My Post Vacation Reflections

We came back a few days ago from our vacation in Beach Haven (Long Beach Island) New Jersey. The wife and I spent Labor day Monday to Thursday with the daughter and her 10 month old baby twin girls. Here's a few of my reflections.FOOD
I was surprised to see how crowded it still was after Labor Day. We tried four restaurants on Monday night. All four had 1 hour wait times. Since we didn't make reservations (assuming they would not be full) with 10 month old twins that was out of the question. Instead we settled for a pizza joint. For $25 you couldn't find a better meal even if it didn't have the ambience a restaurant would provide.

Turns out there was a upscale hotel restaurant within 100 yards of where we were staying. (If we only had known).

This place was very inconspicuous hence how we overlooked it. So on Tuesday night we made reservations there (just in case). We went for the 'early bird' specials. This place actually is quite classy. It had a separate sushi bar/restaurant as well as a large main dining room along with extensive mixed drink & wine lists. The baby twins were super behaved. But the 'early bird specials' were not like I've ever had before and ending up costing us over $100! That was just for the wife, daughter and myself since we brought our own food for the babies because they are not able yet to eat restaurant food.

Since we had food left over from the pizza joint on Monday and from what we could not finish at the restaurant we microwaved and ate them on Wednesday night. (Tasted almost as good as when we had them the first time)


ABOUT BEACH HAVEN
Coming from Allentown, Pennsylvania what surprised me the most was how trusting people are of one another. Each entrance to the beach has bike racks. I only spotted two or three that were locked out of perhaps thirty or forty bikes parked in them on any given day. Usually there were a half of dozen sandals people left along side them to go onto the beach. Nobody swiped them!

The place we stayed at left the building unlocked 24/7. On the porch, the couple who own the place, left out about 50 DVD's anyone could help themselves to watch in their room. This along with books, games and kids toys. They also had a 'Keurig' coffee machine anyone could help themselves to for free. Try doing that in Allentown!

The couple we rented from own this older historic building and will be leaving Sunday for their home in California.


MISC
Near where we were staying there were two raised roofed topped decks on the beach just yards from the ocean. It was sort of like a gathering place where we met and chewed the fat with others. One of the more interesting guys who walked his dog up there (the twins love touching it) turned out to be a off duty cop. He couldn't have been nicer. He pointed out how to detect the signs where rip currents occur. He also told us the beach is actually re-growing after taking a hit from hurricane Sandy.

I also noticed people would actually take time out to acknowledge other people. They weren't walking around texting, hanging on their cell phones or glued to the TV news wondering what Obama or ISIS was going to do. Get a grip!!

I'm not certain why but Tuesday was a big day for dolphins. Almost all day dolphins were heading south towards Atlantic City. Some just swam by. About a dozen others hung around for about a half an hour feeding. As they were jumping out of the water and diving to feed on fish was fascinating to watch. Speaking of Atlantic City, I could see the 'Revel casino' from there. That gave me the bright idea to go home a different way.


THE TRIP HOME
Lady Garmin was the perfect navigator showing us the way down. I decided however if I were to use the 'Garden State Parkway' going home I wouldn't run into a stoplight until I hit Tilghman Street in Allentown. It seemed like a no brainer... and it was!

First off we didn't shave a single minute off our travel time home even though lady Garmin took us through dozens and dozens of them doing things her way. Now you'd think going 55mph to 65mph (even if it were a longer distance) would have saved us some time. Not so. Going her way was relaxing and safe even though we had lots of twists and turns. Doing things my way (dumb) we only had to go down the Parkway, hang a right at the 'Atlantic City Expressway'. Head over the Walt Whitman, up the 'Sure-Kill', NE extension and bingo, we're home.

Well let me tell you going back my way was not only unnerving, but decreased everyone's chances of coming home alive. People were zigzagging lanes passing me doing 70-80 mph almost the entire trip. It seems just about everybody ignores speed limits and nobody I saw got pulled over. Hell who can blame the cops. Why should cops have to speed up to 100mph to try and catch them. Then risk both their lives along the shoulder of a highway feet from where other knuckleheads are blowing past. I see it as it would be more dangerous then just letting them go. That sort of makes sense to me. On the other hand, it makes absolutely no sense to me when these assholes put everybody's life in jeopardy because of it.

As we hit the 40mph cattle shoots on the NE Extension by Lansdale I had two options. Stay in the right lane being tailgated by one ahole after another wanting to go faster then 65mph between those super narrow 'Jersey Barriers' in the 40mph construction zone. Or I could get over in the left lane where tractor trailers are forced to travel. Everyone of those trucks were doing 65mph so I chose the lesser of two evils. Staggering my speed to them and staying between them while cars were continually passing us on the right going at least 70mph. All was going well until we heard screaming tires and the crunching of metal behind us.

Someone had a really bad day. I couldn't focus my attention to all that was happening in my rear view mirror because I was super attentive on staying safe on what was up ahead. What I did see was either the person behind us nicked the Jersey barrier or was rammed by the car aside of them into it ending up getting into a wreck. Either way I'm forever grateful that it didn't involve the babies and us. At 65mph no good can come of it. And when it comes to babies the EMT's always insist they be transported to a hospital. Not only that, I would hate like hell to be the one driving my daughter's new car (that has less then 6,000 miles on it) and have it get wrecked.

Alarmingly someone got killed in this same area about 14 hours later. What the hell's the matter with people! Sure the cops can't park there or pull people over when they travel 30mph over the limit, but cops aren't what concern me. It's these ahole maniacs that have to be scraped up off the highway that take others along with them.


IN SUMMARY
It was nice to take a break from this blog and the kind of rut I've been in. I'm starting to conclude the majority of people not only don't give a hoot what I have to say on this blog, but aren't overly concerned about the bullshit going on in the news, politics, other blogs or any of the other stuff I assumed was important either.

What I found most reflective going forth from this vacation is the people I've come across will most likely not read these words.