Weird goings-on? Must be Florida

MIAMI (AP) - A dead man votes. A parrot is choked and dunked in a margarita at a bar. A police chief resigns after allegations he slept with an inmate's wife. The U.S. attorney resigns amid claims that he bit a stripper.

Don't blame Florida. It can't help but be weird.

Look at the mix: immigrants from all parts of the Caribbean, generations of Southerners, newly arrived Northerners, American Indians, nearly 3 million retirees and 47 million tourists annually.

Factor in extreme weather, 1,300 miles of coastline, a huge swamp encompassing much of its inland and some unusual wildlife.

"There are so many layers," said Karen Cure, editorial director of Fodors Travel Publications. "There's the new Florida, the glitzy Florida, the tourists' Florida, the developers' Florida, the Versace Florida. Then there's this whole Cuban/Latin Florida, and there's cracker Florida and fisherman Florida and on and on and on."

As a new book points out, it's a recipe for the unexpected, a weird side that isn't marketed to tourists, most of whom think of Disney World, spring break and beaches when they hear "Florida."

"I've spent some time in Southern California, and Southern California is pretty weird, but mile-by-mile, form one end of the state to the other, it can't beat Florida," said Eliot Kleinberg, author of the 229-page book Weird Florida.

"I don't think you'll find any other state in America with so much weirdness because Florida is a microcosm of America."

Kleinberg, a reporter for The Palm Beach Post, opens his book documenting Sunshine State strangeness with a challenge: "Florida is the home of more nuttiness per square mile than any place on Earth - and we dare the world to prove us wrong," he writes.

Kleinberg culled through decades of archives and gathered unusual Florida news stories and lore, from a Key West man who had a seven-year love affair with a dead woman in the 1930s to a dead man who voted in Miami's 1997 election.

"We actually had more weirdness than we could fit in the book," he said.

Maria Hayworth, director of public relations for the tourist agency Visit Florida, agrees Florida has a wide mix of people, but said the state is no stranger than other places.

"We allow everybody to be their own individual," she said. "There are a lot of different personalities that are accepted and allowed."

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