A Site for Shore Eyes

I’m glad the Press of Atlantic City rewrote the headlines for Wildwood Crest’s elections to read that the elections were moved from May to November, instead of the original headline which read that the May elections were moved to November. Anyone could figure out that May elections can only be held in May.

In other exciting news, a Middle Township man set a state record for bird sightings. Of course, we have to take his word for it, but even if he’s correct, so what? It’s not that I don’t like birds – in fact, when I lived in Georgia I kept two bird feeders in the back yard and I liked sitting on the back deck and watching birds, but not to the point of making it my primary achievement in life. We had robins, cardinals, brown thrashers, grackles, grey catbirds, chickadees, nuthatches, rufus-sided Towhees, red bellied woodpeckers, and even an occasional pilieated woodpecker, as well as a few others. But I considered it a form of relaxation, rather than a sport.

These people talk about state records and nationwide records as if they accomplished something really significant, rather than just wasting a bunch of time looking through binoculars. This guy says he’s traveled thousands of miles in New Jersey during 2011. Okay, well, New Jersey, from the very bottom to the northwestern corner is 168 miles, so that’s a lot of driving.

Of course, another dude had to say that there’s an element of climate change in scarce birds turning up here. There’s always an element of climate change now that everyone has figured out that man-made global warming is a hoax, although they bring up the warming thing every time there’s some unseasonably warm weather. They ignore the fact that Alaska is going through a terrible winter and one town up there was rewarded with 26 feet of snow since November.

Look, I could understand someone getting excited if he spotted a dodo bird, but I think the real dodo is the person who goes out looking to see birds. Contrary to popular myth, the dodo wasn’t really stupid. It couldn’t fly and had no natural enemies in its habitat. Everything changed when people brought dogs, pigs, and other animals onto the island, and they also hunted it to extinction.

I could probably go on Google Earth and spot lots of birds all over the country, instead of driving thousands of miles, but why would I do that? My point is that these people could spend their time doing more important things, such as hunting quail, ducks, and geese. Even better would be pheasants and the many wild turkeys running around causing havoc.

Oh well, the mayor of Wildwood once again is threatening residents and I’m glad I don’t live there. He says he won’t try to impose a beach tag fee this year, so everyone can breathe a sigh of relief. Imagine, if you will, Wildwood charging a fee for using the beach and North Wildwood and Wildwood Crest keeping the beaches free. This guy and his cohorts apparently spend much of their time sitting around and scheming about how to raise more revenue for the city. Instead of trying to rake in more money, why not cut non-essential government services? Does a clerk really need a salary of $60,000 or so?

Now he’s threatening to raise the tourism and development tax. What is that, you say? Well it’s a tax added to the sales tax for certain businesses, such as restaurants and other businesses which are not supposed to charge it, but charge it anyway, although they don’t send it to the city. For reference, see my article on “Anglesea Auto Repair,” which, by-the-way, is not located in Anglesea. We Anglesea people are rather touchy about that. My point is, if a guy doesn’t even know where his business is located, what else does he not know?

Anyway, they told me that this extra tax would go primarily to the Convention Center, although the guy who was in charge during the time I talked to him seemed to know very little about it, or who should charge it. Here are some hints, taken directly from the ordinance: Hotel, motel, and boarding house lodging; Food and drink sold by restaurants, taverns, and other similar establishments for consumption on or off premises, or by caterers, (but not including vending machine sales), and, admission charges to any place of amusement, including charges for admission to amusement rides, sporting events and exhibitions, dramatic or musical arts performances, motion picture theaters, and cover charges in nightclubs and cabarets. Auto repair shops are noticeably absent.

One problem, though. Should not the Convention Center be self-sustaining, being that it charges admission to events throughout the year? I guess I just don’t think like a politician. The Wildwood mayor, however, never met a tax he didn’t want to impose, or that he could scheme up.

Anyway, the ordinance says that the 2% tax shall be piggybacked on the 7% sales tax, probably so visitors won’t question it or take their money elsewhere. It just shows up as a 9% sales tax.

Strangely enough, both North Wildwood and Wildwood Crest adopted this silly legislation, but if you visit the North Wildwood municipal site and look up the City Code, you’ll be hard pressed to find it anywhere, but most establishments charge it. The funny thing is that it’s optional for a business of any type to charge it, but they get a break on filing other taxes if they do. That makes it easy to see how much they think of their patrons.

The city employees in North Wildwood also make a ton of money; way more than they could pull in out there in the private sector, but the taxes are much lower than Wildwood’s and the streets are in pretty good shape and are being upgraded every year. What is Wildwood doing with its taxpayers’ dollars? Oh, that’s right; they’re going to put in more silly sidewalks along the southern part of Pacific Avenue, so the mobs rushing to Silen’s Shoes will have smooth sailing.

I haven’t been in Silen’s in decades, and wonder if they still have wooden floors? Murphy’s and Newberry’s 5&10 stores had wooden floors, as did our elementary school. Not the smooth, solid, polished type found in homes, but the dull, creaky type that squeaked when you walked on them. This made it virtually impossible for a teacher to sneak up on you at your desk, but I recall hearing floor noises all during my days at school.

Woolworth’s had terrazzo floors, and now the place is piled up with junk from a guy who likes having mannequins made in his likeness. Downtown Wildwood will never be right until those two buildings are put to proper use, not that it would be a cure-all. I could see maybe a Dollar Tree in the Murphy’s building, but what do I know? The governing body would probably opt for a huge store that sold beach balls and fake palm trees.

Some psychologist/researchers in New Zealand say they have taught pigeons how to count. This couldn’t come at a better time because some teachers in the Neshaminy school district in Pennsylvania went on strike. Perhaps pigeons can be brought in to teach the classes at a much lower cost to the school district.

