of the grand shithead, there are far too many conservative people here for my taste.  Not that I need everyone to think like I do (although that would be great) but to see so many fucking morons support that mentally ill asshole is just too disgusting for me to handle.  I’m a liberal and damn proud of it.  (On a side note to my Christian friends please remember that Jesus was a liberal, socialist Jew with a fondness for carpentry and not a conservative by any stretch of the imagination) When I was in California I saw same sex couples everywhere just being themselves.  I saw them at Disneyland, I saw them at Venice Beach, I saw them at the Santa Monica Pier and I saw same sex couples at the Farmer’s Market.  It was a beautiful thing to see.  People just being who they are without fear of some asshole shooting them, yelling at them or throwing shit at them.  I want to live where people are not yelled at for being “different”.  That goes for me too as I often get ridiculed for being a liberal and compassionate person.  So yeah, going someplace more liberal would be fantastic.

I suppose it goes along with the above reason, but I am damn sick and tired of driving around and seeing morons with a stupid Confederate flag flying from their car.  Why not just have a flag that says “Look at me I’m a Racist”.  Oh wait, that’s exactly what they are saying.

I could go on but you get the point: not Africa hot, no assholes from Ohio that think they are better than me (I don’t mean to pick on Ohio.  Ohio is actually a lovely state with some amazing cities and small towns.  The people that live there are very nice.  I met some lovely people in Cleveland, Cincinnati and Columbus.  The retirees I have met in Florida are friendly.  The non-retired people that leave for Florida are mostly assholes) less conservatives, more liberals, no Confederate flags and no freaking hurricanes.  But first and foremost it’s the heat.  So damn hot!

So where do I want to go?  Well to be perfectly honest I would be extremely happy to say goodbye to the USA for good and move to Canada.  I love Canada.  I like the idea of healthcare for everybody and I also like the idea of being to go someplace without the fear of being shot by some idiot with a dozen guns.  In addition I appreciate the fact that they have not allowed right wing extremists to take over their country.  No Drumpf and no Pence is a great way to live.  Plus it is a gorgeous country and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is an awesome leader.  Leadership is something this country has lacked since January 20th.  Sure they have assholes; they cannot be avoided.  However there are a hell of a lot less of them.  I realize that Canada is very cold and moving there is just a pipe dream, but it is the top of my list.  It’s not going to happen though because Donna does not want to go to Canada.  She prefers we stay here and resist.

So where in this country would I like to go?  Well I love the Pacific Northwest.  Washington and Oregon are two of my favorite places to visit and I know I would love living there.  California would be nice as well, but it is so crowded in SoCal that I probably would go nuts with the traffic.  It rains a lot in the Pacific Northwest and I love rain.  I thoroughly enjoy the rainy days.  If you think about it, the fact that all the rain in the winter makes it all the more beautiful in the summer is a huge plus.  I love mountains and I love the beauty of nature.  But I really love that the temperatures are lower than Florida.  Yes, I know a lot of people are moving to Oregon and it’s the in place, but I still want to go.  It’s not going to become another SoCal.

So be looking for me to head west in about four or five years.  I can’t wait.

Namaste