cape cod

small peninsula off massachusetts that sucks money out of tourists and retired millionaires to survive, since the traditional fishing industry is slowly dying - native cod all but wiped out. beautiful beaches protected by the government since the 1950's, but that meant the locals had to give up their beach camps. basically we hate tourists but without them we'd be totally impoverished. there is nothing for kids to do so most of them destroy their brains with drugs & alcohol. everyone says they're going to leave but never manage it and stay working as a landscaper/fisherman/carpenter/waitress/cashier etc. the winters are horrible and in the summer tourists are everywhere. real estate is too expensive for anyone to have a nice house. all the land not protected by federal government is being gobbled up by rich people from far away who want to live "out in the boonies". cape cod has conservative strongholds like chatham in the south ("a quaint drinking town with a fishing problem") and liberal strongholds like provincetown, mecca for artists and homosexuals, in the north. primarily white, but recently there's been an influx of brazilians. the predominant subculture is punk, since we're all so angry at our lives but can't do anything about it. people who leave tend to stay gone. local slang includes "wicked" meaning extremely, "pisser" meaning awesome, and "wash-ashore" for someone whose family hasn't lived on cape cod for more than, say, 50 years or so...