Afflicted, and a Ditzy Moment

I've come down with a cold. Argh! I'd blame the airplane, but I think it was already hitting before I left Florida. I was sneezing and my nose was bothering me even then. Now it's a full-on, eye-watering, nose-running extravaganza. Fun!

And of course today is my first day back at work, and I can't miss it because -- among other things -- we're meeting to discuss the school mission. (You'll remember that I'm on the committee to possibly rewrite our mission statement.) So I'll be chugging the Lemsip and toting Kleenexes in my pocket, and doing my best not to touch anyone, and hopefully that will get us all through with a minimum of hazard. (The students aren't back until Monday.)

I've been thinking of a few odds and ends about our Florida trip that I never blogged. Since I have nothing much else to report today, let me take note of those:

-- I spotted the sign above outside a motel in St. Augustine. I love its retro feel, but clearly it's pretty modern, since it references both the Internet and Airbnb! That's one tech-savvy mermaid.

-- On the plane from England, I was amused to see a woman wearing a plain gray sweatshirt bearing the words, "My dog thinks I'm cool."

-- Speaking of sweatshirts, I have one from a British tree-trimming company called Tree Wise Men. (It was abandoned on a fence years ago at the housing estate where we used to live. After I left it there for about a week and no one came back to claim it, I washed it and kept it myself.) Anyway, I was wearing the shirt in Ocala when we stopped for lunch at a Burger King. A man sitting behind me said, "I like the name of your company. Clever!" And instinctively, I said, "Thanks!" -- even though of course I had nothing to do with naming the company.

-- Dave and I saw this car in a parking lot in Jacksonville. Have you ever heard the B-52's song "Devil in My Car"?

-- Here's another rehabilitated old sign. This one stood outside a legendary downtown Tampa burger joint that closed years ago. A well-known restaurateur bought the sign and the name and resurrected the business in a fashionable neighborhood. We ate there one morning and loved it.

-- I've talked a lot about Dave forgetting his computer, but I haven't mentioned my own brainless mistake. We popped into a Winn-Dixie in Bradenton to buy Dave's mom some flowers. When we took them to a cashier, he rang them up and I chose to get $20 in additional cash from my debit card. That brought my total to $36. "Those flowers are $16?!" I said to Dave, incredulous. I was so shocked that I walked out of the store without my $20, and didn't realize it until several hours later. By then it was too late to do anything. Argh!