TTT - The Other Side of the Coin

Last week, I listed what I like about our little corner of the world. This week, it is the other side of the coin. Fair and balanced, right?

Ten Things That Bug Me About Our Little Corner of the World –

1. Drivers -

The drivers here really leave us shaking our heads. They drive like they are trying to set land speed records at Bonneville Salt Flats – interstates, highways, surface streets all are race tracks for them. Then there are the slow drivers who plod along in the LEFT lane and won’t move over come hell or high water. Mommies and Daddies speed along, yakking on cell phones, and either yelling at or ignoring the seething mass of unrestrained children careening around in their over-sized SUVs. Mommy and Daddy don’t bother with seat belts either – infringes on their personal rights. The local media are filled with sob stories about people thrown from their vehicles during accidents and killed or severely injured – a fund has been established at a nearby bank for donations to the family. Not from me. PUT ON THE DAMN BELT!

2. Children –They have lots of kids per family – it seems to be a requirement here. But do they have to take them EVERYWHERE? Children do not belong in the bar areas of restaurants (more on that in #3). Nor should they attend evening adult-type concerts or R movies – I don’t care if they are with their parents. All too often, their loving parents are too busy visiting with each other and friends to exert any control over them. Heaven help us if the mob from one family joins forces with other roving mobs. Aren’t they all “just darling” and “too cute”?

3. Liquor Laws –

The laws regarding the purchase and/or consumption of alcoholic beverages in this state are too insane to be believed. Should children happen to spy a drink being mixed and poured at the bar of a restaurant (see #2), they could be warped for life. So, restaurants are required to erect an expensive visual barrier around the mixing/pouring operations to prevent this from happening. Bottles of liquor and wine can ONLY be purchased at state owned stores – which charge 3 times the market price and add on punitive taxes to boot (but it “helps fund schools”). Some changes have just been recently enacted by the legislature, but I’m not sure if they are an improvement or not. There’s more, but I still don’t understand all the liquor laws; and I’m sure the esteemed legislators have no clue either.

4. Huge houses –

This is truly the land of McMansions (to shelter all those children). Enormous houses on small lots, frequently under furnished. And recently, over-leveraged and risking foreclosure, if not already there. The heating and cooling bills on our modest abode are bad enough; what must they run for those behemoths?

5. Wind –

It blows – not 24/7, but close enough. And when the wind is strong enough in the Village to carry away small animals, it often is dead calm in the BigTown. Something about how our Village sits in its valley funnels gale-force winds through our environs. I swear the snow grains we saw last week actually had made the 300 mile trip down from the BigTempleCity to the north.

6. Phone books –

Way too many yellow page books appear on our front porch. And not one of them has a complete listing on any service or type of store or is arranged in any discernible order. The best use I have found for them so far is as a booster seat for Pi.

7. Lack of public information –

Information about upcoming events is hard to come by. Forget seeing advance notice of events in the local rag. The assumption appears to be that everyone already knows about such things. Even stores frequently don’t include their address or location in their ads – the most they say might be “on the Boulevard” or some similar non-informative phrase. I guess if you need to know about something, you already know; and if you don’t need to know, you aren’t going to know.

8. Recycling –

For the most part, it doesn’t happen here. Many people are not just indifferent to the concept, they are vocally and aggressively hostile to it. Those of us who have lived in other states accept and embrace recycling – including curbside pickup and other forms of reusing our trash and saving landfill space. People here just come unglued at the suggestion of such things and accuse supporters of trying to “make money off us.” Strange.

9. Lack of good produce –

We lived in Southern California for so many years that we took the availability and affordability of good produce as a given. Not so here. It is expensive and bad. Costco has the best produce around, but GolfGuy and I have trouble getting through crates of oranges and 5 lb. bags of salad, etc.

10. “Oh my heck!” –

This commonly used euphemism for an expletive just GRATES on me. I have even heard news anchors in the BigTempleCity use it on air. The constant use of “darling” and “cute” to describe anything and everything bugs me greatly. I am 66 years old – I am NOT cute or darling – and I don’t like to be referred to in those terms.

Family, blue skies and red rocks and other things (see last week’s TTT posting) compensate for these minor grievances. So no more grousing – at least for now.