Wednesday, September 15, 2010

Trapped in Paradise

Florida is an interesting state because it's so darned LONG. When we lived in Illinois, we could easily get to places like Wisconsin, Michigan, Indiana, Ohio, Kentucky and Iowa. We sometimes even ventured down to Tennessee. We loved to do weekend trips to places like Wisconsin Dells, Kings Island, Cedar Point, the Smoky Mountains, Indiana Beach, Mall of America and Lake Michigan (in Indiana or Michigan, not downtown Chicago).

In Florida, there is no such thing as a simple weekend trip in another state unless you want to drive and drive and drive. After all, as Homer Simpson would say, it's a America's wang, and a darned long one at that. Sure, we could go to Georgia, but that's a state I prefer to see again any time soon after driving through an ice storm there when we moved to Celebration. Other than that, we're pretty much surrounded by water.

Oh, well, I can't complain too much. After all, I live in the heart of Theme Park Country, and if I get tired of Orlando's offerings, I can easily drive to Busch Gardens in Tampa. There are beaches on both coasts, although I prefer the Gulf side because the other side always seems to have some nasty hazard like bird bacteria or rip tides of man-o-wars. We're definitely not at a deficit of leisure things to do. Sometimes I miss all our old road trips, but then I remind myself that people in those states all shiver their butts off while I stare at palm trees in the winter time. I miss Magnum at Cedar Point, but I'll trade it for SheiKra at Busch Gardens, as long as that's accompanied by warm temperatures year 'round, any day.

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