Okay, I don’t know whether to write first about the pigeons or the teachers’ strike, so I’ll write about why someone would name a place Neshaminy. Nah, I think I’ll start with the strike. I find it reprehensible that school teachers would go on strike at the expense of the children (and some adults) in school. Have they no shame? They say they have no contract, and that’s somebody else’s fault how? I suspect they have no contract because the union didn’t like the terms of the contract. Like, how bad could it be, when they only have to work about nine months out of the year? Really closer to eight when you figure in all the holidays. They have no business thinking only of themselves and going on strike, and it’s totally irresponsible.

When I attended school, teachers never went on strike, so we never got any bonus time off. We would have loved for our teachers to go on strike, preferably for the whole year. Instead they actually taught us the three R’s, of which only one begins with an R. The thing is, we knew that only one of them started with an R, but these days I’m not sure some of the teachers are aware of this discrepancy.

I have to add a disclaimer concerning my friend, Rocco, who is a teacher and is not currently on strike. I don’t know if he’s a good or bad teacher, but I know he is pretty smart, despite having done probably even more stupid things than I have done over my lifetime, and that’s saying a lot. There’s no contest involved, and we both used to do stupid things, but it’s just that I think it’s stupid to jump out of airplanes, although he retired from that activity a number of years ago. He seems much more calm these days.

Anyway, the strange thing is that back in the day, teachers had to know the subjects they were teaching, but that seems to not always be the case now. I have known a number of teachers who had rather poor grammar. Elementary school teachers used to teach the full gamut, at least through fifth grade, and all knew how to play the piano. They also all used round pitch pipes which made me hungry for a Mello Mint, which is now extinct.

I’m swerving off track again. Apparently these striking teachers care little about whether the students have to go to school longer in the year to cover the time off from the strike. Public servants who perform essential services should not be permitted to strike, and that includes police officers, firefighters, and trash collectors, to name a few.

But now we have to look into this pigeon thing, which the researchers call “remarkable.” When asked how long it took to teach the pigeons to count, using touch screens, one researcher said it took one hour per day, seven days per week, for a year. Using that same time line one could probably teach certain high school students how to count, and possibly how to add and subtract. The question is whether or not non-striking pigeons could be trained to teach people?

Personally, I think dogs are smarter than pigeons, but neither can talk, so perhaps we should defer to training parrots. African grays are the best talkers and some could probably even teach singing. The problem is that they, like the pigeons, have bird brains, which are considerably smaller than even the stupidest teachers’ brains. I’m pretty sure that’s true.

These researchers may be ostriches, because they stated that only primates had been taught to count previously. Well, I have seen both dogs and horses who nailed counting tests, and many dogs can sniff out drugs, explosives, and cadavers. I don’t want to know how they train them to sniff for dead bodies.

My point is that these psychologists are gushing over the fact that they taught pigeons to count in just a year’s time. I doubt that it would take a dog that long, or a horse, for that matter. And after you teach a pigeon to count, what do you do with him? Teach him how to be a CPA or a bank teller? And do they really know how to count? I doubt it. They get rewards for picking the right images, which they practice for a year. In other words, they know which images to pick, in ascending order, that will get them some chow. That’s not really counting.

It’s like the chicken I saw once in a box with glass windows at an amusement park. This hen’s specialty was pecking a ping-pong ball from a cushion of air and making it go through a little basket with a lever on it. When the ball flipped the lever, a bit of corn was released into a chute. The chicken never missed, but one time the ball, instead of coming back to the stream of air, bounced into the part with the chicken. This confused her, and she kept looking in the cup for the corn. Of course she was not only befuddled, but was also incapable of picking up the ping-pong ball. My point this time is why aren’t those balls called, “table tennis” balls? Just wondering. . .

Today we’re going to talk about fishing, a relaxing and leisurely pastime. Anyone can go fishing, especially in salt waters, because they don’t have to bother with obtaining a license. Okay, my research assistant just informed me that I need to update my information, because fishing requires at least registration, and it can be done online in New Jersey. Then you can print out your little registration card that you must keep with you at all times, lest you be required to pay a fine.

Well, now that we have that out of the way, the rest is simple. You need a rod and a reel, although the rod and reel are both optional, so you don’t really need them. You can use a hand line, but I don’t recommend it. One person who was rather adept at using a hand line was a young guy who used to visit our rooming house with his mother, who was also pretty good at using a hand line. Their last name was Trout, and I am not making this up. So, if your last name isn’t Bass, or Striper, or Wahoo, or some other fishy-sounding name, I would recommend buying a rod and reel.

What type of rod and reel should you buy? Well, that depends on where you’re going to be fishing and how far you’re likely to have to cast. A boat rod doesn’t mean you need a boat, but it won’t do well in the surf, where you’ll have to cast farther.

The reel is another decision. I’ll do better by telling you what types to not buy. Don’t buy a fly-fishing reel, or a bait cast reel, or a spin cast reel, and don’t ask me why. Going after bigger game fish such as marlin requires a huge, expensive reel and lots of line, probably a mile or more, although I’ve never done any real sport fishing. Ask your reel salesman about the type and amount of line to spool on your reel. In the old days I just bought some fishing line and wound it on the reel myself, but now it’s more sophisticated and they do it for you with a machine.

If you buy a spinning reel, lots of luck! Many fisherman use these contraptions these days, but I don’t fully understand them. They usually hold the rod with the reel on the bottom and many turn the crank with their left hand, something I don’t understand. I prefer a regular casting reel, backlashes and all, but that’s just a preference.

The next thing you have to obtain is the right tackle. Football requires both a left and right tackle, but for some reason fishing only requires the right one. And, of course, you’ll have to get a tackle box. This also relates to football, but I’m not sure how. I just hear announcers say that the quarterback can only throw away a pass if he’s outside the tackle box. This seems strange to me, because it would have to be a very HUGE tackle box for the quarterback to be inside it, and from there, I don’t know how he could throw a pass anyway.

We could go into how other nautical terms related to football, such as block and tackle and punting, but for purposes of this informative article we’ll stick to fishing.

