Dawn and I hope everyone out there who reads the blog had a happy and safe Christmas, wherever and however you chose to mark the occasion. We had a fairly quiet week here, choosing to lay low for the most part, as streets and highway in and around Fort Myers were quite busy with traffic, especially around the malls. Here's a few highlights:
Monday Dec. 21 -- Bargains and Lunch
Today we went to Miromar Outlet Mall and Gulf Coast Town Center, despite the earlier mention of crowds. I had a $10 reward certificate from Eddie Bauer that expired 12/31, and I didn't want to let it go to waste. The closest EB outlet is Miromar. Also, I was hungry for lettuce wraps at PF Changs, hence the need to go to Gulf Coast Town Center for lunch after the EB stop.
I scored big at EB, heading directly to the clearance section in the back of the store. With Dawn's help, I got two pair of dress shorts (plaid pattern) and pullover golf shirt, all for $30 after deducting my $10 reward certificate. The full retail on these items was $150, so this is quite a bargain, and fulfilled the need for some cruise-wear for the upcoming Caribbean Cruise on Jan. 9. Thanks to my friend, Amy, for this, as she always gives me her "points" when we shop at EB. EB must hate me, because I most always (99%) shop off their clearance racks, and my average bill at their checkout runs between $20 and $30. But this is one of my little frugal tricks that allows me to binge on the stuff I really like, such as travel and eating out.
We did not spend any other time at Miromar, despite the fact that it was surprisingly not crowded. We simply did not need anything else, and with the heat and humidity, were not in the mood for any recreational shopping. Instead we made a beeline for Gulf Coast Town Center, a little further north of Miromar. This has to be one of most confusing super-malls ever, The place offers no fewer than 28 restaurants from which to choose. Most of those are located around the perimeter of the central mall on a winding road called Gulf Center Drive, filled with right/left turn only lanes that lead you down blind alleys and dead ends. We finally found PF Changs, and it was worth it. I got my lettuce wraps on a lunch special (that included two crab/cream cheese won tons) while Dawn had a sweet/sour chicken lunch special. A diet Coke ran me $2.95, which seems to be the new price point for a fountain beverage, which I find outrageous unless you're going to drink a pail of Coke, but it is what it is. New Year's resolution: Drink more water at restaurants.
Tuesday Dec. 22 -- Florida Plates and Driver's License; Star Wars
Today, Dawn went to the Florida DMV and got both her license plate, and driver's license. Wow, what a financial hit. The plate cost her $413, the diver's license $54. The annual renewal for the plate costs $75, so that is pretty comparable to Wisc. Dawn won't have to renew the plate until April of 2017. The initial registration of the vehicle ($225) is the big bite. But holy cow; no wonder there are so many people in Florida driving around in various states of noncompliance! (According to Dawn's State Farm insurance agent, one in three drivers in Florida are not insured!) The DMV also registered Dawn to vote, so I guess she is an official Florida resident now!
I had purchased advanced reserved-seat tickets for Dawn and I to see Star Wars: The Force Awakens at the Prado Stadium 12 cinemas in Estero. Tuesdays are "Super Tuesdays" at the theater, and you can get a seat in one of their VIP auditoriums for $9 (normally $13.50) and for that you get to see the movie in an oversized leather seat with electric recline. We each got a "senior" popcorn, which costs $4, and a free ice water, so we avoided the $11.25 mafia price for the normal "small popcorn/small soda."
Kathy M., if you're reading this, scroll down and skip the next paragraph because it contains spoilers. The same goes for anyone else who hasn't seen the movie and is sensitive about movie spoilers, or for anyone who doesn't give a crap about Star Wars.
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We both thought the movie was fantastic. Great story line, awesome special effects. Lots of action sprinkled with just enough humor, pathos, and references to earlier episodes of the saga. We both really liked Daisy Ridley's character of "Rey," but also thought John Boyega and Oscar Isaac, as "Finn" and "Poe Dameron" (respectively) turned in great performances as newcomers to the saga, and we'll be seeing them again in the next episode which begins filming in Jan. 2016. It was great to see Harrison Ford, Carrie Fisher, and "Chewy" again. Poor Mark Hamill only got a cameo at the very end, but I'm sure we'll see plenty of him in the next episode as he becomes the mentor to the new Jedi protege, Rey. I literally gasped when Han Solo was killed in such cowardly fashion by Kylo Ren, Han's and Leia's son no less. I knew Han's time in the saga was coming to an end, but I thought he might die in a more glorious, noble fashion.
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OK, Kathy M. and other spoiler averters and Star Wars agnostics, you can continue reading again.
Thursday Dec. 24 -- Pincher's Crab House
I declared a "chef's night off" this evening, and we went to Pincher's Crab House for dinner. Earlier in the day, following a working at Planet Fitness, I had gone to our favorite Pincher's location on San Carlos Blvd., and purchased two $25 gift cards. They had a promotion going on where you got a $5 reward coupon for every $25 gift card purchased. So at dinner time, we took those gift cards down to Pincher's and had a delicious meal. Dawn had a shrimp platter, and I had a pound of large stone crab claws. This has become one of our favorite restaurants, and probably most favorite seafood place. The stone claws present some work, but are totally worth it. And now, we have $10 in coupons to use on future visits.
Friday Dec. 25 -- Christmas Day
We started with breakfast at the apartment of cheese omelets, sausage links, toast, and plenty of coffee. We then nostalgia binged on Netflix and Hulu, consisting of the Radio City Music Hall Christmas Spectacular (filmed in 2007, by the way), the "Festivus" episode of Seinfeld, and the two-part Family Guy where Stewie attempts to kill Santa Claus. In the evening, we watched "White Christmas" with Bing Crosby and Danny Kaye.
In the middle to this, we had 1 p.m. reservations at the Sunflower Cafe, and the place was packed. We were squeezed into a long row of tables, which could be configured into anything from a two-top to a table for 12 simply by pushing together tables, or separating them, sort of like on a cruise ship dining room. They had prepared a special Xmas day menu, with about a dozen entree choices on it, ranging from roast duck to prime rib. Dawn went with the traditional turkey dinner, while I had prime rib. I had my doubts about the prime rib, with this being a family-style restaurant, but it was actually quite good ... prepared medium to my order, nice and juicy, spiced just right (sometimes these restaurants WAY over do it on the rosemary), served with a nice baked potato, and salad with bleu cheese dressing. I skipped the whole kernel corn and the dinner rolls, to save room and calories for dessert. Dawn pronounced her turkey dinner delicious also, served with stuffing, mashed potatoes, and salad with BC dressing.
For dessert, we pulled a quarterback sneak, and drove over to the Perkins restaurant located next door to Sunflower, and got desserts to go. We got a chocolate eclair, a slice of peanut butter silk pie, and a slice of "Wildberry" pie, and brought them back to the apartment to share.
In the afternoon, we "Skyped" to the holiday mother ship of brother/sis-in-law's Curt and Karen's place in Madison, and video chatted with everyone there (Curt/Karen, Kris/Jim, Kathy/Bill/Cameron, Bill Miller Sr., and "Rosie," the new cat adopted by Curt and Karen). It was fun to see what they all got for Christmas, find out what they had for their family meal, etc.
In the evening, Dawn and played Scrabble and watched a little more TV, and then to bed. It was a good Christmas for us, certainly nontraditional, but what the hell is "traditional" these days anyway? We long for the Christmases of our childhood, when we didn't have any cares or responsibilities, and Christmas just "happened" as if by magic because somebody else always took care of the logistics. Those days are gone, and as we all get more fractured and separated by distance and disposition, it becomes necessary to re-invent Christmas and create new traditions of our own because the old ones just don't "fit" any more, for whatever reason. The main thing is to enjoy yourself, spend the time in the company of those you cherish, and unplug for a while from the racket and commotion of daily life.
