French Classes, Waffle House and a Fox

Finally -- a day of rest! I can get my laundry done, read, and catch up on some blogs and other stuff I've been meaning to view online. Maybe I can even just reflect on it all for a moment or two. Sometimes I feel like I'm missing that opportunity -- a chance to process the information and experiences I take in. You know?

Among today's tasks, I need to sign up for the fall term of French classes. I haven't been studying or practicing at all for the past two weeks, and though I can remember highly useful things like the word for shark (le requin), I'm not sure I can still make the past tense. I had enough to do in Florida without taking that on.

Speaking of Florida, I forgot to mention that on my last day there, I indulged in a bit of Southern tradition by going to Waffle House with my family for breakfast. I love Waffle House. I had toast and grits and a waffle and eggs and man, it was good! I think I'm going to order a Waffle House t-shirt, but probably not the camo one.

As I was deciding which pictures to use with today's post, this fox wandered into the garden! Or, more accurately, loped. He or she is very gangly -- an adolescent, I'm guessing. Don't you think? Olga went ballistic, banging herself against the glass doors in the living room, but the fox only departed when it saw me. Clearly I'm more frightening than Olga.

We've decided that the proper way to dispose of the large rose sawfly caterpillars that occasionally infest our roses is to feed them to our venus flytrap. The flytrap loves them -- snaps shut on them right away. Is that cruel? Probably. But it's also nature.

(Top photo: A poppy petal on the patio.)

Red-Hot Pokers

This is one of our most impressive garden flowers at the moment -- our red-hot pokers. We have two plants, one with one bloom and one with four. I was afraid I'd miss them entirely but fortunately the blooms are long-lasting and ours look like they'll go on for a while.

So how did I fare yesterday? Fine, surprisingly! I wasn't even that tired during the day, when I sorted magazines and caught up with all my coworkers. And in late afternoon I came home to this:

Olga's immediate reaction to my return was, "Let's play!"

Our blackberry bushes are covered with berries. Dave doesn't eat them, so I knew I'd have a supply waiting!

I unpacked my suitcase and got everything organized, took a shower, and then Dave and I watched some TV with homemade vegetable soup for dinner -- at which point I began seriously nodding off, dribbling soup on myself. So it was off to the laundry hamper and then to bed. I slept like a rock.

It feels so good to get back to routines!

Back Home Again!

I'm writing this on the train from Gatwick Airport into Central London. It's a typical England day, gray and lightly rainy, and I must admit it looks pretty great after the torrential downpours and blistering heat of Florida.

I loves me some Florida -- it is my birthplace, after all -- but England is just so much milder.

My flight was OK, although I was surrounded by exuberant children. There were lots of young, tattooed, overtanned British parents on board bringing their offspring back from Disney World vacations. They kept moving around between seats as if playing musical chairs. I couldn't quite figure out what was going on -- I just kept my head down, drank my gin & tonic, and finished my book about the sinking of the Lusitania. (Maybe not the best book to read while traveling!)

The flight was delayed a bit and the lines at passport control in London were long, so I'll be a bit late getting to work. Hopefully the boss will start this year off in a forgiving mood!

(Photo: A food truck outside a Tampa restaurant.)

A Few Last Florida Shots

I'm off to London this afternoon. And amazingly, there's only a 40 percent chance of rain today, so maybe weather won't hold up my flight!

Here are a few last pictures from the Sunshine State. The sliding door business above is in Lutz -- pronounced "Lootz" -- where my dad lives.

This might be my favorite sign in the entire world. It's in Ocala, near Silver Springs. I drove up there yesterday to visit my aunt and cousin, who I haven't seen in eight years or so, and I made a side trip specifically to take pictures of this sign. It has neon components too. I've never seen it at night but I bet it's awesome.

The lake behind my mom's house, seen from my old bedroom. I'll miss this view when the house sells. (If it sells.) I'm not saying goodbye yet, though, because at this rate, we may have access to it for a while.

My mom and I agreed, with the assistance of some of my friends, on a few changes we're going to suggest for the real estate listing. Mainly we'd like to de-emphasize (i.e. remove) the photos of the vintage 1966 bathrooms, with their vintage blue and yellow toilets front and center, and focus more on the land and the lakefront. I'm going to write the agent soon to ask some questions.

This is especially for Ms. Moon, who is always fond of pointing out that the scandalous scientific name of the wild butterfly pea is Clitoria. I was lucky enough to catch it in the middle of pollination! Such voyeurism.
 

And finally, early Sunday morning, I got a clear shot of this building, without that stupid white truck.

It's going to be strange to go back to real life in London. I feel like I've been here for ages, and it's been great to catch up with everyone. But I miss Dave and Olga, even though Dave has been sending me virtually daily photographic updates of the mostly-sleeping dog and the abundant garden.