So, what’s the best type of right tackle to buy? Most people go for hooks and sinkers as their primary items, and the hooks should be attached to leaders. Once you’ve figured out the basic concept you can get all fancy with spoons and buck-tails, and whatever else you see in the fishing tackle store. If you don’t know what a buck-tail is you probably don’t need one.

Sinkers come in many sizes and the environment-polluting lead type are the weights of choice. This is because if you get bored while fishing, you can write on the bulkhead with them. Ha ha! Only kidding. The fish don’t worry about whether a sinker is made of steel or lead, because they don’t eat sinkers on a regular basis. If you catch a fish that has eaten a lead sinker it should be taken in for chelation treatment before it is eaten, just to be on the safe side. If the fish is big enough you might be able to squeeze out enough mercury to make a thermometer or two.

But I’m getting ahead of myself because I forgot about telling you what to use for bait. Well, that’s up to you, but it depends on what type of fish you expect to catch. I don’t worry that much about it and like to be surprised, so I just use some surf clam. Some people like using minnows, and the good thing about them is that if you don’t catch any fish and have enough of them left over, you can eat them, although they’re very difficult to clean.

My late uncle often used shedder crab as bait, but that was both too complicated and expensive for me during my youth. Other bait choices include shrimp, green crab, and bloodworms.

Bait has gotten a bit fancier these days, though. Some people seem to have success with Gulp, an artificial bait. It’s available in many forms that resemble actual species.

I was going to talk about jigging and chunking, but this is getting way more complicated than I thought it would. Let’s get down to actually catching a fish.

Not all fish behave in the same manner, so if you’re fishing for flounder it’s important to let the fish take the bait. Flounder rarely strike like other fish, although it sometimes happens. Flounder come in both the summer and winter variety and it’s illegal to catch and keep one that’s not in season. A winter flounder is a left-eye fish and a summer flounder or fluke is a right-eye fish. If you don’t know what that means you’re not stupid – you’re just uninformed. Okay, so I’m uninformed!

Once you get a fish on board or to the dock or whatever, it’s important to identify the type of fish so you can figure out if it’s big enough to legally keep and whether or not it’s in season. The easiest way to identify a fish is to shout to someone nearby, if possible, “Hey, do you know what this is?” If the person says it’s an oyster cracker, you should then ask the individual to take the fish off the hook for you. Just trust me on this.

Another good way to identify a fish is to whip out your smart phone and snap a photo of it. Then you can post the photo on Facebook or Twitter and get a bunch of different answers from hundreds of fishing “experts.” Or, you could just pull up the NJ fish identification chart on line.

This is getting way too complicated and I’m going to have to stop. My point is that I thought fishing was still as simple and relaxing as it used to be, but I may have been wrong. In fact, I may not even advise it as a valuable pastime now that I have had more time to think about it. If you attempt it, just make sure you’re outside the tackle box, whatever that means.

I sometimes wonder what happened to some of the things we had or used way back in grade school (and I’m talking the 1950s here) that I don’t see around anymore. One thing most of us have forgotten about is that white paste that came in big glass jars. We used it to paste cut-outs on backgrounds, etc. Back then we had no tissues hanging around, so whatever was left over would eventually dry on the fingers. After a while, most kids just rolled it off when it hardened.

Apparently they don’t make it anymore, but the internet lists formulas for making your own. I guess it was called, “library paste,” but I just thought of it as the stuff that looked like a jar of marshmallow fluff.

Another paper glue we used back then, but mostly at home rather than at school, was mucilage. It was amber-colored, thick stuff that came in a little jar with a rubber applicator top. The top sported a slit on an angled surface, so the idea was to push down and swipe it across the paper. More often than not, this first required scraping the hardened stuff off first, and clearing the slit.

Yes, these were exciting times with exciting products, and what could have been more exciting than Mercurochrome? For all you sissies out there, this was the answer to iodine and other antiseptics that burned or stung. It was the weapon of choice in our house against those dastardly germs! So where is it now? Well, the FDA won’t allow it to cross state lines, so if you live in Iowa you can brag about more than the Boise State football team, because a manufacturer there still cranks out the stuff. The FDA is a bit of a mercuryphobic organization and its members aren’t quite sure yet whether dabbing a bit of Mercurochrome on a wound could lead to near-lethal doses of mercury in the body. My guess would be no, but I’m neither a scientist nor a doctor. The stuff did leave a much brighter orange on your skin than even iodine.

No word yet as to whether or not the FDA will continue allowing Ford to sell its Mercury line of vehicles across state lines, or whether it will allow Brunswick to sell its Mercury outboards across state lines, but not much in this day and age is really far-fetched.

What’s that, you say? Why aren’t mercury thermometers banned? Well, they pretty much have been. Back in grade school our science teacher made a barometer with a glass tube that sat in a small bowl of mercury. Little did we know that we were being poisoned and would die within a few years. Oh, wait! That never happened! They now have instructions for disposing of a mercury thermometer, which is to put it inside a capped soda bottle and transport it to a disposal site. The EPA says mercury makes it into the atmosphere in two ways: by broken thermometers and emissions from power plants.

Again, I could go into detail about how little mercury is emitted from power plants with all the safeguards now in place, but thermometers? Really? Anyway, the claim is that if a broken mercury thermometer is disposed of in a landfill, for example, microorganisms can convert it into a highly toxic form called methylmercury. Horrors! How many broken thermometers would it take to pollute the atmosphere? I’m guessing somewhere around 700 billion or so, but it’s just a guess. Sort of like how many deodorant sprays would it take to deplete the ozone layer, notwithstanding the emissions put out by large jet airliners, etc. But we’re safe from dangerous propellants these days, thanks to the tree huggers, who know so much more about everything than we mere mortals.