Saturday Dec. 26 -- A Citrus Run
Only outing we did today was a run out to Sun Harvest Citrus to check out the orange and grapefruit situation, of which we are both out. The grapefruit looked spectacular, with each weighing about a pound. The navel oranges continued to look anemic and tasted rather bland, so we skipped those, and bought some "Baby O Mandarins" instead. The latter were delicious ... sweet and juicy. We had split a sub sandwich from Public Supermarket just before departing for Sun Harvest, so neither of us was hungry for an ice cream cone or other treat. So we got out of the citrus place for around $11. By the way, if you're ever in Florida near a Publix market, the Publix sub sandwich is one of the best meal deals around. Made to order. Fresh bread from their bakery, excellent hand-sliced cold cuts and cheeses, and fresh veggies. A 6-9jhalf sub costs $5.50, and for 50 cents extra they use Boar's Head meat and cheese. Go the extra, it's worth it. For 6 bucks, you'll have one of the best and low-cost lunches (or dinners) around.
Sunday Dec. 27 -- Lazy Day So Far
Just finishing the blog. Breakfast and coffee were out on the lanai, but we had to come into the air-conditional apartment relatively quickly because it's another warm/humid day today. We are finally supposed to get some relief Jan. 1. It's been near steady in the high 80s with high humidity ever since we got here, and even many (but not all) the locals are complaining about it. It's even made the papers as ruining certain vegetable crops here (lettuce, spinach, to name a couple). We have a couple of options today, including a grocery run, and the Packer/Cardinal football game, being shown at "Buckets" bar/pub around the corner. We'll see what happens.
Hope you're all enjoying the holiday break.
Love,
Bruce & Dawn
Sunday, December 27, 2015
Monday, December 21, 2015
Update Dec. 13-20
Hi everyone!
It's always hard to believe another Christmas is about to come and go, yet here we are again. No snow for anyone "back home" but hope everyone is getting into the spirit nonetheless. Dawn and I just finished our weekly grocery run, with menu planning for some fun meals, and we're going out to eat on Christmas day. Later today, we're headed to "Buckets," a Packer-friendly bar around the corner, to watch the Pack and the Oakland Raider square off, starting at 4:05 p.m. Eastern Time.
Here's what's been going on this past week. Highlights were a dolphin cruise on Wednesday, and a holiday party for Bruce with his widows/widowers club on Saturday night.
Sunday Dec. 13 -- Packers Defeat Cowboys
Our trip to Buckets ("Wings and More") bar and pub to watch the Packers beat the Dallas Cowboys cost us $42 (including tip) for 3 beers (for Bruce), 15 chicken wings (shared), and a diet soda for Dawn.
Monday Dec. 14 -- Scheduled Maintenance for the Prius, Date Disaster
Started the day with a haircut for Bruce at Doug's Barber Shop on Cleveland Ave. It's an old-fashioned barber shop, and the cuts are $11. "Dawn," (no relation to sister Dawn) is my regular barber there, and did a nice job making me look as good as can be expected.
From there to the giant Toyota dealership here in FM where I had them perform a 30,000 mile maintenance on the Prius, which ran me $317, including a 10% discount that my service rep, Graham (really cool guy from Ireland) gave me because the paperwork took longer than expected. In addition to oil change and tire rotation, I had a basic inspection/service of the air-condition system, and something called an "Induction and Throttle Body Service."
I had their courtesy driver take me over to "Miller's Ale House" on Colonial at Metro Parkway for one of the best burgers I've had down here, along with a pint of "Kona Big Wave," a craft beer brewed in Kona, Hawaii.
The afternoon was spent at Planet Fitness. At 6:30 p.m. I had a short first date with a woman named "Tammy" with whom I'd been corresponding on plentyoffish.com. We seemed to get along well on email. But when we met at "Bahama Breeze" for appetizers and beverages, I could tell within the first 15 minutes that it wasn't going particularly well. Sure enough, in exactly one hour, I got the old "I have to pick up someone at the airport" excuse, and she bolted like a scalded dog, leaving me to pick up a $39 check. Sure enough, the next day she sent me the "you're-a-nice-guy-but ..." email. I have, in fact, put my POF account on hold; there seems to be little interest among the female population down here in meeting a male member of the snowbird species.
Tuesday Dec. 15 -- Special Breakfast
I was craving something special for breakfast, so I had purchased a basic Krusteaz cinnamon coffee cake mix, and added dollops of ricotta cheese and frozen blueberries to the batter, and baked 'er up. Fantastic! And enough leftovers to make a couple of desserts with vanilla ice cream. I am simply not getting any slimmer down here. I work out, bike, and walk. But then we go through pints of Ben and Jerry's coffee heath bar ice cream like they are crack cocaine, and I am whipping up Paul Bunyan-sized breakfasts. So there is just no progress on the weight loss front, I'm afraid.
Dawn and I went shopping at "World Market" today to fill a giant wooden salad bowl with various potables to give away at the gift exchange at my upcoming holiday party, which you will read about a little further down. I bought cookies, crackers, jams, popcorn, herbal tea, and a lovely free-form coffee/tea mug, and all-told had about $30 invested, which was double the suggested $15 spending limit, but what the hell can you buy for $15 these days? Besides, I'm sure other guests will exceed the $15 limit because most of the people in the widows/widowers group do not look like they are hard up for money!
The other cool thing was that I booked tickets for Dawn and I on a dolphin cruise for Wednesday with a company called "Adventures in Paradise," which has several different cruises that they do in and around San Carlos Bay. The tickets were $25 each, for a 90-minute guided tour. Should be fun.
Wednesday Dec. 16 -- Dolphin Cruise
In the a.m., Dawn when and got her oil changed at "Scotty's," an independent garage not far from us. $39.95, and they took good care of her and didn't try to rip her off.
In the afternoon, we went on our dolphin cruise, which departs from a dock at Punta Rassa on the mainland and cruises along the Punta Rassa channel and eventually out into the Gulf of Mexico for about a mile. We were a group of about 15 on a pontoon style boat that holds up to 25 people. Our tour guide, Mike, was very informative, talking about the ecology of estuaries and the importance of mangrove (which is everywhere) to the ecosystem. Mike wore a sleeve around his neck and face for most of the trip, and Dawn finally asked him what it was, and he said it was to protect his face and neck from UV exposure. Apparently, we learned, there is an entire industry springing up around UV-protection wear that is sold to fisherman, highway construction workers, etc., who must work out in the sun all day. Special fabric is used that filters UV rays, and it saves workers from having to smear on sunscreen all the time, which has its own bad side effects. Interesting.
Anyway, we saw many dolphins, perhaps a dozen in all, that appeared to be concentrated into two pods. One of them actually leapt out of the water about four feet into the air, right in front of our boat. Hard to get pics because you had to have your camera ready at the precise moment, but here's one:
We also saw lots of birds, including a HUGE flock of white pelicans that gather every year on one of protected islands in the channel. They are the first birds to arrive for the winter, and they are the origin of the term "snowbird" as it applies to seasonal residents of Florida. It was a fun time, and Curt and Karen this is one of the attractions we plan on taking you to.
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| Unknown tourist at right |
We also saw lots of birds, including a HUGE flock of white pelicans that gather every year on one of protected islands in the channel. They are the first birds to arrive for the winter, and they are the origin of the term "snowbird" as it applies to seasonal residents of Florida. It was a fun time, and Curt and Karen this is one of the attractions we plan on taking you to.
