Red dots from laser pointers once danced across the boardwalk, while hermit crabs crawled up cages in hotel rooms. Today, anoles scurry around plastic cages and mopeds zip up the highway. In just the past few years, Ocean City has evolved into a very different town than it was in the early 1990s.

Laser pointers became immensely popular in the late '90s and were sold at every corner shop on the boardwalk. Kids bought them up and harassed people on the boards until July 1998 when Ordinance 1998-16 vaguely banned their use for bothering others.

In the beginning of this millennium, every visitor left at the end of their vacation with a hermit crab in a colorful shell. Maybe it was because they only lived a week, or because they sometimes lived for five years (like mine did), but sales dropped off in recent years. Today, many beach shops sell small lizards instead. The little brown and green anoles are popular, despite legal opposition to their sale.

The boardwalk itself has significantly changed, with the town doubling the width near the downtown areas with a cement addition. The expansion was necessary with the hundreds of thousands of extra visitors that came to Ocean City every summer, but it took away the slightest amount of satisfaction of feeling the wood creaking beneath your feet.

Where joggers used to exercise along Coastal Highway, there now run hundreds of mopeds. Jogging in the roadway was outlawed a few years ago as traffic increased and pedestrians were injured. Many places now rent small-engined mopeds which zip up and down the main drag. Be careful on them: even though the law does not require you to wear a helmet on mopeds, you can still get seriously injured, and definitely don't wear sandals on them.

What will Ocean City be like in a few years? I am willing to bet that mopeds will be regulated at a minimum, and likely outlawed. After someone's anole collection gets loose in a restaurant, they will go the way of laser pointers as well. Some day, the boardwalk will wash away in a big storm. Will it be rebuilt?

Bonus strange law: Above the third floor of new buildings, railings on porches have to be specially designed so that the rails are in a certain pattern. There are two arguments to this change, one involving keeping toddlers from falling off, and the other to help people who suffer from vertigo. Even stranger: Mayor Rick Meehan, a realtor in the area, is afflicted by vertigo, and approved the building code change.