So, while we’re sitting around fretting and chewing our nails, worried about whether or not the planet and civilization as we know it, will be destroyed by broken mercury thermometers, our elected officials, in their infinite wisdom, once again, force us to use CFLs, or compact fluorescent light bulbs! Oh, that’s right, those CFLs contain mercury. Hmm. . . let’s see. . . if we’re going to worry about mercury then why are we forced to use it in one instance and banned from using it in another? It all has to do with money. Of course, the proponents of CFLs say that the mercury from one thermometer can be used in 125 CFLs. Fine and dandy, if that’s really true, but I’d be willing to bet that the number of CFLs in use outnumber the thermometers in use by at least 1,000 to 1, based on the fact that I don’t know anyone who still uses a mercury thermometer, and the ones who do generally own a grand total of one thermometer. Count the number of lightbulbs in your home. With digital thermometers, why would one even need a mercury thermometer? Oh, that’s right – I almost forgot – we conservatives like to pollute the environment.

I saw many a fluorescent tube broken, especially while working rides on the boardwalk, and we never quite needed a HAZMAT team to clean up the debris. A broom and a dustpan took care of it rather nicely. Now they want us to call FEMA if we break a CFL!

So once again I got sidetracked by liberal silliness. We had no markers or highlighters in grade school, but they supplied us, at least in the early years, with many crayons, however, they were a bit waxy and never seemed to work as well as Crayola crayons, so most kids brought their own. I usually only had the basic set, but some kids had the mega package that, before they changed the name a number of years ago, contained the color, “flesh.”

I don’t necessarily miss everything from that era, but have wondered about many of them. I don’t want to go back to the three-channel antenna programming on TV, especially when we had to also tune in a booster, radio style, to conform with whatever channel we were watching. Even after the Philly stations boosted their power and we no longer needed a booster, sometimes the picture was snowy, or decided to flip up and down. Or it might just decide to go all diagonal from time to time,usually during a crucial TV moment. We had no remotes in those days, so during times of turmoil it paid to sit as near the set as possible. My brother, Larry, and I remember many a Friday night when our father sat in front of the TV, with the lights turned out, squinting and blinking while watching fights on Gillette’s Calvacade of Sports.

Many of the things no longer available to us won’t be missed, but here at the Jersey Shore, as I’ve mentioned before, we’ll always miss subs from J&H Cold Cuts, cheesesteaks from Luigi’s, pizza steaks from Grasso’s Four G’s, and toasted hoagies from Russo’s Gingham Club, but I want to keep my high-def LCD TV with scores of worthless channels.

Usually, when a college football team wins a game, two or more of the players on the sidelines sneak around carrying a tub of Gatorade, complete with ice, and attempt to dump the contents on the coach’s back. Ha ha! Or something. . .

The part I don’t understand is why someone should be punished for winning a game? If it’s important to get the coach all wet, cold, and sticky, shouldn’t it be the losing coach, rather than the one who won the game?

For some reason, it seems that good things must be punished, at least briefly, although I’ve never understood the motive. In the Navy, when an enlisted man makes it to petty officer, the chevron has a symbol of the person’s rate, and a silhouette of an eagle, which is commonly called a “crow.” Well, the crow has to be “tacked on,” so anyone seeing this individual gets to pound him on the arm. On the boats in Vietnam, he was also treated to being thrown into the water.

Back in grade school I hated going to school wearing new shoes, because any kid who noticed and hollered, “Stamps!” got to stomp on the shoes. A new haircut resulted in “Swats!” and anyone shouting this was permitted to rub his knuckles up the back of the neck. Go figure. . .

It’s probably not hard to figure out why people want to punish others for good things, because that’s exactly what the government does on all levels. If one works hard and makes a lot of money, the federal and many state governments take a larger percentage of your earnings in taxes. Earn less and pay less, sometimes nothing at all.

And what about property taxes? Does the city and state reward property owners who invest in their properties and keep them looking nice? Nope. They tax you more. Let your place go to seed and they reduce your assessment, so you pay less.

The northeastern states, probably more than most other states, punish drivers for using certain roads by charging tolls. My work took me to the Southeast, especially Georgia, and very few roads in the south charge tolls, yet they’re better maintained than those in the Northeast. I remember when I first moved back north and was living in Maryland it cost about fifteen dollars round trip to visit my relatives in New Jersey, just for the tolls!

I remember when the Garden State Parkway opened back in the fifties, and the deal was that the toll booths would be removed after the road was paid for. Hello! It’s 2011 and they just hiked the tolls by fifty percent. All my working days I never got a pay increase of fifty percent for the same job.

Back in the fifties they put up a ten-cent toll near Bargaintown and took it down after the exit was paid for. That was the last one I remembered being taken away.

Well, let’s move on to other things. The Wildwood mayor was rather ecstatic about a few people paying fifty bucks to ride horses on the beach. He said, “We have this vast tract of property here and it needed to be used.” Where has this guy been during the summer? The good thing about the off season is the serenity on the boardwalk and beach.

Three women who own Okey Doke Ranch in Clarksboro were the first to practice horsewomenship on the beach. One of them who said the horses were as excited as they were, stated, “I didn’t even let him go full force because I didn’t know if I’d be able to stop him, he was so excited.” I suppose he saw the roller coasters and wondered if he would get to ride them, otherwise it’s pretty much ho-hum for a horse to walk on the beach. However, I think they should make potential riders demonstrate that they know how to stop their horses before letting them ride. If you can’t figure out how to stop a horse on a two-mile long beach, you probably should take up some other sport.

The mayor and two commissioners made their way down to water’s edge and were permitted to ride the horses. One of them said, “It was awesome.” He doesn’t get out much.

The mayor envisions a corral being built near the back of the beach (wherever that may be) and making money for the city renting horses and ponies. I’m not sure how that would fit in with allowing no more than twenty horses on the beach at a time. No word on beach polo, however, or on building a grandstand for a racetrack.

Yes, autos have emissions, but you can’t really see them, as is the case with horses. Horses emit even when they’re running, leaving a nice trail. I guess horses on the beach would be a good idea for someone planning on raising a garden in beach sand, but I think this whole horse thing may affect the building of sandcastles. Thank God for flip-flops!