Friday Dec. 18 -- Rain Day
Today, we had a big rain day, especially in the morning, which forced us to cancel our weekly Farmer's Market day. Instead, we had a large breakfast at I-Hop, mostly because Dawn had a $25 gift card there. The breakfast was OK, in that sort of generic Perkins-Denny's-I-Hop sort of way, but nothing fantastic. I went to a Starbucks in the afternoon in search of a muse to get going on one of my writing assignments coming due soon. I did make some progress, drawing energy from the other Starbucks barnacles gathered there, working on their laptops with earbuds firmly planted.
Saturday Dec. 19 -- Holiday Party
This evening was my big holiday party with the widow/widowers meetup group, hosted by Charlene at her home in the "Cascades" community of Estero. There were 28 guests in all, of which only 7 were guys, the rest females, showing the propensity of guys to kick the bucket first. We had games and prizes. Beer, wine, and spirits flowed. My goody basket/bowl made a huge hit at the gift exchange, and I ended up with a $15 movie gift card at a cinema-plex in Naples, which is a 48-mile round trip from here, but Dawn and I will go and combine various other activities in Naples (perhaps the zoo?) to make it a worthwhile trip. And the food --- oh my god the food. Everyone brought a dish, including one guy who brought about 10 pounds of beef brisket cooked in Jewish tradition (not barbecued) slow roasted, sliced, and served over egg noodles (optional on that last part). It was delicious. And then there were meatballs, deviled eggs, cheese/sausage platters, fruit trays, veggie trays, shrimp platters. Trays of desserts set up in a separate room of the house. We had seating inside, on the lanai room, and outside on a patio, and it was a beautiful night, around 70 degrees with low humidity and a nice breeze. It was, I thought, a perfect evening, and I had more fun than I thought I would because I don't feel I typically do well in large groups of people. I think it helped that everyone in the group was single (i.e., widowed) and I didn't feel like the odd man out at a party (like most I attend) where everyone is married. I got home from that around 10:30, having spent five hours at the party.
Sunday Dec. 20 -- Food Hangover
Had a horrible night sleeping on Saturday night ... woke up in the middle of the night with raging heartburn. Simply too much food and drink. Woke up with queasy stomach, which more or less lasted the day until about dinner time. Managed to slog through the day, which included a trip to the two markets we frequent to do our weekly grocery run. By 4:05, we were at "Buckets" for the Packers/Raiders game, and by this time I was finally hungry and so ordered a brat with sauerkraut, and had three beers during the game to wash it down. We were of course happy to see the Pack win over the Raiders 30 to 20. But we both agreed with one commentator that if the Pack expects to make it through the playoffs (they are assured of at least getting there at this point) they need to sharpen their offensive game. Listen to me talking football! Dawn seems to be pulling me into the Packer arena whether I like it or not.
Monday Dec. 21
Well, sorry that the blog update is a day late, but I really wasn't feeling at the top of my game yesterday, so I let it slide until today. Wherever you all end up over the Christmas holiday, Dawn and I wish you safe and happy times!
Bruce & Dawn
Sunday, December 13, 2015
Update Dec. 6 - 13
No huge adventures this past week. I think we've kind of settled into a routine ... morning coffee on the lanai, errands, workouts at Planet Fitness, Netflix and/or Scrabble tournaments at night with Hawaiian slack guitar playing on Pandora in the background. Plus, we're maybe suffering a little economic hangover from spending some big bucks on travel plans, which this past week included $600 worth of Key West Express travel vouchers. Here are some highlights.
Tuesday Dec. 8 -- Key West Plans, Dinner and a Movie
Today, Dawn and I went to Key West Express Marina and bought six of the $99 specially priced round trip travel vouchers aboard their big boat that ferries passengers (no vehicles) between Fort Myers and Key West. Four of the vouchers are for Dawn and three friends that will be visiting in late Feb. They are planning an overnight in Key West. The other two vouchers are for Dawn and I, and we'll be taking an overnight trip there in late January as sort of a "test run." We've yet to book our hotel, and by the looks of things we better do this pretty soon, as the prime hotels tend to fill up quickly. We're looking at about $400 for a hotel for one night. There are cheaper places, but they are beyond comfortable walking distance from the historic district and Mallory Square (where we want to watch the sunset).
The Key West Express is a large catamaran style boat; the company actually has three of them in their fleet: small, medium, and large that are 140, 155, and 170 feet long, respectively. The round trip tickets are normally $154 each ($124 if purchased 8 days in advance) so the $99 sale is quite a bargain. The trip takes 3.5 hours each way. The sailing from Fort Myers leaves at 8:30 a.m. and gets you to Key West at noon, with one stop at Marco Island. The return voyage departs 6 p.m. and gets you back to FM at 9:30. Unless you just want to do some casual site seeing in Key West, it's best to stay overnight and catch the ferry back the next day. You get a full 24 hours and then some. So we are looking forward to this mini vacation and watching the sunset and seeing the street performers on Mallory Square.
Today, I also purchased advanced reserved seat tickets for the new Star Wars movie that opens Dec. 18. Our date is Dec. 22 (a Tuesday evening) at the cinema's VIP auditorium, which features large, reclining seats. This should be awesome, especially since it's the next in line to the original trilogy, which everyone knows is the best!
This evening, my widows/widowers group had a dinner-and-a-movie night in Bonita Springs. We were only five for dinner and three for the movie. Dinner was at Buffalo Wild Wings... not my most fave place, but OK. The movie was Mockingjay Part Two, which I really enjoyed, having seen (and read) the first three parts of the saga. Julianne Moore was excellent as the sinister, two-timing leader of the rebellion. The CGI special effects were amazing.
Friday Dec. 11 -- Farmer's and Flea Markets
Today was probably our biggest day of week, activity-wise. We started with the farmers market, with sis driving and me riding my bicycle. The first crop of strawberries were in, and they were delicious. It's still amazing to me that we get locally grown strawberries here starting in late Dec. while in Wisconsin we have to wait until June! Anyway, we split a pint box of them, along with bagels and coffee.
We met back at the apartment to reconnoiter. I had about an extra mile on my bike ride back to the apartment due to a detour in the park, so I needed about half an hour to cool off and rehydrate. We then went shopping in search of a bedspread to put on top of the quilt of my bed as a covering against kitty hair. Abby is shedding like crazy, plus she seems to have a nervous habit of licking the quilt. After finding none at Fleamasters, we found an acceptably one at a Salvation Army thrift store for $1.50. Better to have her shed and lick that than my $65 quilt. Plus I can wash the $1.50 blanket here at the apartment. The quilt has to go a laundromat. Dawn insisted on giving the blanket an initial run through the washer/dryer, fearing someone may have died in the blanket and/or had sex on it.
At Fleamasters, we also visited with "Chris the Book Guy" (and I bought a Jack DuBril adventure novel from him for a dollar) and we also had lunch. Dawn had a sensible Greek salad, while I went off the deep end and had a giant donut drizzled with vanilla cream and chocolate sauce (to simulate a Boston Cream Pie), and sprinkled with walnuts. Completely canceled out the bike ride, and then some!
Ran a few other errands, including the bank to get a little cash for a watch collector's meeting here in Fort Myers tomorrow. You never know what I may find!
For dinner this evening, I cooked up a batch of lemon-garlic shrimp over pasta, which is turning into one of our most favorite dishes.
