I was thinking about how awesome it would be to go back to the US and stop at the local White Hen Pantry. Then I did a Google search. The company was taken over by 7-11 five years ago.

I used to go as a kid. They had a large candy selection. My mother would go sometimes thinking that they had better pickles and meat. But it was a bit of a journey so we didn't go much. Looking at the map now, it was only half a mile from our house.

Sure enough, Google Maps confirms that it's a 7-11 now.

Across the street was a bar or something. Now it's an empty building with a "for lease" sign on it. It also has a towing sign (Spanish surname) Towing. This was apparently the most recent owner of the property.

That's another thing. I looked up the demographics of this town. It's 50% Hispanic now. It was overwhelmingly white when I was a kid. Easily 95%.

A classmate lived in the house behind this White Hen and I remember he had a big ugly wooden fence. That fence is gone now. Presumably, his family doesn't live in that house any more.

The nearby barber was called Bobos'. It was owned by a man with the surname Bobos. My idiot mother always pronounced this as "bo-bo's" like a clown's name. Anyway, it's not a hair salon called Carol's Hair Affair.

The last time I looked on Google Maps, most of my town wasn't covered but now they seem to have got it all.

Yeah. There's my crappy house. I don't even recognise it. They got rid of the trees. There were two big evergreen trees. One had long needles, the other had short needles. I remember the one with short needles was about my height when I was maybe 12 years old. When I left to the UK, it wasn't particularly big. But then when I went back for Christmas like seven years later it was huge.

Seems like they got rid of them. All of the bushes are gone too. There were big bushes around the house. Replaced them with small bushes.

The cars in the neighbourhood look so different too.

A few people have those red, white, and blue buntings out. Let's hope these pictures were taken around Independence Day as opposed to that tacky crap being up year round.

Speaking of tacky crap, the new occupiers of the house across the street really went overboard with the shit decorations. A lot of flowers and plastic ducks and shit and the Hispanic classic: a ceramic Mary, of biblical fame.

Used to be an old Slovak woman who lived there. Now it's a young Mexican family. In fact, you can see one of the kids in this picture. He's holding an ice cream and wearing a shirt that looks like it says "Obama Change" on it, with possibly a question mark at the end. So I'm not sure if the shirt is pro or anti Obama. His dad is also out there with some electric garden implement going over the flowers.

Back to my side of the street, two houses down, there are now two large ceramic birds at either side of the entrance up the little pathway to the house. Who on earth thought that this was a good idea? Mexican people must live there too now.

A house on the corner is also really highly decorated with cheap tat. Presumably Mexicans living there now too.

All of the houses used to have these big ass trees in the front but now they're all gone and largely replaced by smaller trees, all of the same size. Presumably, the city paid for all of this. It would be a remarkable coincidence that everybody decided to cut down their trees and replace them with trees of the same height.

A lot more patriotic bunting. The house of the kid who I used to walk to school with has bunting on it too.

They got rid of their huge evergreen tree too. As far as I'm aware, that guy still lives in that house with his parents and sister. This information is about 10 years old, though.

Let me check the school out. Oh, it has a swanky sign out front now. There used to be a tacky as shit white cross with the words "in memory of aborted fetuses" on it.

There's the church across the street. Looks the same.

The nearby McDonalds is still there. Really modernised the look of the building, though. That must have cost a lot.

By contrast, the Burger King across the street looks the same.

This is really glitchy for some reason. Let me check out the high school.

I was going to say no change but across the street is a parking lot now. I don't remember what was there before. Shops, I think. Or houses.

What else? Check out the shopping district. Such as it is.

There's a big billboard of some guy my age. I'm not sure what it's about. I thought he was running for mayor. Maybe he is, maybe he isn't. It might just be advertising the local high school.

The optomotrist is not a massage parlour but it has orange tape all around it saying "keep out". Interesting.

Still in business, apparently. There was a Google review just four days ago saying that they went there and somebody pulled a gun on them. Seems to be a legitmate place, though. Women are leaving reviews, after all.

My old tae kwon do school is a dance school now.

Wow. That sleazy bar is still there.

Flower shop is still there too. That's surprising.

Some hair salon is a computer repair shop now.

The cinema is advertising that it shows silent films and has an organ.

They built a baseball "stadium" too. 1100 people. Used by the local high school and the local college. Why bother when there are already three baseball fields right nearby? Good to see that the kids still apparently enjoy baseball, though. I suppose it is popular in Latin America.