Meet Me Tonight In Ocean City
Yep, I did it again. A much needed vacation. Never in my life have I taken so much time off from work. I don’t care. I needed it. While my book project takes a break to getting the radio show at a higher level, I decided to satisfy my burnt brain with an extended personal holiday to Peck’s Beach. I love the Jersey shore. I mean love it. I have been to other beaches, Florida, the Carolinas(rival second place), Delaware, Rhode Island, Maryland and I have come to the conclusion that the best shore is the Jersey shore. And when I say Jersey shore, I mean everything south of Long Beach Island. Anything northward is a joke. I will say this though. I would clearly trade Atlantic City to the north for Belmar. It’s the only cool place up there despite the bike cops. LBI is great because people live there the most of all the shore towns in the south…Atlantic City is well…you know, Atlantic City, but the lights are pretty at night….from afar. Longport, Margate, and Ventnor are great stops down Ocean Drive, but then of course comes Ocean City. This was a religious retreat following its main history as a farming and logging community. I love the town. Always have. I spent many a summer here and despite it being a ‘blue’ town, there are many spots to buy booze on the outskirts of town in Somers Point, Marmora, Strathmere, Sea Isle…There’s just a magic here that the North shore towns could never have. The attitudes relaxed, the people are nicer, and despite the invasions of Canadians and the occasional lack of driving skills of the obnoxious North/Central Jersians and New Yorkers…it’s like home. But I digress…I love the shore. I don’t know what I am more in love with. Driving there, or actually arriving there. The back roads wind through endless hamlets and lost towns now incorporated into boroughs. My week in the Blueberry Patch proved to be what I thought. No cares in the world with an undying, wild dream of living there. The week didn’t start out so good though. First, was packing. I have no problem packing and it’s usually a breeze for me. Guys are very simple. I usually over pack in the T-Shirt department because I feel you can never have enough especially when it’s hot and muggy. (I like to change clothes a lot). I also love collecting T-shirts with logos as well. So this week, I had a few shirts I wanted to pick up…preferably the 2007 Mack & Manko’s shirt. But my departure would be held up with having to drive to Pemberton to program the show into our Saturday schedule. It wasn’t a big deal, but it was a lot of extra gas miles. So my plan was to leave by taking CR 530 and boogie on down to route 72. There was a problem. Route 72 was backed up for a mile and a half. I am not sitting in traffic in the hot pines on one of the most humid days of the year. My map studies for the last 20 years paid off. I decided to whip down CR 563 and bolt through the carless Pines. Within 22 minutes, I was in New Gretna where I experienced the bizarre storm phenomenon that is only known by those residents for some reason. Whilst driving, the road looked wet. But there wasn’t a cloud in the sky. Yeah it was hot and muggy, but no clouds. I figured people had sprinkler systems on the sides of the road keeping their grass watered. But then it hit me, ‘hey history boy, there ain’t any houses out here!’ Then I saw the culprit….A storm, on a bright, hot sunny day. It was like something out of a movie. The rains fell so hard and so powerful, but as quick as they came, they disappeared. I later found out this happens frequently in the Port Republic/New Gretna area. It’s due to how the marshes, lakes, ponds react to low level moisture with nowhere place for it really to go, but to kick up a brief rain storm. The Crabbers in the area are well familiar with it. I still think it’s the weirdest thing I have ever seen. At any rate, I jumped on to the Parkway from good ole Route 9, which I still can’t believe people actually came to the shore this way at one time, and headed south to the Ocean City/Marmora exit. I hit the 34th street Bridge and the temperature dropped 4 degrees. Sigh. After trips to the supermarket, and saving shoppers from being crushed by Swedish fish, it was off to the liquor store for spirits that would be hardly touched by me, but frequented happily by others. The weather started its unhappiness on Sunday leading to massive flooding on the south end of West Avenue leading to such a flood that the road became a haven for Kayakers. No joke. But that would be the only bad weather we would see. Let alone the heat, which was manageable, I feasted on Crab, Crabmeat, more crab, oh and crab again. I had it canned, on my pasta, done imperial style, boiled, and directly in the crab itself. Obidiah’s in Marmora is great as was this great Italian restaurant in Strathmere called Andrea Trattoria Italiana where I indulged in smoked mozzarella and a wonderful filet mignon. All in all, you can’t go wrong with food in Ocean City either. Despite all the junk food on the boardwalk, there is one great mainstay in Mack & Manco. There is no better place in south jersey for pizza than Mack & Manco. I usually go for the white pizza with slices of jersey tomatoes on them. It’s like you died and went to heaven. Not to mention it is usually packed down there, and when I say packed, I am not talking about 9th street. In ALL their locations on the boardwalk (12th and 8th). Sigh. Good pizza, good times. I am also an old video game junkie. I love the Star Wars Trilogy game that has only brought me to the unfinished Death Star 3 times where I only destroyed it once. I also love air hockey, bubble hockey, and of course Ms. Pac Man. I have been known to break out in a sweat during any of these games. It’s an honest town with honest people. Try losing your wallet there. It will be returned to you.
