Still Limping Along

I just returned from a mini-vacation to Massachusetts where it was apparent to me that the economy has a way to go. What follows are some random observations collected as our family travelled about.

• The town of Rockport (very cool place to visit) is usually jammed with visitors in the summer forcing day trippers to park outside town and hop on Shuttle buses. This time the lots were closed and spaces to park were not too hard to locate.
• Next door, the port town of Gloucester was not very lively on a gorgeous Saturday afternoon with numerous empty storefronts in their rather old fashioned yet intriguing business district.
• Restaurants in suburban Boston were perhaps 60% fool on Friday and Saturday evenings, a time when they used to have huge waiting lists for tables.
• Plymouth needed a last minute influx of donations to save their wonderful fireworks display on July 4th. The sense I got got from chatting with business owners was that things are not going well there right now and many seemed quite concerned.
• I overheard a discussion that Cisco is closing facilities in the region and that very few of those jobs will actually be relocated.

My apologies for pouring some water on your firecrackers. Unfortunately, the rehabilitation of our economy still has a long way to go to be successful.