Yes, the mayor and commissioners are excited, not that it takes much to excite this bunch. One of them is bubbling because some company that sells horse figurines has contacted the city about holding a convention here because the city allows horses on the beach. Ho hum. . .

Wildwood just doesn’t know what to do with its grant money. It got $400,000 from the state and is going to use it to improve the business district. Okay, so what’s wrong with that? Well, nothing, unless you consider the other “improvements” the city made to the business district that drove most of the existing businesses out of town.

First came the conversion of part of Pacific Avenue to a brick-paved pedestrian walkway that never really caught on, and that took business away from the then existing stores. Like, who wants to walk several blocks to a store? The powers that were figured that if the pedestrian mall in Cape May turned out so well and successful, why wouldn’t the same thing work in downtown Wildwood?

Well, first of all, Wildwood is not dominated by Victorian-era structures and never had quaint stores that stocked items appealing to tourists. The downtown area had functional stores that served customers who didn’t want to drive all over the county to buy an item.

The pedestrian mall failed miserably, after most of the merchants who had paid for it were driven away (the pedestrian mall was financed by a tax assessment to the store owners along Pacific Avenue). The city tore up the bricks and gave them to residents who wanted them, and then repaved the sidewalks with a turquoise and green wave pattern that looked rather ridiculous. Yes, I know I’ve covered most of this before. When the colors started wearing off, they tore up the new sidewalks and installed even newer ones, with “patios” at street corners. This made it difficult to turn onto Pacific from a side street without entering the opposing lane, but why worry about little things?

The only thing Wildwood does as well as Cape May is to collect revenue from parking meters. The city just raised the rates last year, making these monsters constantly hungry during the summer months. It seems that if the city were really interested in improving the business district it would remove the meters from Pacific Avenue, which discourages potential patrons, especially those dining in the restaurants. Worrying about an expired meter while eating can give someone indidgestion.

Of course, the current mayor’s family concrete business had nothing to do with the sidewalks, or with the giant concrete beach balls at the end of Rio Grande Avenue, or with the large, paved concrete area around the beach balls.

Originally, some of the street signs were made to resemble rocket ships, and who knows what that was all about? Then they replaced them with palm tree street signs that look as if they were made in someone’s garage workshop.

Let’s clear the air a bit here. Palm trees do not grow naturally in New Jersey. Some, but not all, of the doo-wop motels sported artificial palm trees near the pool areas, but most people would not consider them as desirable assets. Okay, so they look stupid, especially when some of them have blue fronds.

Patrick Rosenello, Executive Director of the Downtown Business Improvement District, stated that, “we continue to make visual improvements to the street (meaning Pacific Avenue).” Well, let’s see. . . he says they intend to upgrade sidewalks, lighting, and other features south of Rio Grande Avenue to Cresse Avenue. One of these improvements is for replacement of Christmas season lighting with new, summer-inspired beach ball and palm tree decorations that will line the street. Even if you think this is a good idea, you should first inspect the new Christmas (is the city allowed to call them that?) decorations.

I guess if you want to call attention to the Christmas holiday without actually offending any members of minority non-Christian religions, a candle sitting on a bed of holly is the way to go.

What is this obsession with beach balls and palm trees? Most people don’t even own a beach ball and I haven’t had one since I was a kid. Why not put up giant flip-flops around the town? I think Wildwood Crest uses starfish and shells for their summer lighting decorations, but why have any at all? Hey, I know, let’s adorn the streets with lights in the shape of the tramcar. They can add speakers that blare all over town, “Watch the tramcar, please!”

Rosenello said that the improvement district had a budget of about $350,000, of which about $125,000 goes for infrastructure and other fixes to brighten the street. The rest goes to the free Dolly the Trolley, which hauls shoppers (huh?) and other visitors around the downtown. The rest goes for advertising and marketing.

This trolley would be a good idea if it had any type of schedule, or if it ran reasonable routes. Whenever I see it go by it usually has very few riders. Once we had a real bus service which ran the length of Pacific Avenue. We sometimes out walked it, rather than waiting for it, but if your feet were tired and sore it would eventually come along.

Rosenello said the district hopes to work with the city in the coming year to improve the lights along Ocean Avenue that were installed several years ago. He said many are in bad shape. However, he forgot to mention how stupid they look even when they’re in good shape.

Don’t worry, though, because Wildwood never has a real problem with spending money, whether local taxpayers’ funds, or grant money from the state, which is divided among all of us residents of the state. Some people think that grant money from the state is free money. It’s not free, and municipalities can always find a way to spend it on useless projects.

The only thing the city never seems to have money for is repaving most of the streets, which get worse every day. The city is threatening to repave part of New Jersey Avenue (one of the worst), but not all of it. I mean, what’s more important, level, paved, streets, or beach balls and palm trees?

The district also installed, or will install, banners that read “Eat. Drink. Shop.” If that doesn’t bring the shoppers in, I don’t know what will, other than having actual stores to shop in.

We mailed a package, via the United States Postal Service, using Priority Mail, to our daughter and son-in-law on December 19, a Monday, and were told that it would be delivered by Thursday, the 22nd. We sent it via the mail because we knew UPS doesn’t deliver on weekends, just in case it was a bit late. It never made it for Christmas, and Monday, the 26th, was a postal holiday. They finally received the package today, which is Wednesday, December 28.

I keep seeing TV ads telling us to use the USPS. It now says it’s going under and needs a bailout. Back in the day, the U. S. Post Office prided itself on always delivering the mail, through rain, sleet, and snow, or something to that effect. Now it laments the use of email, which it says has affected revenues. But is email the bane of the USPS’s woes?

Okay, maybe I could believe that if FedEx and UPS weren’t flourishing and delivering on time, but both of them are, especially FedEx. I find it amazing that a company could be so bold as to guarantee delivery the next day and then to actually follow through on it! I recently sent some info to a doctor in Philadelphia and FedEx guaranteed delivery within two days, or one day if I wanted to pay twice as much.

