UNC

Florida was a great place to grow up. But a crazy place to learn how to drive. Traffic is absolutely a nightmare in Miami. All of the crazy New York drivers move down there and honk at you the second a light turns green. They are ALWAYS in a hurry, how can you possibly live your life like that? Type A personality all the way. Then you combine that with the retirees and snowbirds, who are absolutely never in a hurry and do not particularly care if the New Yorker is blasting away on his horn, they will take their time come to nearly a complete stop before making a right. Of course, in the car with my dad, when I just had my Florida Learners Permit, I couldn’t show my impatience. I made that mistake once, griping about a little old lady, and he let me have it. ‘They are old, they are nervous, and by all means, son, do not rush them. They are not good at driving any more, you are just going to make it worse.’  It’s actually a great perspective; my dad can be really smart.

Another funny thing about florida and driving there is Florida Traffic School. There is now a florida online traffic school that you can do on the web. But when I was there, I got a ticket and had to go to traffic school. They basically read the Florida Drivers Handbook to you, it is so boring. I seriously did not learn one thing. But it was required and saved me some money and points off my license. There were some people taking the course that were not required, they just wanted to learn about driving in florida. Many people from Cuba and Puerto Rico--do they drive on the right or left there? I think only countries associated with the UK drive on the left, like Cayman Islands. Anyhow,  I wish I’d had an opportunity to take the course online, but the Florida DMV was not set up for that at the time. Florida traffic school was a complete waste of time in person, but online at least you could breeze through it.