Even the

mosquitoes in Peachtree City are elitists. They seem to

be carriers of a communicable virus that strikes almost

every person who moves into town before the engine on

their SUV gets cold.

You've heard of Jungle

Fever? Our town is infected with Grumble Fever; that is,

we complain about anyone who moves into town after we

did, like we wanted the town to shut the gate after our

arrival. Along with the Jon Benet Ramsey case or which

NBC "Friend" is hottest, complaining about our

concern for Peachtree City's overcrowding is always at

the top of our conversation list.

As a matter of fact, all it

takes to be a founding father of Peachtree City is to

find someone who has lived here for less time than you.

It would not be unrealistic to witness a person talking

to another who had moved here just one day later and be

saying, "Oh, let me tell you, things have changed so

much since I have moved here. Before you got here this

was a nice city. Then it just got so congested and lost

its small town appeal."

In defense of Peachtree

City, it is the same all over. I travel a lot and I hear

the same complaints everywhere. It's like everyone thinks

they are the original settlers of their town and can't

stand to see the "filth" move in and ruin

Xanadu.

I was in one of the worst

parts of Los Angeles recently at one of those

Plexiglassed, bulletproof Taco Bells. This is the part of

town where they have recycle containers for spent bullet

casings. I heard some guys ahead of me talking and in

broken English one of them was saying things were just

not the same anymore with all these new people moving in

and ruining the place. In my mind I was thinking what he

meant was, the new drive-by shooters were taking the easy

path because in his day it was execution-style or

nothing.

Do you think career

homeless people watch new arrivals walk by and say,

"Jeesh, there goes the neighborhood"?

It's sorta like what Yogi

Berra once said about a overflowing, popular restaurant,

"No wonder no one comes here anymore, it's too

crowded."

In reality, we are all just

trying to protect our territory. Like a bunch of tom cats

we go around trying to mark our domain. "This is my

booth at Shadows." "That end parking spot at

the post office is mine!" "Hey, quit swimming

in the fountains at City Hall, I claimed it as MY

Jacuzzi." Okay, so the mayor does have his

privileges, but still....

Since I have long ago lost

"my" city, I have to resort to staking my claim

on a smaller scale. And since my favorite restaurant,

Partner's Pizza, has long been conquered by squatters

before my time, I have landed my flag at The Italian Oven

on the north (or is it east?) end of town.

Unlike half of the

service-handicapped, cookie-cutter, sit-down food chains

in Peachtree City, you can tell them at the Italian Oven

where you want to sit. And this place has much more to

offer than just crimson-haired cuties who can write

upside-down; food's great, atmosphere is great, price is

great. Just please, don't go there. I have found my

sanctuary and I'm sick of people ruining my good thing.

Okay, go there for dinner, I just eat there at lunch.

It's inevitable that people

are going to continue to move to the south side of

Atlanta; the traffic is better and it does have less

sprawl than the Northside. So, we all need to take a

chill pill, be gracious and simply direct interested

parties... to real estate agents in Coweta County.

[E-mail Billy Murphy at [email protected] ; check out his Internet site at https://billymurphy.homepage.com .]

<!-------------