Rants and Raves

Central PA has had a few days of 85 to 90 degree temps this past week or so. Yesterday three or four people mentioned the heat and humidity and asked if it doesn't remind me of South Florida. Actually, it doesn't feel that bad. In West Palm, it was unbearable by 9AM and stayed that way until after dark. Here, even in mid afternoon, it's hot but not unbearable like Fla.
I guess hot (and cold) is in the eye of the beholder.

Summertime in Hershey is tourist season. Since my business is in Hershey and is not tourist related, I put up with the lost drivers, the wandering children and the rudeness that accompanies hoards of people trying to get to a theme park. The interesting thing is that many of the local businesses do nothing to attract the tourist dollar even though they could financially benefit. They cater to their year round business from the locals and if they get some additional tourist business, they won't complain.
One friend owns a pizza and sub shop. He closes every Sunday to give his employees and himself a day off. He could care less about the Sunday tourists. He knows that his business in the Winter is what sustains him, not the 3 or so months per year that the park is jumping. There is another nearby restaurant that is open from 4 to 9PM only and closed on Sunday. They could probably do a big business on Sunday, but don't see the need.
Maybe I've been around too long, but I long for the old system where everything was closed one day per week (usually Sunday). In some of the smaller towns, most local business used to close at 1PM on Wednesday and Saturday, be open after 5PM only on Friday and always close Sunday. Times have changed but I guess I haven't.

I haven't posted in over a year, maybe I mellowed. Actually, I moved back to my 2nd hometown, opened a new business and have been just working away trying to make do.
I have found that some of the political and people events here are just a crazy as they were in Florida, and I've only been away for 12 years. Anyway, working my way to Social Security, I can promise more frequent updates.

On March 29, the Palm Beach County commissioners decided they would change the hours that liquor can be sold on Sundays from starting at Noon to starting at 7AM. Since liquor sales in the county must end at 5AM, that only leaves a 2 hour window for drunks to attend AA meetings, sleep it off or sober up. This change was started because the airport authority wants to open it's bars at 7AM on Sunday like every other day.
Since the municipalities generally make liquor sales stop at 2AM, this gives the impaired driver a reason to leave Delray or Boca or Lake Worth at 2 and drive drunk to a bar in the county that's open until 5. Then at 5AM when they're really lit up, they drive to wherever.

I guess I better be sure to drive cautiously on Sunday mornings

There's been a lot published recently about the possibility of a housing bubble that will burst and leave people with negative equity in their homes. Can it happen? Has it happened before? The answer is yes and yes. Japan has had a slow housing market for the past seven or eight years so any economy is susceptible.

The economics department of National City Corporation, a large financial institution, did a study to try to identify in the 99 largest US markets where single family home valuations are at a premium or a discount. And good old Palm Beach County per the study is 26% overvalued per the benchmarks used. All of the markets that were more overvalued were in California. Also highly overvalued in Florida were the Miami Ft Lauderdale and Sarasota markets. Big markets like Orlando, Tampa and Jacksonville were basically neutral. The most undervalued, Memphis and Salt Lake City.
You can read the entire study at http://www.nationalcity.com/economics

The most recent edition of the South Florida Business Journal had a study conducted by their parent company, American City Business Journals. Using a combination of poverty levels, unemployment and "poorly educated" residents, it attempted to measure socio-economic stress on a city by city basis.

High on the list of "Most stress" were the Palm Beach County cities of West Palm Beach, Riviera Beach, Belle Glade and Lake Worth. On the least stress city list were Boca Raton, Palm Beach and North Palm Beach. The most stressed large US city, Hartford Ct., middle sized city was Camden NJ and small city was Gladeview FL., a Miami suburb. Of small cities, the four most stressed were in Dade County and Palm Beach County Florida.

Where to live with little socioeconomic stress, Naperville IL, Maple Grove MN or Fort Hunt VA.

An article in the AARP Bulletin for February 2005 detailed the Ten most dangerous cities, for pedestrians. Is it any wonder that 6 of the 10 most dangerous are in Florida. And of course, our lovely peaceful West Palm Beach was included. Study was conducted by the Transportation Policy Project and released in December 2004.

There's been a couple of views in recent years on retesting of drivers over a certain age (generally age 80). Some view it as a must, since motor skills, vision and reaction times tend to wane at a certain point in life. Others, notable AARP and elder advocacy groups think it is a right and it's up to the individual and their family to make that decision.

Guess what, they've never had to drive in South Florida. We've got tons of over 80 (and over 90) residents who still drive (both day and night) and really create a menace on the road. How can you tell? Well, they're driving below the speed limit in the center or left lane. At a traffic light, they stop 40 or 50 feet behind the car ahead. When they have to turn, they are hesitant and appear confused about where the lane goes from the turn.

There was a case this week of a local man (well over 80) who failed to pick his wife up after a medical appointment. The first article in the paper quoted "sometimes he gets confused with directions". Well they found him, almost 300 miles away in Georgia. Bad directions? I don't think so. Just someone who shouldn't be on the road.

Riding around in Palm Beach County, which is required by my job, I see incidents every day which could have been fatal, but weren't because someone was paying attention. I've seen these seniors turn up the wrong side of a divided highway, just stop in a travel lane full of traffic becasue they suddenly realized they had to turn right or left, or in one case last Thursday, drive out of a gas station, over the curbing of the street directly into 3 lanes of westbound traffic.

As someone over 60, I hope when my turn comes, someone takes my car keys and says,"Hey Fred, take the bus>"

Have you ever tried to drive north to south in this county. Today, there is some kind of construction or lane reduction on every through north south road in the county, except Congress Avenue, and that has half a zillion lights. Interstate 95 will have construction into the next millenium. The turnpike is being widened in stages from the Delray exit to Jupiter for the next 8 or 10 years. US444- Rte 7 , Jog Road, Haverhill Road and Military all have reduced lanes soemwhere in the area of Southern Blvd. Go into the city (WPB) and try to go through downtown, good luck. It's been dug up somewhere since the 70's. The people in Palm Beach proper have the right idea. They do all their projects in the Summer when the powerful and deal makers are in Maine or Wyoming. When they come back for the Winter, all road construction is done

If you have a comment, questions or difference of opinion, let me know