[JB in TV]

Sorry in advance for this...

Saturday, we were headed to the Home and Garden Show in LSL about 1PM...forget it! Got stuck in traffic entering the area from Morse Blvd. and it took 15 minutes just to get back out. Didn't even try to find a parking place..it was so packed with cars and carts, couldn't even turn around. Perhaps they should have planned the Chili cookoff at a different location? Or make it a two day Garden show?

This morning at 7:30AM, I called Colony Health to see about getting a same day appointment for a medical issue that has been bothering me all weekend, and...no appointments available today. They offered to refer me to an Urgent care clinic. I didn't think that was the way these Village Health centers were supposed to work.

We all know about the terrible parking problem at Colony shopping...with due respect, Publix does a great job of having check-outs open and moving folks thru the lines quickly!

Over an hour wait at most restaurants at normal dinner time (5:00-7:00PM)...many posts (the most recent one I remember is about the new Italian place in Brownwood, also Mezza Luna) have suggested trying to go to dinner at 4:00... REALLY!!?? We (party of 4) waited over an hour at Cane Garden last week..etc. To me, NO restaraunt is worth standing for an hour waiting to get seated at a table. Are there any that take reservations or "call ahead seating"?

These are just a few of the examples of what I see as The Villages getting too big.

It sounds like I am complaining, well, yeah..kinda...but that wasn't my initial intent when I started writing...I'm really looking for ideas on either how to deal with it, or suggestions we can forward to the powers that be. We really like it here, but not being able to enjoy dinner out without a long wait, or being able to even get near the Garden show just spoils it. I must add, that we are not stuck in a mind set that we have to use a golf cart to get where we are going either.

We've only been here a little over a year, (full time residents) and we realize things get much worse during Jan-March/April, but it's getting to the point were we don't enjoy going out anywhere....and isn't that kind of the intention here?...going out and having fun with friends and neighbors?