This is just one of the wonderful things about living in a touristy/weather refuge/retirement paradise-type place.
I once (briefly) considered a job in a town on the Maine coast. I figured that once the snow melted and it got decent outdoors, all the beach spots and clam hangouts would be deluged with visitors and I’d be fighting for parking spaces.
You live in a popular spot with crappy weather for at least half the year, whether Maine, Michigan, Arizona or Florida, you figure you’ll have plenty of company for when it’s nice out, and you remember who in fact do pay the bills for, if not you personally, a lot of your neighbors. Or you bitch and moan.
Unless there is a direct correlation between age and assholishness, I see no problem with snowbirds. All the OP’s complaints are equally valid for any “entitled” idiot or nuisance tourist.
The one thing that makes elderly assholes different from regular assholes, is the decades of reaffirming incidents of douchebaggery getting them what they want. They’ve honed their craft to a level above the normal asshole but that certainly is not limited to just snowbirds.
Depends on where you come from. I met some people way up north in Canada. They went south for the winter. They went to Sault St. Marie.
Fudgies comes from the Mackinac area fudge companies near the bridge. Tourists buy the fudge and walk around with a brick in their back pockets.
Snowbird: But I can’t afford that $1 item. I’m on a fixed income*.
*Said as they root around their keys to the $50K Caddy and front-door keys of their 1/2 million dollar “winter” house (not to be confused with the 1/2 million dollar “Summer house”) looking for the $1 in nickles and pennies.
Did they buy your $1 item? Did you profit? They are called “customers” at that point. If you don’t like customers, ignore them. They will probably go away.
Actually, this experience was about 15 years ago in my retail days and yes, she did buy the $1 item. It took her 10 minutes to pay for that $1 item with nickles. It was a Radio Shack battery that she was miffed about paying for in the first place because she didn’t have her Free Battery/Month card on her.
In the meantime, other salespeople are getting my commissions from people who aren’t on “fixed incomes”*. Or the people who walked out the door because I couldn’t help them fast enough. Who knows what I could have sold them!! Let’s face it, very few retirees here in Tampa were buying computers, VCR’s, stereo equipment, etc.
I could have ignored them just fine and made MORE of a profit.
*What the hell is a “fixed income”, anyway? I’m salaried. I’M ON A FIXED INCOME!!!
In 1981, there was a wonderful song parody making its rounds of the radio stations. It was called “The Snowbird Song” by Johnny and the Leisure Suits and was set to the tune of “The Night Owl” by the Little River Band.
This site has the story behind the song, the lyrics, and the link to an MP3 recording for those of you who remember it, would like a chuckle, or would just like to experience a moment of recreational outrage.
That’s not limited to snowbirds - all immigrants (either from in country or out of country) are guilty of that. We experience that A LOT in Calgary, since we are the economic powerhouse of Canada right now and everyone wants in on the gravy train.
That’s certainly not limited to snowbirds, either - they try to pull that crap at home a lot, too. Yeah, your income is “fixed” at $7500 per month - boo freakin’ hoo. Enjoy that pension you’re sucking down, because most of us aren’t going to be seeing anything like it.
You know, it looks like snowbirds are just regular people - assholes like the rest of us. Maybe they seem worse because they’re concentrated.
I’m sorry Scarlett–I’m sure your parents are wonderful people. But–the majority (maybe 8 out of 10 I run into on a daily basis) are rude and snobbish. Mr. Hellpaso is an anesthesia provider and has them rudely try to order him around, refuse to answer questions, and just be all-around assholes. (would you do that to someone who was getting ready to take you down to near death levels and bring you back?) They seem to take the attitude that they are so far above us poor people who live in the Rio Grande Valley year-round. And OMG! You wouldn’t believe the line around the liquor stores on Wednesday when they offer a 10% senior discount. And you know what? I’m sick of seeing fucking “scrapple” in the freezer at the grocery store. I’m in TEXAS, goddammit!:smack:
What’s always occurred to me when I’ve seen people complain about snowbirders is that the attitude seems to correlate to something that was said on cruise ships back in the mid-to-late 80s. Your first day on board, when they’d have a bit of passenger “orientation” someone was sure to say something along the lines of “you’re not in the real world here, here, you’re on Vacation. The rules do not apply. You are the king. You are the queen. Do whatever you want to do. And remember chances are extremely slim that you will ever see any of these people ever again.”
In short, they gave people carte blanche to wear shorts or appear in their bathing suits at the pools or on the beach, no matter what their bodies looked like. They made it okay to get a little drunk and dance like a fool at the nightclub. If someone wanted to eat three rich, extravagant meals, plus go to an ice-cream sundae bar mid-afternoon, a wine and cheese tasting after dinner and the frightening (for the hour) midnight buffet and stuff themselves like crazy at all of the above? Go for it. The normal conditions people placed upon themselves, the regular limits to behavior, were said not to apply.
I think a lot of snowbirds have that 80s cruise ship mentality. Their time in the sun is not real life, it’s not Vacation, but it is WinterTime. And normal conditions do not apply. Sadly this isn’t limited to things like how they eat or if they put on a pair of shorts (oh, Uncle Stanley, no!) but in how they treat people and behave within the non-WinterTime society as well. All the rules seem to be suspended. And, like cruise ship passengers (“there wouldn’t be an cruise industry if it weren’t for us!”) they’ve convinced themselves that it’s all okay because their presence in these places during WinterTime is crucial to said places continued existence.
