Anachostic

Just returned from a trip to the homeland – PA.  I just spent about a half hour researching when I was there last.  According to credit card purchases, it was July, 2011.  That’s a pretty long while, I guess.  But there’s a good reason for it.  There’s nothing good there.  To quickly summarize this trip:

• There’s far fewer people there.  It shouldn’t be surprising, but the magnitude of it is.
• There’s far fewer young people there.  Old people work everywhere.  I thought FL had a lot of old people.
• The hills and clouds make everything dark.  It’s depressing.  Even the stores are so poorly lit they always look closed.  The good thing is that it’s so depressing, and the bar for happiness is set so low, you can feel good about the most meaningless thing.
• There’s so much nothing that it’s 30 minutes to do anything or go anywhere.  That’s probably why I have no issue driving 30k miles a year, but it was annoying to drive so far for so little all the time.
• People are friendlier there and kids can wander the streets without requiring adults hovering right beside them.  Small town advantage.
• Another small town advantage is everything is within a couple square blocks.  Everything.  The disadvantage is that “everything” is a very small selection.  If you’re happy with fewer choices, great.  if you want more, tack on an extra 30 mins of driving, at least.

But, I have content for more posts.  Plenty to bitch about.  I’m set for another five years, for sure.