Saturday Dec. 12 -- Watch Collector's Meeting, Dinner at Mel's Diner
Today was a meeting of NAWCC Chapter 98 (Calusa) watch and clock collectors, held at the nearby Myerlee County Club. It was, for the most part, a bust, and I spent zero dollars and only did one trade with the only other fellow wristwatch collector to attend the meeting. I was there for about an hour, and then had my gym bag packed and in the car, and headed to Planet Fitness for a workout, shower, and shave. I declared this evening "cook's night off" and we went to Mel's Diner for dinner. Dawn had a Cobb salad, and I had an order of their delicious baby back ribs, which are slow baked with a mild BBQ sauce, and are fall-off-the-bone tender. A full rack is accompanies by fries and 'slaw. Delicious, I splurged again and had carrot cake for dessert along with coffee. Back at the apartment, we had a rousing 3-game Scrabble tournament, then watched a little TV (Netflix/Hulu) and then off to bed.
Sunday Dec. 13 -- Groceries, Packer Game
Today, we had breakfast out on the lanai of oatmeal laced with pecans and dried cranberries, and coffee. I also had a grapefruit, peeled and sectioned. Dawn is laying off the grapefruit for the time being due to cranky bowels. We're doing a big grocery run for the upcoming week, then going to "Bucket" bar and pub to watch the Packers play the Dallas cowboys.
Tomorrow, I have an appointment with the giant Toyota dealer here in Fort Myers (Auto Nation) to do the 30,000 mile scheduled maintenance on the Prius.
That's all for now.
Bruce
Tuesday Dec. 8 -- Key West Plans, Dinner and a Movie
Today, Dawn and I went to Key West Express Marina and bought six of the $99 specially priced round trip travel vouchers aboard their big boat that ferries passengers (no vehicles) between Fort Myers and Key West. Four of the vouchers are for Dawn and three friends that will be visiting in late Feb. They are planning an overnight in Key West. The other two vouchers are for Dawn and I, and we'll be taking an overnight trip there in late January as sort of a "test run." We've yet to book our hotel, and by the looks of things we better do this pretty soon, as the prime hotels tend to fill up quickly. We're looking at about $400 for a hotel for one night. There are cheaper places, but they are beyond comfortable walking distance from the historic district and Mallory Square (where we want to watch the sunset).
The Key West Express is a large catamaran style boat; the company actually has three of them in their fleet: small, medium, and large that are 140, 155, and 170 feet long, respectively. The round trip tickets are normally $154 each ($124 if purchased 8 days in advance) so the $99 sale is quite a bargain. The trip takes 3.5 hours each way. The sailing from Fort Myers leaves at 8:30 a.m. and gets you to Key West at noon, with one stop at Marco Island. The return voyage departs 6 p.m. and gets you back to FM at 9:30. Unless you just want to do some casual site seeing in Key West, it's best to stay overnight and catch the ferry back the next day. You get a full 24 hours and then some. So we are looking forward to this mini vacation and watching the sunset and seeing the street performers on Mallory Square.
Today, I also purchased advanced reserved seat tickets for the new Star Wars movie that opens Dec. 18. Our date is Dec. 22 (a Tuesday evening) at the cinema's VIP auditorium, which features large, reclining seats. This should be awesome, especially since it's the next in line to the original trilogy, which everyone knows is the best!
This evening, my widows/widowers group had a dinner-and-a-movie night in Bonita Springs. We were only five for dinner and three for the movie. Dinner was at Buffalo Wild Wings... not my most fave place, but OK. The movie was Mockingjay Part Two, which I really enjoyed, having seen (and read) the first three parts of the saga. Julianne Moore was excellent as the sinister, two-timing leader of the rebellion. The CGI special effects were amazing.
Friday Dec. 11 -- Farmer's and Flea Markets
Today was probably our biggest day of week, activity-wise. We started with the farmers market, with sis driving and me riding my bicycle. The first crop of strawberries were in, and they were delicious. It's still amazing to me that we get locally grown strawberries here starting in late Dec. while in Wisconsin we have to wait until June! Anyway, we split a pint box of them, along with bagels and coffee.
We met back at the apartment to reconnoiter. I had about an extra mile on my bike ride back to the apartment due to a detour in the park, so I needed about half an hour to cool off and rehydrate. We then went shopping in search of a bedspread to put on top of the quilt of my bed as a covering against kitty hair. Abby is shedding like crazy, plus she seems to have a nervous habit of licking the quilt. After finding none at Fleamasters, we found an acceptably one at a Salvation Army thrift store for $1.50. Better to have her shed and lick that than my $65 quilt. Plus I can wash the $1.50 blanket here at the apartment. The quilt has to go a laundromat. Dawn insisted on giving the blanket an initial run through the washer/dryer, fearing someone may have died in the blanket and/or had sex on it.
At Fleamasters, we also visited with "Chris the Book Guy" (and I bought a Jack DuBril adventure novel from him for a dollar) and we also had lunch. Dawn had a sensible Greek salad, while I went off the deep end and had a giant donut drizzled with vanilla cream and chocolate sauce (to simulate a Boston Cream Pie), and sprinkled with walnuts. Completely canceled out the bike ride, and then some!
Ran a few other errands, including the bank to get a little cash for a watch collector's meeting here in Fort Myers tomorrow. You never know what I may find!
For dinner this evening, I cooked up a batch of lemon-garlic shrimp over pasta, which is turning into one of our most favorite dishes.
Saturday Dec. 12 -- Watch Collector's Meeting, Dinner at Mel's Diner
Today was a meeting of NAWCC Chapter 98 (Calusa) watch and clock collectors, held at the nearby Myerlee County Club. It was, for the most part, a bust, and I spent zero dollars and only did one trade with the only other fellow wristwatch collector to attend the meeting. I was there for about an hour, and then had my gym bag packed and in the car, and headed to Planet Fitness for a workout, shower, and shave. I declared this evening "cook's night off" and we went to Mel's Diner for dinner. Dawn had a Cobb salad, and I had an order of their delicious baby back ribs, which are slow baked with a mild BBQ sauce, and are fall-off-the-bone tender. A full rack is accompanies by fries and 'slaw. Delicious, I splurged again and had carrot cake for dessert along with coffee. Back at the apartment, we had a rousing 3-game Scrabble tournament, then watched a little TV (Netflix/Hulu) and then off to bed.
Sunday Dec. 13 -- Groceries, Packer Game
Today, we had breakfast out on the lanai of oatmeal laced with pecans and dried cranberries, and coffee. I also had a grapefruit, peeled and sectioned. Dawn is laying off the grapefruit for the time being due to cranky bowels. We're doing a big grocery run for the upcoming week, then going to "Bucket" bar and pub to watch the Packers play the Dallas cowboys.
Tomorrow, I have an appointment with the giant Toyota dealer here in Fort Myers (Auto Nation) to do the 30,000 mile scheduled maintenance on the Prius.
That's all for now.
Bruce
Sunday, December 6, 2015
Update Nov. 28 - Dec. 6
Today, we are meeting Karen and Craig, Dawn's friends, for an early lunch at B.J.'s Restaurant & Brewhouse out on Alico Road by the airport. I have five of their watches I got in running condition for them. Most were just batteries, but one was a stem and crown replacement on a lady Movado watch which ran me $40 all by itself to have my buddy down the street at Prestige Jewelers obtain the parts and install them. I'm doing very little watch repair work for people these days, because it's generally a PITA. I'm trying to train all my relatives to simply tell people that I'm retired! But these are good friends, and I know how hard it is to obtain reliable and honest watch repair, especially around this part of the country. Looking forward to trying the new restaurant and catching up with Karen and Craig.
A mixed bag this week, due in good part to a couple days of torrential rain that pre-empted our usual Friday outing to the Farmer's Market. But still we managed to get out and have some fun.