Welcome To New Jersey. Now Go Home.
My feeling when I go to these places of pleasure is, as idiotic as it seems, is my annoyance of the obviously visible, non native visitors. These are the ones that look like tourists. This is what inspired me to get the T-Shirt. First off, a guy cuts me off in the liquor store when I am going to get ice and then gets an attitude with me. He was from Canada. The Ontario tags on their car was the dead giveaway. I drove over the 34th street bridge upon my arrival to find 3 cars from Canada, one from Philadelphia (car was bought in Bristol), then 3 from New York. First, the Canadian drivers must think the driving rules change once you come into New Jersey, like riding with your foot on the brake. Not to mention all I could see were knuckles. Ok, I will let that one go. Then I am side to side with another car on the lanes coming into town, and this Canuck, who can CLEARLY see my Jeep, decides to go into my lane while looking at me! Ok, wait, it gets better. Then there are the idiots that want to sight see amidst heavy moving traffic. You know the ones, pointing, looking around, talking, putting their foot on the brake to stop. This makes me insane. So as I passed them I yelled, “THANKS FOR STOPPING ALL OF US. PLEASE GO HOME.” True energy vampires. Then of course there are the New Yorkers who don’t use turn signals. They just decide two lanes over, to make a right turn and can’t understand why people are honking at them, and the guy behind them just clipped their bumper. And they say New Jersey drivers are bad? We aren’t bad, we are just smarter than the norm and know where we are going and don’t want you in our way while we get there. I admit we are aggressive. But we don’t stop traffic on the parkway to look at a deer, we don’t think the 3rd lane is a cruise control lane, and we know how to negotiate circles. Once I arrived at the house, and what a great house it was, we could see the house across the street were avid Penn State fans. Beers were flowing from 2:00 that afternoon, well into the wee hours of the morning. As a matter of fact, I had gone out side to have a smoke, and saw the same guy earlier in the day going wooooooo! Only difference was, he was the only guy out there. Their house remained quiet and calm the rest of the week with everyone in recuperation, yet started to show signs of life the following Saturday. I don’t think I can write much more about the trip because I honestly get depressed thinking about how awesome it was. Sigh.
Muck The Fetts
After losing the way the Phillies did to San Diego on their home stand, I was done. I officially gave up on the Phillies, and said the only way back for me would be if the Phillies swept the scumbag “other New York team that’s irrelevant, and not the Yankees.” I really had bad feelings because the Phillies have been the hottest team in the National League since 04/18/07. But when you have no pitching, you have to score like 30 runs to beat teams. This just can’t happen. But the closer I studied the ‘other NY team that’s not the Yankees’ I started to realize something. They aren’t that good. Either that or the Phillies are awesome. The overrated bank roll has done really nothing to wow me like maybe the Yankees or the Red Sox. In other words, they are slightly good in a league of mediocrity. So all the dopey NY fans start talking their trash that NY will do this to the Phillies, do that etc, blah blah blah, even luring in the poor innovator to join the stupidity. Ya see, I’m smart. I don’t come out and say things like most Philadelphia fans, or even retarded NY fans stuff like “WE ARE GOING TO THE WORLD SERIES” or “WE WILL WIN EVERYTHING THIS YEAR.” I am a realistic sports fan. And granted, the Mutts have talent, but they don’t play together. The Phillies have a nucleus and are a hitting machine, but they have no pitching whatsoever. I mean that. It’s god awful. But the Mets are loaded with talent and money that goes nowhere. So all week prior to the series I was hearing about how great the Mets were, and that the Phillies had no chance.
GAME 1 – Phillies 9, Mets 2
GAME 2 – Phillies 3, Mets 2 (great fights started by NY fans that got their ass kicked. Friggin dopes)
GAME 3 – Phillies 4, Mets 2 (This is getting good here)
GAME 4 – Phillies 11, Mets 10
The beauty of the last one is that we were up 5-0, then tied 5-5, then down 8-5, then we tied it, then lost the lead only to come back and win 11-10. Here’s the topper. Paul LoDuca of the Mutts had the balls to go on WFAN and in the media to say the Phillies shouldn’t celebrate the sweep we just laid on them. Wait a minute. The Mets taunt more teams than any other in BASEBALL, and you are criticizing the Phillies for kicking your ass? That’s just dumb. I was glad to hear commentators on WFAN say the same. Sour grapes you friggin dope. I will sum up my finish for the Phillies in 2007. They aren’t going to the World Series. They probably won’t make the playoffs. But I will say this, the ‘other NY team that’s not the Yankees’ will have a colossally bad finish in 2007. Be it the playoffs, end of the season, world series…they will do nothing…just like I predicted next year. I will even go this far and say; the Yankees will go farther than that NY team.
‘n dats dat!