Tomorrow morning I'll go straight from the airport to work in the library. Hopefully, as I sort and log an entire summer's worth of magazines, I can keep my eyes open!

Sarasota Sojourn

And so our quick beach trip comes to an end. Mom and I will be back in the car driving up to Tampa this morning, leaving Longboat Key to my brother and his family for the rest of the week.

I drove down to Sarasota yesterday to meet my friends Jay and Nancy for lunch. Sarasota is my old stomping ground -- I was a reporter for the local newspaper for seven years until 2000, and Jay and Nancy were coworkers. It was great to see them, and the city, again. I last saw Jay two years ago. He's the one who took me to my only Broadway opening -- where I got to watch Celeste Holm eat a Hershey bar, although that was obviously not the focus of the show -- back in 2008.

Sarasota has changed a lot since I lived there -- it's much more vertical now, with many more high-rises in and around downtown. What would John D. MacDonald say? (MacDonald used to live there and repeatedly emphasized the folly of coastal development in his novels.)

I also went to visit my old condo, which was probably my favorite of all my various houses and apartments. It had a skylight and a glass wall facing a wooded creek, and at 1,100 square feet it was easily the biggest apartment I'd ever had. I installed pale Berber carpeting, and I owned it, and I loved it -- and in the end I only got to live there a year before the opportunity arose for a job in New York. Oh well. Je ne regrette rien. I loved New York, too!

Last night we all went to dinner at the Seafood Shack in Cortez. I don't know who invented placemats that can be colored with crayons, but thank god. They keep kids occupied and they keep parents sane.

(Top photo: A house in Sarasota, yesterday.)

Driving Up, Driving Down

Well, my mom and I made it down to Longboat Key yesterday with no problem. I set out from Anna Maria Island about sunrise (above), and drove up to Tampa to pick her up.

I know it seems kind of ridiculous to drive all the way up there and then turn around and come back almost to the same place I started from. I'm traveling up and down Florida, up and down, like those mermaids inside the water-filled plastic pens we used to buy at beachfront souvenir shops.

But my brother felt that my mom shouldn't have to drive down to Longboat on her own. We also had concerns about parking should we all bring our own car. So, yeah, that was me, zipping over the blistering-hot Howard Frankland bridge (above) yesterday morning, headed for Tampa and home.

Now we're here.

This is the same condo complex where my dad used to rent a unit each summer between 1980 and 1985 for all of us to stay a week. I was surprised, when I walked down to the beach, to see how well I know this curve of sand -- the way the coastline dwindles to a point in the north, the profile of the buildings to the south. I've gazed at that horizon many, many times. (Before we stayed in these condos, we rented a cabin just a few doors to the south. All in all I spent about eight summer weeks here.)

It's great to see my nieces now in my shoes -- exploring this beach as children, picking up broken augurs and ark shells and cautiously skirting clear globs of jellyfish. Rolling in the waves. We walked the beach yesterday evening and found silly, stilted birds, a filmy dead angelfish, a broken sea fan, a strip of green sea grass that would have made a great headband if only it had been longer.

I know I keep moaning about the heat, but man, is it hot. It's like an oven out there. A nuclear reactor. I don't remember it being quite so intense when I was a kid. Is it just my age? All I know is, my knees go weak with delight when I come inside.

I also feel no desire to get into the warm bath of the Gulf. I used to love swimming in the Gulf as a kid. Now I'm content with the pool, and even then, only occasionally. We get so soft when we get older, don't we?

I know I haven't been around blogland much lately. I've managed to post each day, albeit somewhat superficially, and my reading has fallen behind. I'll do my best to keep up!

A Short Entry Featuring Mr. Spock

A short post today -- I've just driven back to Tampa to pick up my mom, and we're about to set out for Longboat Key, off Sarasota, where we'll be spending the next few nights with my brother and his family.

I'm certainly getting some time behind the wheel on this trip! It's a good thing I like driving.

John, Sue and I had a good day in Anna Maria yesterday. Sue and I plundered some yard sales in the morning, where I tried very hard not to buy anything given that I'd have to haul it back to London in my suitcase. Even when I'm not buying, I get a kick out of yard sales, though obviously the sellers probably weren't all that happy with me. (I did pick up two books, including a Julia Child cookbook for Dave, and a candle holder.)

I've discovered a downside to my recently acquired Berger cookies shirt. The iron-on on the back of the shirt is so stiff and new that I can feel it clinging to my back when I wear it. I feel like Mr. Spock when that giant single-celled neural parasite attaches itself to his back in Star Trek:

I hope after I wash it a few times it gets a bit more flexible!

(Top photo: A bar in Elfers, Fla.)