FedEx has its own area at most airports, including a shipping office. When I worked some out-of-town jobs which required equipment, we always went to the FedEx office at the airport and shipped our equipment home, which was much easier than putting it on the airplane as baggage.

The latest figures I could find say that the USPS has 17 727s operated by a private company, but sends most of its mail by commercial airlines. UPS had, at last count, 266 airplanes, and leases additional planes during the Christmas rush. FedEx has 344 planes and usually has more on the ground at its Memphis hub than the entire USPS fleet. These figures pretty much tell the tale as to which organizations are most efficient.

The USPS has created many of its own problems, including a benefits and pension plan that is helping to bankrupt the organization. My uncle, who retired as an RFD carrier, said that, once a year, they sent a person to go with him on his route to evaluate his performance. He bragged that he would deliberately take much longer than usual and they would either give him more money or take part of his route away from him. In the real world he would have been fired.

During any time other than the Christmas season, he usually finished his deliveries by one o’clock in the afternoon and was home shortly thereafter. He worked six days a week, which really worked out to about four days, if one considered the hours put in.

Our mailman during my youth seemed in no hurry to get rid of his load. During my teen years I would anxiously await a letter from one or more girls (I couldn’t help that they lived out of town) and the mailman would sit on a bench by the custard stand shooting the bull for a couple of hours.

The post office in town is large, and used to be a hub of activity. Now, only half of it is used, and the lines are always long.

Considering inflation, 44 cents (or whatever it is) for first class mail isn’t really outrageous, when inflation comes into play. That’s only 8.8 times as much as back in the 1963, when a candy bar cost a nickel, the same as a postage stamp. Try finding that same candy bar for 44 cents!

Also, back in the day, I had only to walk a block to mail a letter at the small mailbox on the corner. Other, larger, boxes sat at many corners all over town, and some had snorkels, making it possible to mail a letter without getting out of the car. Now only a few mailboxes exist, usually at a shopping center, and it’s considerably more inconvenient to mail a letter. It somehow became way too much trouble for the post office to pick up mail at the boxes.

Many people used to send out Christmas cards unsealed, with the flap tucked in. Why? Well, if it was unsealed it only required three cents postage instead of the five for a sealed envelope. This applied to any letter, not just postcards, and it had to do with third class mail instead of first class mail. The theory then was that it could be inspected, if necessary, so they tell me.

Chapter Two, Section 558, of the U. S. Postal code makes it illegal to send a letter by private carrier, with the penalty, if caught, of fifty dollars per incident. Apparently it’s okay, however, if there is some urgency involved, and that must be stated on the outside of the envelope. Strangely enough, the USPS uses FedEx for delivering its priority mail, express mail, and first class mail, and has FedEx boxes in many post offices.

If you suddenly realize it’s Grandma’s birthday and you only have two days to get a card to her, you probably won’t get caught if you send it via FedEx, the company that will guarantee delivery on time. It’s much cheaper to use the USPS rather than FedEx or UPS, which both charge the same rates. Neither seems to be concerned about the cheaper rates offered by the USPS. I wonder why. . .

“Happy Holidays,” is what they tell us is politically correct, because it offends no one. That is, unless you consider the millions of Americans offended by not saying, “Merry Christmas.”

Okay, so what holidays are we talking about? Let me see, most people don’t go Hanukkah shopping, or Kwanzaa shopping, so aren’t we talking about Christmas?

In my younger days, starting with grade school, the Jewish kids in my class celebrated Christmas. Of course they celebrated Hanukkah, but they celebrated Christmas also. I don’t know if this was true in all cases, but I knew many Jewish friends who celebrated Christmas.

In my earlier adult life I used to get a Christmas card from a Jewish guy who was the prosecutor for the township where I worked, and one year I ended up with three Christmas cards from him. He told me his wife was in charge of sending cards and she must have forgotten she had already sent one – oops – I mean two.

Neil Diamond and a number of other Jewish singers have made Christmas albums, and that’s what they called them. They didn’t call them “Holiday Albums,” and they didn’t sing “holiday carols.”

So how did this aversion to Christmas come about? Well, it started, I suppose, with ruffled feathers by either an atheist or someone who is of a religion other than Christian. Attacks on local governments to remove all things Christmas were pushed by the ACLU in yet more attempts to secularize America and make it ripe for transforming the government into a communistic form.

Also, in my earlier adult life friends would say things such as, “We’ll have to get together over the holidays.” When is “over the holidays?” I used to get part of Christmas Eve and all of Christmas Day off, so were we talking two days as “over the holidays?” Or were New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day included, because neither was open for me. New Year’s Eve used to feature the Sugar Bowl, and New Year’s Day featured the Gator, Cotton, Rose, and Orange Bowls, so I was not likely to be free from watching those games.

Between Christmas and New Year’s I usually worked, although hardly anyone else did, so they couldn’t have been talking about that time as “over the holidays.”

Consider the gall of some retail chains that promote happy holidays without mentioning Christmas. Can anyone think of a sillier way to thank the shoppers who are shopping for CHRISTMAS presents, than to refuse to acknowledge the holiday responsible for the increase in sales?

Congressmen have been instructed that putting “Merry Christmas” on a (duh) Christmas card is unacceptable if they want it to be paid for by taxpayers. Obama sent out a holiday card, but what would one expect from a Muslim?

Christmas is nothing to be ashamed of, and those offended by it, or the mere mention of it should sedate themselves with a tranquilizer and let the rest of us celebrate our holiday.

I come from a country that celebrated Christmas in schools, in the workplace, and in stores. Some schools (actually most) would put on a Christmas Pageant, and it included singing Christmas songs and carols and often involved a creche. Oh, wait! That was this country!

Donating to charities is good, right, especially during this time of year? Well. . . maybe, and much of it depends on the particular charity.

Some NPOs (non-profit organizations) are nothing more than businesses looking for a way to rake in tax-free money. An NPO, as the name suggests, cannot turn a profit, but that doesn’t mean it can’t pay its officers exorbitant salaries, and many do.

