You and I have very different experiences of Orlando, even though I might hate the place more than you do.
I don’t know any about Orlando but I have always been perplexed about people choosing to live in landlocked Florida.
Orlando is only a thing because Walt Disney wanted a place amusement parks could be open year round and land was cheap, so he bought up a bunch of insect and gator infested swamp land to create Disney world. That being said, what's so bad about being an hour from both gulf beaches and atlantic beaches?
Maybe if it was actually an hour. Hell, last time I was in Florida, I think it took almost an hour to get from TPA to the beach.
Hate to tell you guys this, but Orlando has a pretty significant knowledge industry base that probably either grew in parallel with or separate from Disney. NAWCTSD (part of Naval Support Activity Orlando) is there and the predecessor installations date back waaaay before Disney showed up. Tons of defense/simulation contracting. Still, it's a hive of scum and villainy.
I'm sure there are other, unrelated things in Orlando, but... In 1970 (one year before Disney World opened), Orlando had a population of 310,000 (Columbus had a population of 790,000). Today Orlando had a population of 2 million (Columbus has a population of 1.7 mil). For 10 years, once Disney opened, they had >6% population growth annually and stayed above 4% for the whole decade following that (Columbus hasn't been above 2% since before 1970) Disney was a HUGE part of it. I swear, always said it wasn't possible, but lakeland was a half hour from Orlando and a half hour from Tampa (okay, so that was 20 years ago) https://www.macrotrends.net/cities/22963/columbus/population
I think just straight-up being in Florida is bigger part of it. Florida had a single area code that covered the entire state in the first iteration of the NANP in 1947, and Ohio had 4. Hell, Iowa (!) had 3. Florida in general has seen insane growth almost all over the state in recent decades. Defense contracting in Orlando predates Disney.
🟦 NEW KITS FOR '23 🟦 pic.twitter.com/Yk2QfP81cD— U.S. Soccer Men's National Team (@USMNT) April 3, 2023 Thanks, I hate it. The WNT home jersey, on the other hand, I can ******** with: I'd assume they'll be the same, but I haven't seen the men in the new home kit yet.
Mysteries abound. And woof: Basically England’s old kit 🙄 pic.twitter.com/OqYbwTzOSt— Jackson (@dumonster16) April 3, 2023
I like the men’s shirt. They do the Jackson Pollock kit, people hate it. They do a plain red and blue kit, people hate it. What do people want?
I have never, ever, ever understood the love of that thing. It's of a kind with the old Colorado Caribous with the fringe: awesome nostalgia/ironic signaling/man-cave frame bait, embarrassing to actually wear or even contemplate contemporaneously. The 1990s were stunningly awful, broadly speaking, regarding soccer kits, though.
Nike to have a modicum of creativity while not shitting on what has traditionally made club and national kits great. They recycle everything, and when it's not a big global player, they shoehorn in one of their two unique designs every year onto literally everyone else they have a contract with.
My favorite kits are: 2011 Away 2012 Home 2014 Away 2018 Home If we're going with all/mostly white: 2004 Special 2010 Home 2013 Special 2020-21 Home Denim is a class of its own. EDIT: The 2004 and 2013 Specials are among my favorites, too. 2004 is probably my most favoritest.
Top 2 are good-to-great. Third was OK. Fourth is typical Nike bullshit. 2004 Special is fantastic. All many people have ever wanted is a minimally-modernized form of that, which 2010 Home should have been, but Nike got caught up in their usual sublimated darker shade over same shade main color, too-subtle-by-90% crap they like to do. 2013 Special is decent, but the badge is comically huge. 2020-21 Home doesn't suck for white.
I like the 2011 Away, the 2012 Home, and the 2018 Home.... That 2014 Away is turrible turrible turrible Those white's are all alright.