Monday Nov. 30 -- Beach Day
A nice day today, so we spent most of it at Fort Myer's Beach. We had lunch at the Sunset Beach Tropical Grill, the new bar that replaced the aging "Top 'O Mast" bar near the city pier. We each had the basic burger, mine with sweet potato fries, and Dawn had potato salad. Burgers were delicious. We spent the afternoon on the beach in a couple of rented chaise lounge chairs. I had a nice swim in the ocean.
While we were relaxing, our maintenance man, Mike, was busy powerwashing all of the white fences in the back yards of all three tenants. They were covered in mold, and in bad need of a washing. Before we left for the beach, Mike also took a look at our leaky toilet (since last season) and promised a brand new unit this week. The fence looks AWESOME now, and we no longer have to look at a green, slimy fence while we have our morning coffee out on the lanai!
Tuesday Nov. 1 -- New Toilet, Shell Factory
This Morning, Mike returned to the apartment with a brand new toilet, and installed it in about a half hour. Yeah! No more leaky toilet going off every half hour to refill the tank! That only took a year!
Meanwhile, I was online and finished a cruise reservation for sis-in-law Julie and I about Royal Caribbean's "Navigator of the Seas" for a nine-day Eastern Caribbean cruise departing Jan. 9. We depart from Fort Lauderdale, and will take in San Juan Puerto Rico, Labadee Haiti, St. Kitts, and St. Marteen. Plus have 3 whole days at sea. I also made Julie's flight reservations with Frontier Airlines. She'll be coming in Jan. 7 and flying back out on the 18th,
Dawn and I were looking for something to do, so we went to the "Shell Factory." This is one of the few, if only, attractions in North Fort Myers, and I had never been and wanted to see it. They advertise quite a bit, and supposedly do a big business in seashells, both wholesale and retail. They advertise the biggest gift shop in Southwest Florida, along with a couple of "museums" on the premises, and also a nature trail with supposedly "over 200 critters," and a display of stuffed animals shot and killed from around the world.
OK, I'll try not to grind this thing into the ground, but in a word, it was terrible. The whole thing was rather sad and depressing. Everywhere we looked, we saw major signs of neglect. Planking on the walkways was rotten. Railings and stairs needed painting. All the animals in the stuffed menagerie (not our favorite thing anyway) looked like they hadn't been dusted in years.The "museums" were little more than a glass display case or two containing a few artifacts. The "nature trail" required a separate $12 admission, and we passed on that. The fudge in the fudge shop looked like it had been sitting there since the Obama inaugural ball (the first one!). There was virtually NO ONE in the gift shop (yes it was huge) to even keep things tidy. The boxes of shells for sale had many damaged shells in them, and looked like they hadn't been restocked in months. I think the problem is that kids just aren't interested in this type of entertainment any more. They want roller coasters and waterslides, while mom and dad want 12 different restaurants to choose from. So anyway we left feeling rather depressed, and our general advice is that if you're ever in the North Fort Myers area, skip the Shell Factory, and keep on driving!
Saturday Dec. 5 -- Matlacha and Pine Island
Today, we took a drive to Matlacha (pronounced Mat La SHAY), and to the north end of Pine Island at Bokeelia. Matlacha was little more than a fishing village back in the 1920s, and it's been preserved like this so people can see what life was like back then and what much of Southwest Florida looked like. The buildings are now gift shops, galleries, and restaurants, but the original "flavor" of the town is preserved. We had lunch at a place called "Bert's" and I had a sandwich of blackened "Twin Tail," a member of the red snapper family, and it was delicious. Dawn had fish and chips. One of the galleries we visited was the "Leona Lovegrove Gallery and Gardens" which kind of famous around these parts. It's kind of recycled meets psychedelic. Bright neon colors and media as varied as canvas, bottles, and old travel trailers.
After that, we drove over to Pine Island and drove the length of that to see all the tree/plant nurseries, and ended our journey at Bokeelia, where the road literally ends and you look out onto Charlotte Harbor and beyond it the Gulf of Mexico. A beautiful Saturday drive.
That's all for now. Just made a grocery run following a nice lunch with Karen and Craig. Relaxing in the apartment.
Bruce and Dawn
A mixed bag this week, due in good part to a couple days of torrential rain that pre-empted our usual Friday outing to the Farmer's Market. But still we managed to get out and have some fun.
Monday Nov. 30 -- Beach Day
A nice day today, so we spent most of it at Fort Myer's Beach. We had lunch at the Sunset Beach Tropical Grill, the new bar that replaced the aging "Top 'O Mast" bar near the city pier. We each had the basic burger, mine with sweet potato fries, and Dawn had potato salad. Burgers were delicious. We spent the afternoon on the beach in a couple of rented chaise lounge chairs. I had a nice swim in the ocean.
While we were relaxing, our maintenance man, Mike, was busy powerwashing all of the white fences in the back yards of all three tenants. They were covered in mold, and in bad need of a washing. Before we left for the beach, Mike also took a look at our leaky toilet (since last season) and promised a brand new unit this week. The fence looks AWESOME now, and we no longer have to look at a green, slimy fence while we have our morning coffee out on the lanai!
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| Before |
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| After |
Tuesday Nov. 1 -- New Toilet, Shell Factory
This Morning, Mike returned to the apartment with a brand new toilet, and installed it in about a half hour. Yeah! No more leaky toilet going off every half hour to refill the tank! That only took a year!
Meanwhile, I was online and finished a cruise reservation for sis-in-law Julie and I about Royal Caribbean's "Navigator of the Seas" for a nine-day Eastern Caribbean cruise departing Jan. 9. We depart from Fort Lauderdale, and will take in San Juan Puerto Rico, Labadee Haiti, St. Kitts, and St. Marteen. Plus have 3 whole days at sea. I also made Julie's flight reservations with Frontier Airlines. She'll be coming in Jan. 7 and flying back out on the 18th,
Dawn and I were looking for something to do, so we went to the "Shell Factory." This is one of the few, if only, attractions in North Fort Myers, and I had never been and wanted to see it. They advertise quite a bit, and supposedly do a big business in seashells, both wholesale and retail. They advertise the biggest gift shop in Southwest Florida, along with a couple of "museums" on the premises, and also a nature trail with supposedly "over 200 critters," and a display of stuffed animals shot and killed from around the world.
OK, I'll try not to grind this thing into the ground, but in a word, it was terrible. The whole thing was rather sad and depressing. Everywhere we looked, we saw major signs of neglect. Planking on the walkways was rotten. Railings and stairs needed painting. All the animals in the stuffed menagerie (not our favorite thing anyway) looked like they hadn't been dusted in years.The "museums" were little more than a glass display case or two containing a few artifacts. The "nature trail" required a separate $12 admission, and we passed on that. The fudge in the fudge shop looked like it had been sitting there since the Obama inaugural ball (the first one!). There was virtually NO ONE in the gift shop (yes it was huge) to even keep things tidy. The boxes of shells for sale had many damaged shells in them, and looked like they hadn't been restocked in months. I think the problem is that kids just aren't interested in this type of entertainment any more. They want roller coasters and waterslides, while mom and dad want 12 different restaurants to choose from. So anyway we left feeling rather depressed, and our general advice is that if you're ever in the North Fort Myers area, skip the Shell Factory, and keep on driving!
Saturday Dec. 5 -- Matlacha and Pine Island
Today, we took a drive to Matlacha (pronounced Mat La SHAY), and to the north end of Pine Island at Bokeelia. Matlacha was little more than a fishing village back in the 1920s, and it's been preserved like this so people can see what life was like back then and what much of Southwest Florida looked like. The buildings are now gift shops, galleries, and restaurants, but the original "flavor" of the town is preserved. We had lunch at a place called "Bert's" and I had a sandwich of blackened "Twin Tail," a member of the red snapper family, and it was delicious. Dawn had fish and chips. One of the galleries we visited was the "Leona Lovegrove Gallery and Gardens" which kind of famous around these parts. It's kind of recycled meets psychedelic. Bright neon colors and media as varied as canvas, bottles, and old travel trailers.
