Wednesday, August 17, 2005

Avoid the Southern New Jersey Beaches at All Costs: Prologue

by the Juice

Prologue?!?!?!? WTFMFF is a prologue? And you probably thought the Juice wouldn’t know such words. Well, you know what I’ve got to say to that: I do! Go Farmington Hills Library!

Welcome to my new series: Why to Avoid the Southern New Jersey Beaches at All Costs. I gotta set the tone here, right at the beginnin’. Imagine this series to be a combination of my Tales from the Vacation series and The Kingdom of Magic Isn’t for Kids series. Only with more venom. I’m like a rattler about to sink my fangs into Ocean City, NJ. Believe you me, all the love I have for Disney World won’t be reflected here. That’s fo dang sho.


How can I have such anger at a place after one visit? That’s where you are wrong. Wrong, sir! Wrong! I’ve had my fair share of trips to the Jersey shore. Most of them to Ocean City. However, the last few years we’ve been stayin’ in Margate. If you take out your Monopoly boards, you’ll find it on there somewhere. I think it’s one of those properties no one ever buys. I’m real tempted to go off here on the game of Monopoly and how I’ve never finished a game of it, but I’ll save that for another post. Stay on target! Stay on target! For those of you who don’t know, or don’t care, Margate sits conveniently between Atlantic City (boring!) and Ocean City. Apparently, it’s where the rich folks (or the folks who think they’re rich) have their summer homes judgin’ by all the fancy gardens around and Lexus, Mercedes and Cadillacs that cruise thru the streets. I tell ya, there’s nothin’ more predictable than a dude goin’ thru a mid-life crisis. You see all the “cool” dudes drivin’ around Margate in their “cool”, expensive cars. It’s like teenagers crusin’ your local mall. Only more pathetic, and durin’ the day. ‘Cause Margate shuts down at night. Don’t be lookin’ for ice cream at 10:30 pm. Unless you like the boxed kind at your local Piggly Wiggly, or whatever grocery store you folks up north shop at. Probably Northerns R Us. So much for stayin’ on target…


The missus has family that own a shore house in Margate, that we visit on a yearly basis. The house that is. I don’t go near the missus’ family. Talk about your undesirables. In case you were wonderin’ though, that’s how a guy like the Juice ends up in Margate. Certainly not ‘cause he’s puttin’ on airs or wants to feel all high and mighty.

It seems the older the Juice gets, the less I enjoy the shore. I used to love when my ol’ man and his wife would take me and my sister to the Jersey shore. It would suck that I’d have to spend most of the day watchin’ my sister, cause the ol’ man and his wife would disappear for hours at a time, but otherwise it was a good time. Now, though, I can’t stand the beach. Which is where my story begins…well, just about. Hence the Prologue.


We had the beach house from Monday to Thursday. The missus wanted to leave on Sunday night. It’s a bit of a long drive, and I was havin’ no parts of it. Not that that mattered. We still “left” on Sunday night. And what a mistake! We got in the car around 7 pm. Why so late? Well for one, the person who was suppose to watch the mutt, Snowflake, didn’t come to get the dog. For fun’s sake lets just call this person Un Predictable. See, Un was suppose to pick up the dog in the mornin’. Somethin’ the missus had planned out with her for months. But, we didn’t hear from Un all day. Great! Fucking Great. Finally, around 3 Un decides to call. It kinda went down like this:

“The dog? Oh, yea…I’m gotta get the dog.” Un droned.

“When, Un? We’re suppose to be leaving for the shore soon.” The missus asked concerned

“Yea…I’m gonna git him.” Long hesitation. “Soon…”

“When, Un?”

“Uhhh…soon.” Un replied.

“I just wanna make sure you pick up the dog.”

“Uhhhh…I will. I’ll be over in a little bit. I’m just waitin’ for the paint to peel.”

I wasn’t happy about this turn of events. But, the Juice is only one man. And my portfolio ain’t full of stocks in the mutual fund known as Patience. I figure if Un says she’ll pick up the dog, she would. Eventually. Maybe. Hence the name “Un Predictable”. I just wanted to get on the road. ‘Cause we still had 27 too many errands still to take care of. So, we left the dog to his uncertain future. Don’t worry, don’t worry. I had a back up plan if Un didn’t show up. Please don’t send me any of your forsaken emails…

One of the many errands we had to take care of involved goin’ over to Father Brett’s to pick up the Lucifer’s Pack N Play that we lent to him for his new baby. Which, I’m fairly certain wasn’t used once. Now, Father Brett lives 5 minutes from the ol’ trailer. I shit you not. The Juice has timed it. Five fuck minutes! Sweet, huh! However, the county is fuckin' everyone who lives in Riverdale trailer park. How so? Cause they’ve blocked off the bridge that leads to our local shoppin’ center. So, instead of a convenient 5 minute ride, now you’re starin’ down the barrel of a 15 minute out of your way drive just to get a pint of Ben and Jerry’s (the Juice may be a bit “uncivilized”, but the Juice knows good ice cream when he tastes it. the Juice would never eat No Frills ice cream. He saves that for the kids. Kids are so dumb!) Father Brett lives 2 seconds from the shoppin’ center.


So, we go out of our way to get the Pack N Play (little foreshadowin’ here…the lil bastard never even used the fuckin’ thing! Nice. More on that later!) And…OFF…to the shore, right? Wrong again! We decided to fuck all the other errands and head to the shore. We we’re just about on the main highway out of town when the missus realizes she left a bill back at the house that had to be paid while were away.

“You fuckin' me, woman?” I ask slammin’ on the brakes in the middle of the four lane road. I give the missus the evilest eye I could muster. “I mean it feels like I’m bein’ fucked, but I got all my clothes on.”

Know what she says? “Does, it look like I’m fuckin’ ya?”

Touche! So now, we’ve gotta travel the 12 minutes back to the house. Which doesn’t sound very far, but when you’ve already spent close to 45 minutes in the car and haven’t left a 5 mile radius of your house, it’s gettin’ to be a bit ridiculous.

Up next: Guess who still hadn’t picked up the fucking dog?