Jersey

I know I’m going to live to regret saying this but I hate Jersey. (Now that I have publicly admitted to hating Jersey, my kids will probably stick me in an old age home located there.) It’s not that I have anything against people who live there but whoever was in charge of putting up street signs should have a special circle in hell.

Any time we have ever gone into Jersey, we have gotten lost. On the rare occasions that we don’t actually get lost, we end up sitting in traffic for hours on end. Yesterday as we were driving home after attending a party in Jersey, I got so excited that the needle on the speedometer went above 20 that I started cheering.

Whoever is in charge of tourism in that state also needs to do something about the view. As soon as you cross over the Goethals Bridge and enter Jersey, this is what you see:

Yep, big white oil tanks stretching as far as the eye can see. I have a suggestion for the tourism people. Paint the tanks. The people driving over that bridge into Jersey are coming from NY. We like farms & cows and stuff. Cover the oil tanks with cows and horses and farm scenes. Pretty it up a bit.

Moving on to a bit of a tangent, why do we say “Jersey” instead of “New Jersey?” I have never heard anyone say anything other than “Jersey.” We don’t do that to New Hampshire or New York. No one says Hampshire or York. No one shortens New Mexico to Mexico and lucky thing since Mexico is actually directly beneath New Mexico. That would get a bit confusing. So just what is it about Jersey that causes people to chop off the “New?”