I left all areas North of the Mason\/Dixon line almost 25 years ago.\u00a0 There was a return to Boston for a few years when a relationship got serious with a girl there but the truth is, I\u2019m not really a Northeast kind of guy.\u00a0 It\u2019s a fun place to visit\u2026 but perhaps best visited in short bursts.\u00a0 I love some people in this part of the country, but I find the area, especially in wintry weather, to be, um\u2026 trying.<\/p>\n
This is especially true in a return to what I guess could be considered my hometown.\u00a0 Albeit at this stage, I\u2019m not sure it can be a homecoming when you don\u2019t really think of it as home anymore.\u00a0 From the time I touched down in the Philadelphia Airport, I was reminded of why I was moved to move for college\u2026 and beyond.\u00a0 In November the weather turns cold, and dark, and damp, and dreary, and, well, the best way I think I can describe it is oppressively depressing.\u00a0 I need sunshine and while there were times when the sun broke through, there was just a sense of\u2026 ominous ennui to the place.<\/p>\n
I readily admit the place is haunted for me, stray memories of youth intermingled with ghosts both personal and locational.\u00a0 I\u2019ll always miss you, supposed mafia front Italian restaurant O Sole Mio<\/em>.\u00a0 But driving through the small main street of Malvern, PA, I was struck by how relieved I am that I\u2019m not living here anymore.<\/p>\n Part of that feeling was enhanced by my biased interactions with the locals.\u00a0 To me, the cold weather prompts people to bundle up, put their heads down, and focus on getting from point A to point B as fast as possible\u2026 and to hell with anyone else.\u00a0 Courtesy and friendliness take a massive backseat to the necessity of motion.\u00a0 So I already had these vibe of people disdaining me as a person be it as a pedestrian or a driver; of the latter, I noticed those in cars in this area might be amongst the worst drivers I\u2019ve seen.\u00a0 And I live in Orlando where the majority of drivers are tourists unfamiliar with the roads and driving rental cars they aren\u2019t familiar with, and all living in vacation mindset which seems to divorce them from reality and the needs to, I don\u2019t know, pay attention in any way, shape or form.\u00a0 The Philly drivers meanwhile seemed to drive recklessly on purpose, as if the grit and grime of salted roads during winter time created an enveloping force field on their cars that made them think they were impervious to damage\u2026 or at least damage they would care about.<\/p>\n Separate from the drivers, I continually felt like Pennsylvania was trying to nickel and dime me on every little thing.\u00a0 Prices would be marked but then I\u2019d be billed just a bit more.\u00a0 It started when I picked up my rental car and was charged local taxes and fees that ran 110% of my rental price.\u00a0 And the city of Philadelphia recently enacted a sin tax on soda such that there\u2019s a surcharge on drinks.\u00a0 I had forgotten that when my $1 soda came out to $1.89, which included the surcharge and a tax the list price and the surcharge.\u00a0 Except later I would buy the same size $1 soda and the price was only $1.64.\u00a0 I was still in Center City so it wasn\u2019t like there was a different city tax rate.\u00a0 I don\u2019t know if the tax is less on weekends\u2026 or maybe they just charge a random amount based on whims.\u00a0 But considering the tax was to provide a disincentive to soda consumption and to fund I suppose anti-obesity efforts, I wanted to pull up my MarathonGuide.com race history and say, \u201chey, ya know what?\u00a0 Maybe you need to look at an exemption for me.\u201d\u00a0 But that elitist attitude is wrong headed \u2013 I should be supportive of measures to get people to pursue a healthier lifestyle.\u00a0 And yet at the same time \u2013 NWMDC, ya know what I\u2019m saying?\u00a0 Not With My Diet Coke, yeah?<\/p>\n The gas prices are also closer to California than Florida\u2026 and I guess I should have filled up in New Jersey when I stayed there one night before the Rocky Run.\u00a0 Even with their insane \u201call stations are full service\u201d rules, they were a good 40 cents CHEAPER than Pennsylvania.<\/p>\n Look, I know I\u2019m being petty talking about pennies but there are also dollars involved here. \u00a0While I mind less (though still mind some) overpaying when it\u2019s for family or friends, when it\u2019s just me and I feel like I personally am throwing money away on silly old me, well, it cuts somehow much, much deeper.<\/p>\n I got GPS routed onto the PA turnpike and didn\u2019t want to pay the daily usage fee of the rental car for their EZ pass device.\u00a0 So I dutifully pulled through the cash lane entryway to get my ticket.\u00a0 The problem is, the PA turnpike didn\u2019t tell me the exit I was supposed to take was an EZ Pass ONLY exit\u2026 or at least they didn\u2019t tell me until I passed the last exit before it that I could have used my ticket.\u00a0 I wound up then driving an extra 10 miles to get to the next ticket booth exit\u2026 10 miles which cost an additional $3 on the turnpike.\u00a0 It all felt like a scam to screw the tourists.\u00a0 And Florida is guilty of that too but at least there the odds of warm sunshine are higher.<\/p>\n Sigh. \u00a0Rant, rant, rant. \u00a0Woe is me. \u00a0I\u2019m a victim. \u00a0I know, I know. \u00a0This has veered from fun running\/traveling tales into a therapy session.<\/p>\n I sound like a spoiled rotten brat, I know.\u00a0 But seriously, this town and I just aren\u2019t meant for each other.\u00a0 Maybe we never were.\u00a0 The final insult to injury came as I arrived at the airport.\u00a0 I used to love that PHL had a policy wherein the prices charged inside the airport had to match what you\u2019d pay outside the airport \u2013 it was designed to discourage price gouging and to put a thumb on the scale of supply and demand given that we all are a captive audience here inside security.\u00a0 And yet in the years since I was last here, that policy has clearly been abandoned.\u00a0 A sandwich from a deli chain that should be IRL<\/em> real life $5 to $6 was running $9 to $10 here at the terminal.<\/p>\n I\u2019m just going to come out and say it.\u00a0 I kinda hate you, Pennsylvania.\u00a0 I suspect your definition of \u201cbrotherly love\u201d that you use to market Philadelphia is much more aligned with passive aggressive rough housing and abuse than what I view as my relationship with my brother Steve.\u00a0 So I\u2019ve paid my taxes and fees and tolls and arbitrary penalties for visiting you.\u00a0 I look forward to having dinner with my brother some day soon and NOT feeling like I\u2019ve been ripped off.<\/p>\n Perhaps as a reminder of what is really important you have succeeded; you just made me not want to come back any time soon.<\/p>\n Fortunately for your city and state coffers you have some of my favorite people in the world here.\u00a0 I suggest you treat your residents better than you treat your visitors.<\/p>\n Huffily and puffily (in more ways than one), I am Kevin S. Hanna.<\/p>\n And I approved this message.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I left all areas North of the Mason\/Dixon line almost 25 years ago.\u00a0 There was a return to Boston for a few years when a relationship got serious with a girl there but the truth is, I\u2019m not really a Northeast kind of guy.\u00a0 It\u2019s a fun place to visit\u2026 but perhaps best visited in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-29641","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/runkevinrun.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29641","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/runkevinrun.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/runkevinrun.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/runkevinrun.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/runkevinrun.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=29641"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/runkevinrun.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29641\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/runkevinrun.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=29641"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/runkevinrun.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=29641"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/runkevinrun.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=29641"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}