Home of the Brave, Free & Retired

America may be the home of the brave and the free, but Florida is the home of oranges and retired people. I know this. I marvel at it and occasionally snigger about it. Yet, it never fails to catch me unaware.

At the cinema, just out of Burlesque (both women belt it, the burlesque is more like burlesque and less like Vegas, Stanley Tucci is delicious and the young stud has a body to beg for, but otherwise, give it a skip), like every middle aged woman susceptible to incontinence, I deem it prudent to visit the ladies before our departure. I find myself at the end of a queue of white haired women. Hmmmm, maybe they let them out of their old age homes for a jaunt in the town on Sundays? As I wait my turn, I realise that my presence there has pulled the average age all the way down to 65!!

Hunger pangs strike me en route home and we stop at the causally termed Bob Evans... where there are 3 other sets of diners, naturally, all sporting various shades of grey and white atop their head. As we work our way though some indifferent food (this is what happens when you shun the fried stuff in an attempt to be healthy), the place starts to fill up, and the number of people with walking aids outnumber the people without. An elderly couple shuffles in with his mother, and I wonder if the restaurant has paramedics on standby in the parking lot (given the age of the clientele and the winningly themed choice of appetisers like fried zucchini, fried apple pie sticks, fried mozzarella, fried potato bombs....). The sound of cutlery and shuffling is interrupted by a geriatric demanding to see his favourite waitress, and insisting that he be seated next to some young girls. Deboo and I look at each other and shudder, but we are saved by his rather telling question, "ARE there any young girls in Florida?". Ummmm. Not in South West Florida there aren't...

What there is in South West Florida is an overabundance of hungrily growling, sexy Corvettes and macho rumbling Harleys cruising the streets. And old people. Yeah. You think about that. You do the math. I'im too busy wondering just why we're even bothering to eat healthy. The last thing this State needs is more people living to a ripe old age!