[Rally]

I find it more amusing than irritating when urbanites put down small town and rural life. What DOES get me fired up, though, is to have those same folks move in for a few weeks of the year to take advantage of the outdoor and other opportunities the countryside has to offer and then tell those that live there full-time how things ought to be done.

We raised our family in Fallbrook, a rural town in northern San Diego county.  Our neighbor was Camp Pendleton and, Marines being Marines, occasionally they fired off mortars and suc, and if conditions were right (or wrong) strong reverberations would roll across town.  Every year someone would retire from Orange County and immediately write to the local paper demanding that the camp be shut down. Of course the same people then wrote complaining that the county needed to do something about the coyotes, possums, raccoons, weasels, skunks, rabbits, snakes, Wildcats, and if, as happened every other year or so, a mountain lion was spotted on Sleeping Indian Road a cry would go up for someone to "do something about it!"  When they discovered that children from the Pauma Band of Indians attended the local schools that would send some running.  Fortunately, the good ones stayed and we had a lovely town.

[Rally]

I find it more amusing than irritating when urbanites put down small town and rural life. What DOES get me fired up, though, is to have those same folks move in for a few weeks of the year to take advantage of the outdoor and other opportunities the countryside has to offer and then tell those that live there full-time how things ought to be done.

We raised our family in Fallbrook, a rural town in northern San Diego county.  Our neighbor was Camp Pendleton and, Marines being Marines, occasionally they fired off mortars and suc, and if conditions were right (or wrong) strong reverberations would roll across town.  Every year someone would retire from Orange County and immediately write to the local paper demanding that the camp be shut down. Of course the same people then wrote complaining that the county needed to do something about the coyotes, possums, raccoons, weasels, skunks, rabbits, snakes, Wildcats, and if, as happened every other year or so, a mountain lion was spotted on Sleeping Indian Road a cry would go up for someone to "do something about it!"  When they discovered that children from the Pauma Band of Indians attended the local schools that would send some running.  Fortunately, the good ones stayed and we had a lovely town.