You know you're from Florida when ...(part 2)

[RagingInMiami]

* When your “other car” is actually a boat.

* When you have been within ten feet of a live alligator and not took off running.

* When you know how to pronounce conch (pronounced conk).

* When you don’t drop your jaw every time you see a topless woman on the beach.

* When either you or a close friend is getting into the hurricane shutter business.

* When the further north you drive, the further south you get.

* When you are forced to buy extra mattresses for your out-of-state relatives cause they come once a year.

* When you never stop appreciating the smell of a salty breeze blowing in from the ocean.

* When you can drive from the ritziest neighborhoods into the hardest ghettoes by crossing a single traffic light.

* When either you, a family member or a neighbor is in the witness protection program.

[nickgutierrez]

1. "The further north you drive, the further south you get."

That's true. I'm from Naples, in the southwest (where the north goes to die). Not very southern. But if you travel up towards the panhandle... yeah, Georgia and Alabama do start a bit early.

[sui generis]

2. must be some crossed genes with Texas

especially the neighborhood/ghetto proximity and the farther north thing.

except:
* When you never stop appreciating the smell of "allowable" limits of raw sewage in the Trinity river

* When you never stop appreciating the smell of commercial slaughterhouse feedlots wafting down through the Panhandle

* Where there is scattered weather everywhere, all day long. Sunshine in Dallas, 40 miles away it's snowing in Ft. Worth.