If you’re thinking of donating to a charity, plenty of information is available on line as to how much of that money you donate actually goes to the cause for which it’s intended. It’s not unreasonable for an organization to have operating costs as well as salaries, but it’s unreasonable to expect those costs and salaries to make up the major percentage of the donated cash and items.

I stopped giving to the United Way many, many years ago, but that was just a decision I reached after reading about the exorbitant salaries of its officers back then. I also thought it was really just a scam that someone thought up, with the concept of donating to many charities through one organization. Well, that was another part of the problem – I didn’t want my money going to organizations such as Planned Parenthood, which is responsible for killing many babies, and sometimes the potential mothers. Yes, women still die from abortions, even in “safe” clinics.

In many ways, the Salvation Army helps a lot of needy people, but I spent 33 years married to the daughter of two officers in the SA, and it was a bit of an eye opener. I’m not really trying to bash the organization itself, but I was aware of some things that offended me.

Her parents, who were captains when I met my wife, made it to the rank of major before retiring. They were always given a home to live in, a vehicle, and I believe they got a food and clothing allowance, as well as excellent medical benefits.

For Brevity, I’ll refer to my ex mother-in-law as “Mrs. Major.” Her favorite role was to put on the poor mouth and whine about how little they got paid. This amazed me, not because I thought they got paid more, but because they had a whole lot more money than they would have at the salary she said they got.

For years they lived a good drive away, and when they visited, Mr. Major always had a wad of cash that would make my eyes pop out!

Let’s see, at Christmas time, when the kettles were out, Mrs. Major would lock herself in a room to count the cash. The SA always gets loads of money during the Christmas season, with the bell ringers planted everywhere. In the small churches they oversaw, I don’t think they got much in the collections, but Salvation Army Corps have to be self-sustaining. Part of that comes from the thrift store, if the corps has one. But the Salvation Army doesn’t have to worry much about that any more.

Ray Kroc’s wife left money to a number of charities and she left 1.7 billion to the Salvation Army. In Augusta, Georgia the Army built a new corps with the money, and the Ray and Joan Kroc Corps Community Center sits on 17 acres near the Augusta Canal. They earmarked $33.9 million for construction and $33.9 million for an operational endowment, provided Augusta raised another $30 million for the endowment. The Salvation Army has earmarked sufficient funds from its operations budget in Augusta to reduce the new money required to be raised locally from $30 million to $20 million.  Once the campaign ended with over $22 million raised for the operating endowment, The Salvation Army in Augusta received a $33.9 million community center with a permanent operations endowment of over $55 million.

The Salvation Army’s Kroc Corps Community Center will contain over 100,000 square feet of programming space including a 77,000 sq ft complex located on a 17 acre site in the historic mill community of Harrisburg.  Nestled along the Augusta Canal, the center campus is comprised of one main building designed to complement the nearby Sibley Mill and King Mill and a 10,000 square foot building that will house the First Stop Family Service Center.  In addition, there will be expansive park space and several historic homes and even a historic church renovated for programming on the campus.

But back to the majors. Back in the 70s, when Pulsar watches came out as probably the first digital watches, they had to get one for each of them, even though they went for over $300.00. You couldn’t read the darned things in the sunlight, but that wasn’t a problem, because they got tired of them rather quickly.

Also in the 70s, she gave me and her two sons Seiko watches she bought at Bailey, Banks, and Biddle, and they seemed to have every gadget known to man at the time. Yes, she generally shopped in the finest stores. She bought an expensive sewing machine on a whim, although I never knew her to do much sewing. She often bought things and gave them away, and she gave me a camera she had bought for herself as well as a guitar. I wasn’t ungrateful, but wondered why someone would buy something and then give it away?

I would like to say they were the exception, rather than the rule, but I met a number of Salvation Army officers during my 33 years, and none of them seemed to be anywhere close to poor.

One thing that bothered me was that they would get in a shipment of donated food, mostly canned goods, and would stock their pantry first, and see what was left over for the needy.

What bothered me the most was the holy roller attitude versus their actions. They usually had a scripture of the day posted on a white board, and Christian books sat just about everywhere in the house. The radio was tuned to only Christian stations.

However, when they wanted to go see an R-rated movie, they went, and saw no problem with it.

Mrs. Major, my wife, and I were in a cafeteria-style restaurant where the waitress brought drinks, kept them filled, and also brought yeast rolls to the table. Mrs. Major told me that when she and her husband came there they wouldn’t leave a tip if, after finishing their meal, the waitress didn’t ask them if they would like some coffee. On this occasion the waitress asked if we wanted anything else and the Mrs. said she would like coffee. Then she told me she wasn’t going to leave a tip because the waitress didn’t ask her if she wanted some coffee. I said that the waitress asked if we wanted anything else, and she replied, “Yes, but she didn’t ask if I wanted coffee.” Only after I said I would leave a tip did she finally leave something.

We decided to name our second daughter, Alisa. When we told them about it, he said, in a very loud voice, that no granddaughter of his was going to be named Alisa. I told him that we get to pick the names of our children, so these good Christians shunned Alisa for at least a couple of years, because she had a name they disagreed with.

They came to visit once in a station wagon that had a rear seat at the back, facing rearward. I told them I didn’t want our girls riding in that seat, but I learned from our daughters that they ignored our wishes. It was the same thing when I said I didn’t want either of them riding in the front seat, and didn’t want them riding without a seat belt. Good Christians, ignoring the instructions of parents.

So now it’s the Christmas season and the Salvation Army is at it again, asking for donations. In Augusta, it takes credit for distributing new toys and clothing to over 2,000 families under the Angel Tree Assistance program. An officer at the Augusta Salvation Army stated that this program would not be possible without those who have adopted angels and volunteered at the Christmas Center. Duh! So, does the SA buy toys and clothing for these people? Well, they rent the building where people bring the donated items, and they get volunteers to help with the distribution, so whatever floats your boat, I suppose. At least with the Angel Tree Assistance program, each donor adopts an angel on the tree and provides an item, so they probably all end up where they were intended.