After that, we drove over to Pine Island and drove the length of that to see all the tree/plant nurseries, and ended our journey at Bokeelia, where the road literally ends and you look out onto Charlotte Harbor and beyond it the Gulf of Mexico. A beautiful Saturday drive.
That's all for now. Just made a grocery run following a nice lunch with Karen and Craig. Relaxing in the apartment.
Bruce and Dawn
Sunday, November 29, 2015
Update Nov. 21-28
Hope everyone had a happy and safe Thanksgiving
It's Sunday here, the last day of a long weekend. Lots of people will be driving and flying the unfriendly skies today in their journeys home. We are glad to be staying put here in our "home base" of Fort Myers.
Looking back on the past week, here's a summary of our goings-on.
Monday Nov. 23 -- Sanibel Island
This was probably our most eventful day. We got to Sanibel at 9 a.m. and started with a leisurely breakfast at the Lighthouse Cafe on the more laid-back eastern end of the Island. I had pancakes and sausage, and Dawn had the "Lighthouse Special" omelet, which has turkey, broccoli, fresh mushroom, and cream cheese in it. From there, we drove to the Matthew-Bailey Shell Museum on Sanibel-Captiva Road, where we had a fun time learning about shells and the two types of mollusks -- gastropods and bivalves -- that inhabit these parts. From there, we took a drive through the Ding Darling Nature Preserve. Very pleasant, but the bulk of the birds still have not arrived yet from their migrations from points north. Next, we went to Bowman's Beach and walked along the surf line for about an hour. Unknown to us, the beaches of Sanibel had been hit with a "red tide" about a week ago that washed tons of fish up onto the shores. Bowman's Beach had actually been closed for a couple of days due to high bacteria count. Apparently it was "all better" by the time we had arrived because lots of people were walking in the water, and a few brave souls were even swimming out in the surf.
Having worked up an appetite by then, we went to Casa Ybel Resort and had lunch by the pool -- grilled Grouper for Dawn, and crispy tuna tacos for me. Dawn pronounced her Grouper "just OK" while my Ahi tuna (seared rare) tacos were delicious. Our bill with beverages came to $50, so this was one of our more expensive lunches. We sat by the pool after lunch playing cribbage and watching the activity around the pool. We crossed back over the Causeway around 4 p.m. and back to the apartment.
Tuesday Nov. 24 -- Sand Sculpting
Today, we went to a sand sculpting competition to see the work the artists had done. The competition had been going since Nov. 20, and suffered a pretty bad setback over the weekend when the area (including us) got some serious rain. It melted or at least damage all of the sculptures, and the artists had to hustle to rebuild. A couple of them apparently gave up, and all that was left of their work was a big pile of sand. But most of the sculptures had been rebuilt. Here is one of our favorites:
Organizers haul in 1,000 tons of sand for the competitors to use, and the 16 "solo master" and 10 "doubles team" artists came from as far away as New Hampshire, Canada, and even Portugal to compete for cash prizes. It's amazing what some people can do with sand and water, and obviously a lot of time on one's hands because I don't think the job "Master Sand Sculptor" pays very well ;-) but I do admire these men and women who have found a way to avoid actual work.
Tuesday night, I reunited with my friend, Nora, from Fort Myers. We met last season on one of the online dating sites, and have remained friends. We hooked up at the Lighthouse Restaurant and Bar off McGregor just before the Causeway. Guitarist Mary Winner was performing, and she is a good friend of Nora's. We were joined by about 8 other friends of Nora's, many of whom I had met the previous Easter Sunday at a gathering over at Nora's condo. It was great to see her again and listen to some music.
Wednesday Nov. 25 -- Tamale Day
Wednesday are "tamale day" at a restaurant just up the way from us called "La Casita," so we went there for lunch, our first visit to this favorite restaurant since arriving here. The restaurant didn't disappoint, as we each got two tamales wrapped in corn husks, along with beans, rice, salsa, and chips. The who bill came to $24 with tip, so this is a fantastic value. We might make Wednesdays "Tamale Day" on a permanent basis!
Thursday Nov. 26 -- Thanksgiving
Today, we watched the Macy's Parade, then it was off to the Sunflower Cafe off San Carlos Blvd. for a restaurant Thanksgiving. The kitchen here is so small, I could not imagine cooking up a turkey dinner, so we simply went out. Many other folks had the same idea, because the restaurant parking lot was packed. Despite this, we got in right away, and both ordered the traditional turkey dinner. Despite the meat being cut from "turkey rolls," it was quite tasty, and the portions generous. We topped off the meal with pumpkin pie (included in the price) and coffee. This bill came to $20 apiece, with tip,and I don't think we could have bought the ingredients for that price, plus we didn't have to clean up the mess.
That night, we watched the Green Bay Packers play against the Bears, and stayed up past midnight to watch the Pack get beat on their own home turf. It was damn near painful for Dawn to watch. The weather there was miserable ... raining in near freezing temps. It was kind of neat seeing Brett Favre and his player number retired. Sad to see Bart Starr, now 80, in such fragile condition, but admire him for making the effort to come out.
Firday Nov. 27 -- Farmer's Market
Today, we did our traditional breakfast/look-around at the Lakes Park Farmer's Market. Folr the first time, I rode my bicycle, while Dawn drove. We had bagel breakfast sandwiches, fresh fruit, and coffee. Delicious. We also met our friends who do their Friday bike ride. I had a wonderful bike ride ... about half hour each way. We skipped the flea market today because neither of us needed anything.
Saturday Nov. 28 -- Comcast Fiasco
Today, I got the monthly bill from Comcast, $192 and change -- and nearly hit the roof. I had recently upgraded my service following a "tech call" (which ended in no solution to my problem, by the way!) and allowed the service rep to talk me into a "bundled" package that promised to reduce my bill by $10 monthly. What she failed to tell me was that the $10 reduction applied ONLY to the Internet portion of the bill, which would be trimmed from $49/month to $39/month. The OVERALL bill, however, dramatically increased for the enhanced cable, and the new telephone line. With all the installation charges (bogus because nobody actually came to the apartment; it was all handled from a computer keyboard, I'm sure), modem and cable box rental charges, and tax, the bill came to $192.
Lying commie bastards!
Question: How can you tell when Comcast customer service reps are lying?
Answer: Their lips are moving.
It's the same all over. Charter, Comcast, Whatever. Beware the Bundle.
Anyway, I got on the phone to Comcast, and cut everything except Internet, including the basic cable stations, and I'll be back to $49/month. I then went to Radio Shack and picked up a digital antenna to try and pick up the local broadcast stations. That met with disastrous results, even after returning the "basic" antenna, and buying the supposedly more powerful "deluxe" antenna. In both instances, the signal was too week for the TV to hold any of the local stations. Guess we will have to go without our daily network news, Wheel of Fortune, and Jeopardy, along with our CBS Sunday Morning. Somehow, I think we will survive. I did sign up for Hulu-Plus for $7.99 monthly, which will give us some additional entertainment options in addition to Netflix.
I have yet to see one of the digital antennas actually work! Just another example of our federal government fixing something that wasn't broken. Thank you, FCC!
