Sunday I drove like 10.5 hours by myself! Definitely the longest solo roadtrip I’ve ever done–well, obviously Trixie was there so I wasn’t entirely alone. Like other roadtrips in our past, we fought constantly for control of the stereo (she only wanted ABBA, because of course). However, we managed to agree that the audiobook I’d picked out was completely fab. Finally:
Florida!!!
I actually meant to take selfies at each state Welcome Center sign, but this didn’t work out because:
South Carolina: raining
Georgia: no sign???
Florida: pack of ravenous mockingbirds made the parking lot too dangerous to remain stationary for long
Florida gets a bad rap from everyone, of course, as like some crazy lawless place, and I can’t deny that a bunch of weird shit goes down here. But it’s because Florida is basically the US version of Australia. In no other state does nature want to kill you quite so much. You’ve got your weirdass weather: hurricanes, daily torrential storms in the summer, lightning capital of the world some years, freak hail, waterspouts etc. And you’ve got your ridiculous wildlife: snakes, freaking gigantic spiders, alligators, birds that literally have no fear, stingrays, jellyfish, and maybe killer bees.
Last time I visited there was this news story about a guy stopped by the cops for running a stop sign, who leapt out of his car and ran into the wilderness, where he promptly fell into a mangrove and was mauled by an alligator. That kind of thing can’t happen anywhere else, because nowhere else are you living right on top of a swamp that wants its land back.
On the other hand, the welcome center was full of slightly tipsy old people, so some stereotypes are true.