South Beach Sucks

And not because I'm not thin, rich and good looking.  I don't really care about any of that shit at this point in my life.  After having five surgeries since 2008 and it appears, surviving cancer?  I'm just happy to be here no matter what I look like.

And it isn't because my choice of automobile wouldn't stand up.  About every sixth or eighth car is a Camaro or an Audi of some kind (but I do have say, the, "Lambo", Ferrari, Porsche demographic is REALLY big here).

It's because there is NO PLACE TO PARK!  Say what you will about the boring life we have in the Suburbs of Murray, Utah.  But when I need to pick up a prescription, get a cup of coffee, or go to the liquor store, I have a place to park.  Here?  Not so much.

You have only two choices on this island.  You can circle the block, hoping for a break, or you can go to the public car parking lots, and pay, with your credit card.  Minimum of $1.  Then return to your car, and put the receipt on the dashboard.  Then you walk to where you hoped to drive.

You just can't, "Pop out" and go get a six pack, or a soda.  It's going to cost you, and take WAY more time than it should.

On top of that the people here drive like complete maniacs.  In cars that cost a million dollars!  You haven't lived until your rental Chevy Impala has been cut off in rapid succession by a BMW, an Audi, a Lamborghini, and a Ferrari, that were cutting between you and the Bentley in front of you.  You are worried about the rental getting hit, but not as much as the guy who cut you off suing you just for shits and giggles cause his car cost five time what your house did.

They pay absolutely NO attention to traffic lights, traffic signs, or those stupid lines painted on the road.  It's like all that stuff is just a suggestion.  To be ignored.

Traffic around here is unreal.  Have you ever tried to drive down The Strip in Las Vegas on a Friday or Saturday night?  If so, picture that, but instead of drunk people there to get married in, "limos", and rubes from where ever America in their rental cars?  You're stuck in a gaggle of Jaguars, and, "Lambos" moving two miles and hour being held up by a tourist in a rental car, who thinks she can just drive to South Beach, park on the street and watch, Jennifer Lopez have dinner.  Crazy.

We leave, "The Beach" tomorrow.  We head to the Sheraton to meet the rest of the folks on our tour, and then we fly to Cuba on Monday.  So today, I let Deb and Danny go to the beach.  I washed clothes.

Spent a couple hours in the Prison Laundry...  er, HOTEL, laundry listening to the sound of two washers, two dryers, a Coke machine and a perpetually running ice maker for the fourth floor while watching golf.

Now, if there is anything more boring than golf on TV, it would be golf on radio.  But the only choices on Saturday afternoon in South Florida, were that, Pro Bowling, NASCAR and old movies.  I Might be from West Virginia, but I'm not OF West Virginia, so NASCAR was out.  Bowling?  Really?  Who cares.  So golf it was.

And by the time I was done doing that, I just wanted to be out of that windowless room, and see some sun.  Should have gone to the beach out back, but decided to go for a drive.  Really bad decision.  I went five blocks in 45 minutes.

I don't know if it's because it's, "Mercedes Benz Swimsuit Fashion Week"  or if it's like this every weekend here.  But either way, I want nothing to do with it.

Danny decided that he'd had enough linen table cloth, sea food, hoity toity dinners and lunches this week (we ate at  Peruvian place for lunch today that was REALLY good.  But yeah, the waiters were wearing ties and vests.  Again) so we set out in search of a, Diner.  Good luck.  There are no, "Diners" on Miami Beach.

An hour and a half later, we had him set his GPS for, "Mexican" and found a place that was great.  But we didn't eat dinner until after eight o'clock.  I'd never even contemplated vegetable tamales.  I thought they HAD to be chicken or beef.  But they are awesome.

So our stay in the trendiest place on earth ends tomorrow, and It can't happen soon enough for me.  And, I'm pretty sure I won't be back.  If I have to fly to Miami for a cruise, or what ever reason?  I'll stay somewhere else.  Where I can park a car.