Sunday Nov, 29 -- Checking Out the New Neighborhood, Groceries
Today, we have been lazing about. Breakfast out on the lanai with fresh grapefruit sections, scrambled eggs with home fries and smoked sausage. We are planning to take a "check it out" drive along Lakewood Blvd. by our new apartment. There is a Winn Dixie supermarket there which we will tour. Then walk a lap around Lakes Park, and then a major grocery run, as we are out of just about everything. It's a beautiful sunny day here today.
That's it for now,
Bruce & Dawn
It's Sunday here, the last day of a long weekend. Lots of people will be driving and flying the unfriendly skies today in their journeys home. We are glad to be staying put here in our "home base" of Fort Myers.
Looking back on the past week, here's a summary of our goings-on.
Monday Nov. 23 -- Sanibel Island
This was probably our most eventful day. We got to Sanibel at 9 a.m. and started with a leisurely breakfast at the Lighthouse Cafe on the more laid-back eastern end of the Island. I had pancakes and sausage, and Dawn had the "Lighthouse Special" omelet, which has turkey, broccoli, fresh mushroom, and cream cheese in it. From there, we drove to the Matthew-Bailey Shell Museum on Sanibel-Captiva Road, where we had a fun time learning about shells and the two types of mollusks -- gastropods and bivalves -- that inhabit these parts. From there, we took a drive through the Ding Darling Nature Preserve. Very pleasant, but the bulk of the birds still have not arrived yet from their migrations from points north. Next, we went to Bowman's Beach and walked along the surf line for about an hour. Unknown to us, the beaches of Sanibel had been hit with a "red tide" about a week ago that washed tons of fish up onto the shores. Bowman's Beach had actually been closed for a couple of days due to high bacteria count. Apparently it was "all better" by the time we had arrived because lots of people were walking in the water, and a few brave souls were even swimming out in the surf.
Having worked up an appetite by then, we went to Casa Ybel Resort and had lunch by the pool -- grilled Grouper for Dawn, and crispy tuna tacos for me. Dawn pronounced her Grouper "just OK" while my Ahi tuna (seared rare) tacos were delicious. Our bill with beverages came to $50, so this was one of our more expensive lunches. We sat by the pool after lunch playing cribbage and watching the activity around the pool. We crossed back over the Causeway around 4 p.m. and back to the apartment.
Tuesday Nov. 24 -- Sand Sculpting
Today, we went to a sand sculpting competition to see the work the artists had done. The competition had been going since Nov. 20, and suffered a pretty bad setback over the weekend when the area (including us) got some serious rain. It melted or at least damage all of the sculptures, and the artists had to hustle to rebuild. A couple of them apparently gave up, and all that was left of their work was a big pile of sand. But most of the sculptures had been rebuilt. Here is one of our favorites:
Organizers haul in 1,000 tons of sand for the competitors to use, and the 16 "solo master" and 10 "doubles team" artists came from as far away as New Hampshire, Canada, and even Portugal to compete for cash prizes. It's amazing what some people can do with sand and water, and obviously a lot of time on one's hands because I don't think the job "Master Sand Sculptor" pays very well ;-) but I do admire these men and women who have found a way to avoid actual work.
Tuesday night, I reunited with my friend, Nora, from Fort Myers. We met last season on one of the online dating sites, and have remained friends. We hooked up at the Lighthouse Restaurant and Bar off McGregor just before the Causeway. Guitarist Mary Winner was performing, and she is a good friend of Nora's. We were joined by about 8 other friends of Nora's, many of whom I had met the previous Easter Sunday at a gathering over at Nora's condo. It was great to see her again and listen to some music.
Wednesday Nov. 25 -- Tamale Day
Wednesday are "tamale day" at a restaurant just up the way from us called "La Casita," so we went there for lunch, our first visit to this favorite restaurant since arriving here. The restaurant didn't disappoint, as we each got two tamales wrapped in corn husks, along with beans, rice, salsa, and chips. The who bill came to $24 with tip, so this is a fantastic value. We might make Wednesdays "Tamale Day" on a permanent basis!
Thursday Nov. 26 -- Thanksgiving
Today, we watched the Macy's Parade, then it was off to the Sunflower Cafe off San Carlos Blvd. for a restaurant Thanksgiving. The kitchen here is so small, I could not imagine cooking up a turkey dinner, so we simply went out. Many other folks had the same idea, because the restaurant parking lot was packed. Despite this, we got in right away, and both ordered the traditional turkey dinner. Despite the meat being cut from "turkey rolls," it was quite tasty, and the portions generous. We topped off the meal with pumpkin pie (included in the price) and coffee. This bill came to $20 apiece, with tip,and I don't think we could have bought the ingredients for that price, plus we didn't have to clean up the mess.
That night, we watched the Green Bay Packers play against the Bears, and stayed up past midnight to watch the Pack get beat on their own home turf. It was damn near painful for Dawn to watch. The weather there was miserable ... raining in near freezing temps. It was kind of neat seeing Brett Favre and his player number retired. Sad to see Bart Starr, now 80, in such fragile condition, but admire him for making the effort to come out.
Firday Nov. 27 -- Farmer's Market
Today, we did our traditional breakfast/look-around at the Lakes Park Farmer's Market. Folr the first time, I rode my bicycle, while Dawn drove. We had bagel breakfast sandwiches, fresh fruit, and coffee. Delicious. We also met our friends who do their Friday bike ride. I had a wonderful bike ride ... about half hour each way. We skipped the flea market today because neither of us needed anything.
Saturday Nov. 28 -- Comcast Fiasco
Today, I got the monthly bill from Comcast, $192 and change -- and nearly hit the roof. I had recently upgraded my service following a "tech call" (which ended in no solution to my problem, by the way!) and allowed the service rep to talk me into a "bundled" package that promised to reduce my bill by $10 monthly. What she failed to tell me was that the $10 reduction applied ONLY to the Internet portion of the bill, which would be trimmed from $49/month to $39/month. The OVERALL bill, however, dramatically increased for the enhanced cable, and the new telephone line. With all the installation charges (bogus because nobody actually came to the apartment; it was all handled from a computer keyboard, I'm sure), modem and cable box rental charges, and tax, the bill came to $192.
Lying commie bastards!
Question: How can you tell when Comcast customer service reps are lying?
Answer: Their lips are moving.
It's the same all over. Charter, Comcast, Whatever. Beware the Bundle.
Anyway, I got on the phone to Comcast, and cut everything except Internet, including the basic cable stations, and I'll be back to $49/month. I then went to Radio Shack and picked up a digital antenna to try and pick up the local broadcast stations. That met with disastrous results, even after returning the "basic" antenna, and buying the supposedly more powerful "deluxe" antenna. In both instances, the signal was too week for the TV to hold any of the local stations. Guess we will have to go without our daily network news, Wheel of Fortune, and Jeopardy, along with our CBS Sunday Morning. Somehow, I think we will survive. I did sign up for Hulu-Plus for $7.99 monthly, which will give us some additional entertainment options in addition to Netflix.
I have yet to see one of the digital antennas actually work! Just another example of our federal government fixing something that wasn't broken. Thank you, FCC!
Sunday Nov, 29 -- Checking Out the New Neighborhood, Groceries
Today, we have been lazing about. Breakfast out on the lanai with fresh grapefruit sections, scrambled eggs with home fries and smoked sausage. We are planning to take a "check it out" drive along Lakewood Blvd. by our new apartment. There is a Winn Dixie supermarket there which we will tour. Then walk a lap around Lakes Park, and then a major grocery run, as we are out of just about everything. It's a beautiful sunny day here today.
