Florida is weird.

I hear news stories about Florida a lot, these days. You got your bath salts face-biting and your FloridaMan twitter account, (which is admittedly hilarious); you got botched elections and former governors who use too much spray tan. We have a lot of weirdos, to be sure, but these stories got me thinking about my feelings toward my home state in a more general sense. You see, many people in the States have a strong affinity and feeling of pride for their birth state, but I find myself lacking such a feeling, at least in any particular strength.

That's because Florida is weird.

Now, I don't mean weird in the sense of those stories I mentioned earlier. Let's be truly honest: those could have happened anywhere. I mean that being from Florida is a weird thing to describe, because the state is so vastly different anywhere you go. Take my home county for instance: Collier. Collier County, Florida was actually featured in Ace Ventura as the home of Ray Finkle, and it was shown as a desolate swampy area with no people for miles and miles. This is true enough, but my home town is also in Collier County, and this is what Naples looks like:

Not exactly swampy.

Even in just one county, depending on where you are, you have vastly different cities, people, and lifestyles. It's true: most of Collier County is swamp, but when you get to the coast, you have lovely beaches and tons and tons of old, retired, rich, white people. The same is true of my current home, Alachua County and the city of Gainesville. The 'ville is home to UF, so within a few miles of the university campus, (which is three square miles itself), you have all the bars, hangouts, chain restaurants, apartment complexes, etc. But go not five minutes past I-75, and you soon find yourself in the middle of fucking nowhere. Farms. Cows grazing. Small, gentle hills. Two-lane roads with speed limits 55+ mph. It's an entirely different world, and you just left Gainesville a mile ago. 

Since Florida is so weird, living here instills a lot of weird behaviors in us. Here's a list of things about Floridians that are weird:

1.) Hurricanes aren't even worth worrying about unless they're Category 4. Maybe Category 3 for some people. But Cat 2s, Cat 1s, and Tropical Storms? We fly kites and go the beach in that shit. It's fun. 

2.) Because of the above, we love laughing when hurricanes bypass us and make their way further north on the Atlantic coast. Watching news reports of Yanks FREAKING OUT about a Cat 2 storm is hilarious. 

3.) We have no sympathy for people who don't carry umbrellas in their cars or leave their car windows rolled down. 

4.) Spring Break is more of an eye-roll for us. A lot of us are from typical Spring Break destinations and honestly, it's more annoying to us than anything. My best Spring Break was going to North Carolina and getting to see snow. That's how desensitized to beaches and shit I am; I'd rather go where it's snowing, because at least it'd be a change. 

5.) True Floridians may very well be a minority in many cities. Naples, in particular, is home to almost entirely, (or so it feels), older folks who have moved there for their retirement, or other people who moved down from the North. While working at Barnes & Noble, a woman tried to make small-talk with me while I was preparing her latte. She asked where I was from. When I said, "I'm from here; from Naples," she was FASCINATED and astounded and proceeded to probe me about it. Though what I could have possibly elaborated about, I haven't the faintest idea. Luckily I was 17 and looking stupid and clueless is a thing all teens are good at. 

6.) Bugs aren't terribly worrisome to us. They're everywhere here, and some of them are pretty huge. 

7.) Many of us will bust out straight-up winter coats that are damn near parkas for 60 degree weather. Because normally it's 96 degrees out, and we get tired of that part of our wardrobe gathering dust, (though I am admittedly not part of this phenomenon, I do understand it).

8.) We will wear flip-flops for almost any occasion. Mostly because our seasons go like this:

SuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuummmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmerBitChillySoMaybeWeCanCallThisNOPE!MORE SUMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEERRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR

9.) Never tell us it's humid where you're from. Go outside in central Florida in August at 2 o'clock in the afternoon and then come talk to us. 

10.) I didn't even know what a humidifier was and what the hell you would ever need one for until I was practically an adult. 

11.) It is rarely cool enough to turn the AC off. And when it is, there are no heaters being turned on; it's not that cold. Our tiny winter may as well be called Save-Money-Off-Electric-Bill season.

12.) We have an entire theme park dedicated to alligators. No, seriously, we do. It's called Gatorland, and as Gabriel Iglesias has pointed out, their automated phone message is hilarious, (although they've changed it since whenever he called them; it's not nearly that funny, but it's still pretty entertaining). 

13.) Though we are technically part of the South, and even the Deep South, I know very few Floridians who consider themselves "southern". I do, but not because I'm from Florida; because my father's family is from North Carolina, which as the name implies, is much further north than my home. 

So we have these weird quirks, which are amusing, I suppose, but it's weird. I don't really feel pride in being from Florida. Maybe because it's just such an odd amalgam of people, it's hardly to feel centrally united by much of anything. 

I will surely think of more weird things about Florida and Floridians to post later.