When one thinks of Florida, they think of palm trees, sandy beaches, the inability to count votes, and warm weather. Well these last few weeks we have definitely not been experiencing the latter. There has been a most undeniable nip in the air, tonight reaching a low of somewhere around 29 degrees.

We have come to know a lot of people here at the park and their first question as of late can be expected to be, “Have you froze in that popup of yours yet?”. The management was so worried about us becoming workamper popsicles that they offered us and another young pop up couple that works here a few free nights in one of their rental park models until the chill leaves the air. While being touched at their generosity, we all declined, because finding warm comfort in our pop up is not as hard as everyone imagines.

While our trailer doesn’t have A/C, it does have a powerful little propane heater that doesn’t seem to have any trouble keeping the cold out. Most times we opt out of using it, because it works too well and we’re sweating in no time. As an alternative we go with a small space heater. It does the trick and doesn’t waste our propane. I find that we only use the big boy when we first get in the trailer after not being there a while to help cut the cold quickly and then let the space heater take over from there.

The downer that I find hardest to deal with in this frigid climate is working in it. Not so much with the temperature itself, but with the fact that we work in an “outdoor” bar and grill and I can sympathize with our lack of customers who want to eat and drink in 40 degrees weather with a cold wind. Jessica and I work off of tips, so no customers means, no tips – and no tips means, walking home with pockets just as empty as when we went in. There’s nothing worse than working a full day and having nothing to show for it.

Lately the highs have been hitting in the fifties and this “drop in mercury”, as the media loves to say, lately is nowhere near over yet. I grew up in Florida and am quite used to the weather patterns, but I think it’s been a long time since I’ve seen it this low. With the money situation the way it is we need the customers to come back so that we can scrounge together the funds that we need. Hopefully there will be light at the end of this tunnel soon, let’s hope that the light is warm.