I suppose we’re all hypocrites in one way or the other, but I think if you’re a minister of God and go around professing your faith you should live your life accordingly, and I don’t think that includes stealing from donations, whether food or money.

Some people just don’t understand acceptable condiments for certain food items. While growing up in South Jersey, whenever I went in a store to buy a sub (hoagie to some) no one ever asked me what I wanted on it, other than whether or not I wanted hot peppers. I first became alarmed while living in Georgia, where I bought subs at Publix, a supermarket. They had a regular sub shop near the deli, and whoever was making my sub would ask me whether I wanted mustard or mayo. Ugh! On a sub? I told them just oil and vinegar, although they didn’t have a blend, so they usually squirted the vinegar all over the place.

Southerners (probably natives, judging from the way they talked) often said yes to the mustard and mayo and the sub assembler would slap it on generously with a big spatula. I considered this an abomination! In the method of Subway, I had to tell them each item I wanted on a sub, such as tomatoes, lettuce, etc. That’s not the way it used to work here. Back then I would walk in the place and say I wanted a sub without peppers and they put it together. They didn’t have American subs, or Italian subs, or Irish subs (if there is such a thing); they just had subs. Sure, you could order a tuna sub or a provolone cheese sub, because back then, many of us didn’t eat meat on Fridays. Each place had its own blend of oil, and that’s what you got. The modern places offer many different types of subs, and some of the ones I see advertised by Subway look truly ridiculous. At Wawa you order your sub almost piece-by-piece from a touch screen.

Of course, South Jersey and Philly are both noted for cheesesteaks, and there’s no mystery there. The standard in South Jersey was and still is, American cheese, although some use provolone. In Philly, where cheesesteaks supposedly originated, they push Cheez Whiz, although they’ll put on American or provolone for the asking. An alternative is the pizza steak, but since Grasso’s Four G’s closed many moons ago, there’s little sense in ordering a pizza steak anywhere else. I know, because I’ve tried, always hoping for something magical to happen, but it never does.

Next comes the proper dressing for a hot dog. Most sensible adults agree that catsup (or ketchup, if you prefer) has no business even coming in contact with a hot dog, something I tried to explain to my oldest daughter for years. Mustard remains the prepared condiment of choice, and other things may be added, such as onions and green relish, two of my favorites. I’m not going to mention once again my favorite hot dog joint on the boardwalk for years, but, in fairness, there used to be a place in Newport, Rhode Island that sold Coney Island hot dogs that ranked near the top of any I’ve eaten. I’m sure it’s there no longer, as this was at least 44 years ago, but the chili sauce the place used was excellent – no beans, of course, and not too hot, but the buns were steamed and the dogs very tasty. Yes, it was acceptable to put mustard on the chili, as well as chopped onions.

Some people like sauerkraut on a dog, but I’m not one of them. I don’t like eating anything that causes me to make an unpleasant face, and sauerkraut does that. I can eat a kraut dog, however. In the south, slaw dogs are popular, and it means just what it says – a hot dog covered with coleslaw.

Then there’s the Chicago-style hot dog that’s a bit of an abomination in my mind. It starts with a poppy seed bun and then they pile on mustard, chopped onions, green relish (sounds okay so far), dill pickle spear, tomato slices or wedges, pickled sport peppers, and some celery salt. A hot dog loaded up like that is very difficult to eat, and half of the stuff shouldn’t even be there, in my humble opinion, but, I’m not from Chicago. I don’t even like Chicago, and when I went on liberty while in boot camp at Great Lakes, I went to Milwaukee. I don’t know what their hot dogs are like and really don’t care.

I almost left out the Texas Hot Wiener. In most places, this is a hot dog, often a knockwurst, or that size, that is covered in a hot chili sauce. In my youth, my father used to buy Texas hot wieners from Jim’s Lunch, in Millville, NJ, which has been going strong since 1923. Jim’s uses a sauce sans meat and they put it on both the wieners and the hamburgers. Back in the 60s I thought it tasted better, and now it lacks consistency. I’ve seen the grill man add grease to the pot of sauce from time-to-time, so I guess it depends on when you happen to be there. Also, these days they tend to not cook the dogs enough, and that detracts from the experience.

Can we move onto hamburgers, please? Okay, you can put just about anything on a hamburger, although I don’t see sauerkraut as a viable option. My own formula is that if the burger has a tomato slice on it, catsup and mayo are the preferred condiments. Without the ‘mater, I prefer mustard and catsup. Some of my favorite burgers of the past are no longer made. Torelli’s, also in Millville, NJ made burgers with a special sauce that was quite different from Jim’s. When Joe Torelli died, apparently the recipe died with him. The place opened up under a new name, and the new owner claimed to have the recipe for the sauce, but he obviously didn’t. Jim’s burgers used to be quite good, but I don’t like them as much these days, just like the wieners.

The other place that turned out surprisingly good burgers was the Beef Corral, which has been gone for some time. When it opened back in the early sixties burgers were fifteen cents, just like at that other place, but these tasted much better. They weren’t large, but they were good, and that’s about all I can say about them.

Now you can buy much more fancy burgers at these “upscale” places, with just about anything you want on them. They usually offer a bacon burger, a ranch burger (with barbecue sauce) a mushroom burger, and many others. Almost all places offer a burger with blue cheese, something I’ll never understand. I’m not sure why people have such a penchant for moldy cheese, or moldy anything, for that matter. I won’t rate the chain burger joints, because not everyone likes what I like, but they all pretty much offer similar fare, with some differences.

I don’t think we need to go into pizza, but suffice it to say that some pizza toppings have reached the point of being ridiculous. Yes, we have some good pizza places in South Jersey, but the best pizza is found at Roma’s, in Augusta, Georgia, and you’d better hurry, because the same guy has been running the place for about 30 years.