My Christmas Vacation, Part III: The Flo'

Florence, South Carolina is a sleepy little city. It has a population of over 32,000 souls and celebrated its birthday on Christmas Eve. Florence is now, as Willard Scott would say, 120 years young.

Florence (or "The Flo'" as I have decided to call it) is fairly rural, with big box stores and strip malls peppered throughout. The downtown, like many downtown areas around the country, is run-down and many storefronts with boarder up windows. The businesses that are there include some "urban" clothing stores, salons/barbershops, liquor stores, and pawn shops. Two years ago my mother decided to give my sisters and I a "tour" of the tiny downtown. We drove past this one...gentleman...standing in front of one of the abandoned storefronts. My mother pointed at him and said something like "look at that guy." The fellow noticed my mother's pointing and made a gesture of his own, his in the shape of a gun, and pointed it at us and said "merry Christmas." To this day my mother sees nothing wrong with she she did.

There is a gas station about a mile from my parents' crib that I've been frequenting for pop and newspapers. It's called "Ken's Corner" and is owned and operated by Ken and Frannie, two Sikhs from India (something tells me their names may have been Westernized). They are very nice, and now Frannie is excited to see me (maybe because I still have my teeth and don't speak like an idiot).

Next door from Ken's Corner is George's Package Store. The corner liquor stores are called package shops, and I really like that. I'm assuming it's called George's: the sign in the window says "Georges Package Store" so maybe it is owned by a Frenchman.

I saw a little person walking out of the CVS. She was of color, wore cowboy boots, and was hauling a lot of junk in her trunk. She climbed into a small black pick-up truck with lots of chrome and some craaaazy hubcaps. It was pretty great.

The Flo' isn't big on sidewalks. The only streets that have them, as far as I can tell, are the major roads, and those don't have crossing signals. It is kind of like Frogger walking out here. Except fun.

I wish I could tell you more about The Flo', but seriously, that's all there is to it.