Sadly, I don’t know what the antidote to that kind of thinking might be.
Well, my dad’s dead now, but I can totally believe that my folks could be obnoxious. My mom can get mighty uppity about making sure she gets her senior discount, and did you know that any restaurant meal that doesn’t include your drink is a RIPOFF??
And I’m hoping that now that my bigot dad is gone, I can get my mom to tone her racism down a bit. Why she complains about all the “scuzzy Mexicans” (oh, but that doesn’t include the one nice Hispanic woman that she knows personally – it’s all the rest who are scum) and then chooses to live among them is beyond me. (They should all learn to talk good English, don’tcha know?) :rolleyes:
LOL,
Scarlett–sorry about your dad. I don’t mean to be nasty, but these winter texans are , as a whole, snobbish and hateful to the locals. As well, the Mexican nationals are not nice to the locals. As an anglo, the Mexican nationals are respectful to me. They tend to be not nice to the local Mexican-Americans. Sorta like the fact the local people have darker skin–they are considered inferior. Not to highjack this thread–but people have no idea about the racism among the Mexicans. You’re better off being anglo in this area. I’ve always found it funny to read in Texas Monthly about how the Mexican National women stroll though the McAllen Walmart in their finery as if they were walking through Neimans!
I recall a sign in the DMV of the tiny Texas town where I went to high school, just adjoining a little resort town. It was very cheerful with perky lettering and said “We don’t CARE how you do it “Up North!””
Guys, it’s not just that they’re Northerners. It’s not just that they’re coming down for the wintertime and have no roots here, no stake in life down here. It’s not just that they complain that this authentic Mexican food is “ooh, just too too spicy, don’t you have anything that doesn’t have… seasonings? I can’t imagine how you eat this” or that they count out their pennies at the grocery store or drive at 35 on the highways.
It’s that they do all these stereotypical oldie things and more – things we’d cheerfully shake our heads at if our own grandmothers did them – all while acting like the most entitled kings and queens of the yard. I have been accosted angrily as a cashier when I informed snowbirds of the price plus sales tax:
“Sales tax?! We don’t have SALES TAX where I come from!”
“Really? We have it here.”
“Well I don’t come from here, I shouldn’t have to pay it. We don’t have to pay these taxes.”
“Ma’am, we do. So we have to charge them.”
“Well, I pay my income tax in Ohio-or-wherever!”
“That’s nice. Maybe Ohio can send us a check. Until then…”
Americans are known (it’s true!) for being very friendly and welcoming toward foreigners. Southerners have a reputation for distrusting Yankees (anyone further north than San Antonio, mostly), it’s true, but from my experience and for the most part a person who behaves politely, laughs at bad jokes, has a beer or at least a lemonade with the folks, and generally does not act like a fuckwit nobleman down from the castle to slum among the common folk finds us to be some of the most welcoming hosts imaginable.
Heck, I’m technically a Yankee and it never brought me trouble. I made trouble all on my own.
And then there are the tragic Small Penis Syndrome snowbirds. They are the ones who buy a motorhome powered by a turbocharged semi drive train. Then every slightest incline becomes a personal challenge to their waning manhood.
It’s entertaining to watch because the pig may fly but it still handles like a motorhome. I’ve seen those big boxes careening down the straightaway and nearly going up on two wheels in a turn as they take their half of the road out of the middle. I can only imagine the poor passengers hanging on for dear life.
Dear God yes. I’m a tax collector. I collect school district taxes from July-December and hear that at least 3 times a week, probably 3 times a day during my busiest season.
I live in Florida year round and on a fixed income to boot. The sun is nice, the beach is nice, and the abundance of doctors of every conceivable specialty is nice. My Darling Marcie is now retired, and she too lives on a fixed income. We both live on fixed incomes. We combine our fixed incomes into our joint checking account. We have a great life, being together every minute of every day mostly because we are unable to go anywhere else.
We can barely afford to breathe at this point, because she has yet to begin receiving her full retirement income due to some idiotic morons who have been incapable of processing her papers during the preceding five months. She is assured, almost daily, that “any day now” her papers will be complete and she will receive her full benefits, plus the back pay due her. I hope we will still be in our house instead of under a damn bridge when it is done. But, what the hell, we could be living up North in the snow with a bunch of snowbirds who couldn’t afford to come down South because they are in the same boat we are.
I’ve been around Winter Texans all my life, never had a problem with them. Yes, they do the “normal” old person stuff like driving slow, taking all the seats at Luby’s, and complaining about shit all the time. But then again teenagers are annoying when they do their normal crap, 20 somethings can be annoying as hell in their own special kind of way, and 30 somethings with their kids can really work people’s nerves.
I like em because they are generally polite Midwest types (are there rude people in Minnesota and Wisconsin?) and they spend a lot of money without using to many public resources. I worked in restaurants and I can’t say that they were any more dickish than anyone else- but again, they were old and slow and some were a bit tight with the tips. But at least we were always busy and everyone got all the work they wanted when they were around.
One time in McDonalds, when I was a young hoodlum, my friend started bullshitting one of them, saying that he was from Missouri too and how much he hated it there and a bunch of other condescending crap. The snowbirds ate it up, not realizing he was lampooning them, but the old guy started telling us about his life experiences and giving us advice. I actually remember a few of the things he said. It was an interesting and positive experience.
However, I can agree with the Rich Mexican National issue- it has been my experience that those guys are more frequently loud and rude and don’t treat service people very well as compared to the general population.
