Rants of a business traveller in FL

[CU_rob]

Ah, alas time for another road trip for work. So here i sit now in Orlando, FL in my cheap crummy hotel room ($79, yet with free WiFi) eating bad take out for a week, but i digress... Here are some notes from the road thus far.

1. Florida is a state of rental cars. I have seen a million base model neons, all dirty and wragged to hell, tortured by their temporary operators.

2. Central FL C-D-J Dealership might be the largest on the east coast (3-tier parking garage) but they are stuck up snobs.

3. I hate ford focus. I arrive at the car counter...neon please...out, ok what you got?...focus or accent...focus. These cars at least 04, are truely rental quality grade vehicles. I miss my ACR. Fit and finish is not impressive, seats are cheap as crap, power door locks sound like prison door locks engaging, driver position sucks - fells like sitting in a suzuki, turn signal is annoying, brakes squel too much, cheap goodyear tires, ...but it does have pretty decent steering feel, low speed zip is good with the AT,... higher speeds it can't get out of its own way even with O/D turned off.

4. There is a gorgeous red SRT-4 owner in the Orlando area with stock rims with the centers painted black, outer edges not painted.
Props to the owner...and sorry if i scared you staring at your car.
There is also a 03+ yellow SXT with black rims with chrome ring in the area...dude wash your car, there are enough hand prints on the back in the soot it could qualify as abstract art.

5. There are a lot of foreigners in orlando, and I don't mean just the spanish speaking ones. So far I have heard japanese, chinese, russian, ukraninian, spanish, french, german, dutch... and all of that was in one night just visting Bestbuy, Circuit city, Office depot, Office max, Compusa, and Walmart (and no i didn't find what i was looking for)

Well that is all for now, thank you for listening, err...reading my rant. I may share later as my week progresses.

[Diablo0]

Thats great!

Almost 5-6 years ago I took a trip down to Orlando with my mom when she went down on business. It was fun, we stayed at the Rosen Centre Hotel. We had a POS Chevy Cavalier that had badly warped rotors and a trunk lid that wobbled.

But I completely understand everything your saying.

[threefortyduster]

Ah, alas time for another road trip for work. So here i sit now in Orlando, FL in my cheap crummy hotel room ($79, yet with free WiFi) eating bad take out for a week, but i digress... Here are some notes from the road thus far.

1. Florida is a state of rental cars. I have seen a million base model neons, all dirty and wragged to hell, tortured by their temporary operators.

2. Central FL C-D-J Dealership might be the largest on the east coast (3-tier parking garage) but they are stuck up snobs.

3. I hate ford focus. I arrive at the car counter...neon please...out, ok what you got?...focus or accent...focus. These cars at least 04, are truely rental quality grade vehicles. I miss my ACR. Fit and finish is not impressive, seats are cheap as crap, power door locks sound like prison door locks engaging, driver position sucks - fells like sitting in a suzuki, turn signal is annoying, brakes squel too much, cheap goodyear tires, ...but it does have pretty decent steering feel, low speed zip is good with the AT,... higher speeds it can't get out of its own way even with O/D turned off.

4. There is a gorgeous red SRT-4 owner in the Orlando area with stock rims with the centers painted black, outer edges not painted.
Props to the owner...and sorry if i scared you staring at your car.
There is also a 03+ yellow SXT with black rims with chrome ring in the area...dude wash your car, there are enough hand prints on the back in the soot it could qualify as abstract art.

5. There are a lot of foreigners in orlando, and I don't mean just the spanish speaking ones. So far I have heard japanese, chinese, russian, ukraninian, spanish, french, german, dutch... and all of that was in one night just visting Bestbuy, Circuit city, Office depot, Office max, Compusa, and Walmart (and no i didn't find what i was looking for)

Well that is all for now, thank you for listening, err...reading my rant. I may share later as my week progresses.

think about where you are....ITS ALL TOURISTS. of course it will be rental car land, as there are very few cars there that actually live there. orlando sucks plain and simple, which is why I left. All the Dodge dealerships there suck ass, just go to Greenway Dodge and have them chase you out to your car to get you to buy something (yes, it happened to me, when the guy tried to sell my mom a concorde that we made plainly known that we didn't want)

[RopeRat1]

Rob
I was in Orlando in 2000 for Big-Rig 2000. We spent a week cutting up semis, school buses and transit buses. I think I stayed at the SAME hotel (but no wi-fi back then).

I couldn't find a 7-11 (or whatever the hell they're called down there) with an English-speaking employee.

DON'T FORGET THE RETIREES!!!!! I watched this elderly couple in a white Benz w/ Wisconsin plates make a left turn from the right lane across five lanes of rush-hour traffic. The husband driving looked like the Crypt-Keeper's first cousin.

I drove my '94 Blazer down. That way I had MY vehicle with me.


Keep us posted on how yer week goes.
Jonathan (RopeRat1)

[threefortyduster]

Rob
I was in Orlando in 2000 for Big-Rig 2000. We spent a week cutting up semis, school buses and transit buses. I think I stayed at the SAME hotel (but no wi-fi back then).

I couldn't find a 7-11 (or whatever the hell they're called down there) with an English-speaking employee.

DON'T FORGET THE RETIREES!!!!! I watched this elderly couple in a white Benz w/ Wisconsin plates make a left turn from the right lane across five lanes of rush-hour traffic. The husband driving looked like the Crypt-Keeper's first cousin.

I drove my '94 Blazer down. That way I had MY vehicle with me.


Keep us posted on how yer week goes.
Jonathan (RopeRat1)

we have 7-11s here..its a national chain...but yes, they are all owned by indians.

how are the idiots from wisconsin our fault? we try to tell them we don't want them here, they just don't listen.

his week will be filled with fun stuff from the idiot drivers up there

[RopeRat1]

They're AmeriStops or Thornton's up here.

Florida is a RETIREE MAGNET


Jonathan (RopeRat1)