A Site for Shore Eyes

Wildwood Days 2006 is on its way! Memorial Day Weekend traditionally kicks off the summer season in Wildwood. Although the boardwalk starts opening on weekends around Palm Sunday, and some shops struggle through the weekdays during the spring, almost everything gears up completely on Memorial Day Weekend.

This is the closest thing the Jersey Shore has that’s comparable to Spring Break in other resort towns. If you’re looking for weird, it will be there. For most of the summer season, Wildwood attracts a varied crowd, but the younger generation pretty much owns the first weekend of the season. The traffic starts streaming in on Friday, and continues well past the midnight hour. As if the traffic noise weren’t enough, many revelers hang out car windows and let everyone else know they’ve arrived.

Back in the 60’s, this time marked a transition for me each year. I worked on the boards while in high school and tech school, and it always seemed strange going to school during the day and running rides at night. I never liked the feeling of working in a carnival atmosphere while faced with the reality of breaking the mood by attending school the next day. I wanted total freedom, and I wanted it NOW!

Our schools had a habit of letting out rather late (I remember June 21 one year). Most of my neighborhood Philly friends got out around the end of May or the beginning of June. I really felt as if I was missing something, with them out on the street, and me sitting in the classroom all day.

But the school year always eventually ended, and I was free to begin my annual rite of complete freedom! But when the Fourth of July rolled around a little too quickly for my own comfort, I always began to sense that the days were getting away from me. I never succeeded in slowing down time, and hated the stores that started advertising their “Back to School Specials” in early August. Like, who needed a reminder?

The title of this post is redundant, because that’s what this rant is about. Yes, I know, a lot of people will think I just have too much time on my hands, but redundant acronyms drive me crazy!

For anyone who doesn’t already know, “ATM” stands for “Automatic Teller Machine.” It’s an “ATM,” not an “ATM Machine!”

Nor is it a “PIN Number” or “VIN Number.” It’s either a “PIN” or a “VIN,” nothing else! “Personal Identification Number Number” sounds ridiculous, as does a “Vehicle Identification Number Number.”

For those of you who feel compelled to add words to acronyms, please do it properly. If you want to say “AT Machine,” that’s okay, as is “PI Number” and “VI Number.”

Well, gotta go now, because I’m low on cash. Have to run down to the ATM Machine. I hope I can remember my PIN Number.

Well, the boating season is pretty much upon us, and we don’t have the boat ready yet.  I took out the old starter on the port engine, but haven’t gotten around to installing the new one yet.  We’re way behind schedule, but once we get the bottom painted, the new starter installed, and the steering fixed, we’ll have ‘er plopped in the water and do the rest of the stuff later. 

We intended to do a lot of work on the boat over the winter, but just never seemed to get around to it.  Can’t blame it on the weather, can we?

Sometimes I long for my old 8-foot pram, 20 feet shorter than our present boat.  Maybe sometime I’ll tell about the time, back in the 60’s, that I took my pram, powered by a 3-horse Evinrude, out in the ocean and around the bell buoy, with two of my nutty  friends. Maybe…