That's it for now,
Bruce & Dawn
Sunday, November 22, 2015
Update Nov. 14-21
Greetings all. We see Wisconsin has had its first snowstorm of the season. We continue to deal with unseasonably hot temps down here, but it looks as though things here will cool off a bit and next week and be normal (mid to upper 70s). We are kind of tired of running the AC all day and night and having to keep the windows and lanai door closed all the time.
Well, another busy and eventful week, so let's get started:
Saturday Nov. 14 -- A Walk in the Park
We did indeed get out to Lakes Park and walked a lap around the "inner track" ... about half mile. Fairly nice day. From there, we did a big grocery run to Publix for deli meat and cheese; and then the Walmart Neighborhood Market for the balance of the list to get the better prices. For dinner, I cooked in and made lemon-garlic shrimp over linguine, and an apple walnut salad from one of those Dole "salad kits" in the produce section. The salad was good, but the other salad kit we bought from them -- pear Gorgonzola -- was better. Meanwhile, Dawn struggled with the healthcare.gov website, and finally made her selection of a Blue Cross/Blue Shield plan here in Fort Myers that will run her about $125/monthly with tax credits. She'll finish out the year with the COBRA plan offered through Great Lakes. It's still all kind of "great mystery" because she still doesn't know who the providers will be, though it's a sure bet it will be through the Lee County Health System, since they are the dominant player down here.
Sunday Nov. 15 -- Green Bay Packer Day
Dawn has been suffering from Packer withdrawal since we left Wisconsin Nov. 2, so we found a local pub just around the corner from us ("Buckets") which airs the Packer games and watched the game along with about 20 other fans. We got there about 12:30 to secure a booth for the 1 p.m. kickoff, and proceeded to order food and drinks. By the time it was over, we had ordered a Reuben sandwich (for Dawn); a small cheese/sausage pizza (for Bruce ... the pizza by the way was sub-par, necessitating a continued search for decent pizza down here); a half bucket of chicken wings with celery and bleu cheese dressing; and four bottles of Michelob "Ultra" beer. The food/drink tab came to a little over $50, and all to watch the Pack get beat (on their own turf no less) by a bunch of hacks from Detroit ... a city forced to declare bankruptcy in 2013. I'm no expert, but the Packers looked awful. The Lions had not beaten the Pack in Lambeau since 1991, but today was their day. I will say it was a nail-biter up to the end. The Pack's botched field goal at the end was the icing on the cake. Dawn and I will need to adjust our "food strategy" to lessen the impact on the wallet. The strategy by the other fans seems to be sip on soft drinks/beer up to the half-time, then order the food.
Monday Nov. 16 -- Car Insurance, New Nike's
Dawn decided on State Farm for her car insurance, so we went to a local agent. He turned us loose on a new admin associate who proceeded to falter through the quote process and came up with a package that will run her $409 every six months, versus the $285 every six months she was paying in Wisconsin, so about $21 more per month. This is about right, based on what I've heard about car insurance costing more in Florida. Mostly because of something Florida requires called PIP insurance which covers bodily injuries to people involved in the accident, no matter who is at fault. Certain states require it, and Florida is one.
After that, we went to DG Chinese Restaurant (in the same strip mall at State Farm) and dined on Dim Sum, including steamed pork dumplings, Terryaki beef skewers, and shrimp spring rolls. All delicious.
From there, we went to the giant Miromar Outlet Stores in Estero, just south of Fort Myers. I went to the Nike store and got myself a spankin' new pair of running shoes ... the "Pegasus 31" model ... in royal blue with a neon green inner liner and soles. Holy crap, there were about 50 different athletic shoes from which to choose, but a very nice lady at the store steered me toward these, and they are totally worth it. Great support and comfort to replace a sloppy pair of "Sketcher's" that I absent-mindedley bought about a year ago that turned out to offer almost no support. Support is a good thing. Dawn didn't buy anything, except for an iced coffee that we each bought at a Starbucks later in the afternoon for a pick-me-up. We got in a very good walk, as we traversed the outdoor mall from one end to the other and back again.
Tuesday Nov. 17 -- A Costly Glass of Wine and a Martian
Tonight is "dinner-and-a-movie" night with the Southwest Younger Widows/Widowers meetup group, and tonight we had dinner at "Cirella's", an upscale Italian bistro in Estero, where I paid the world record price (at least for me) of $11 for a glass of house-brand Pino Noir during supposed "Happy Hour" because the PN was not among those happy-hour priced! This is the deal ... many places rig their Happy Hours so you need to ask precisely what's on sale versus what's full price. So lesson learned. For main course, I ordered the Lasagna at $18, which was some of the best I've had in recent memory. So all in all, a good meal, and good company. Keep it perspective, I guess. For the movie, the group went to see "Missing You Already," a chick flick in which one chick dies of cancer, and I had absolutely no interest in seeing (had enough cancer, thank you very much). So I opted for "The Martian" which has been on the screen for a while, but I didn't get a chance to see before leaving Wisconsin. Because I had read the book, I really wanted to see the movie, and I thought it was AWESOME! Very true to the book, and Matt Damon turned in a fabulous performance. Ice cream afterward. A very enjoyable evening.
Wednesday Nov. 18 -- A New Apartment!
We got a tip from my former landlord, Heather, about a condo unit for rent at Summerlin Trace, off Summerlin Road at Lakewood. Great location ... right across from the back entrance to Lakes Park, and a couple miles closer to the beaches than our current location. The property owners -- John and Kim Regets -- met us at the property, and we fell in love it. After a little negotiating, we got the place for $1,250/month (completely furnished)with a $500 security deposit, and our lease will start April 1. Here are some photos:
The rub will be getting out of the current lease before July 15. I am hoping the current landlord will work with me in releasing me from the lease early. I have offered to help by showing the current apartment to prospective renters.
Anyway, we are very happy about this, and celebrated by going to Pincher's Crab Shack, were I had a pound of stone crab and Dawn had deep fried scallops.
Thursday November 19 -- Seminole Casino
Now that the Big M casino ship is no longer in business, I thought we might check out the Seminole Casino in Imokalee, about a 45 minute drive east of here. We arrived about 11 a.m., did a walking circle of the casino to check it out, then had lunch at the "First Street Deli," one of three eating establishments in the casino. We each had a mile-high deli sandwich, me a corned beef and pastrami combo Reuben sandwich, and Dawn a corned beef on Pumpernickel with Swiss and cole slaw. Both were delicious. From there, we each played slots, because there were no $5 gaming tables; the minimum was $10, and this is too rich for my blood. I won $16 playing two different slots, and Dawn lost just shy of $20, so it was about a wash between us. It was interesting to drive to Imokalee to see the vast difference between a seaside city (Fort Myers) and a landlocked one. Not a whole lot going in in Imokolee besides the casino. Big agricultural town with lots of fruit/vegetable pickers. Businesses with bars on the windows, and bilingual signs everywhere. I'll let you use your imagination. I don't know that we'll be back, but good to know there's a casino nearby if we get an itch to play slots.
Friday November 20 -- Farmer's Market and Fleamasters
Per tradition, Friday is farmer's and flea market, and we arrived Lakes Park about 9 a.m. for breakfast and commiserating with my group of buddies from the bicycle club. We had a few good laughs with them. After that we stopped at Chase Bank; we both had a little business to do. I had to obtain some additional "counter checks" because I forgot to bring the checkbook from Janesville. From there, we went to Fleamasters. Not much on our shopping list today, but I did pick up a book from Chris the Book Guy, and a battery for an Accutron 214 watch that I will sell on eBay. We also had lunch in food court ... I had a gyro platter, and Dawn a Nathan's hot dog. On the way out, we grabbed a 10-pound bag of Indian River ruby red grapefruit which I prepare for our breakfasts by peeling and sectioning the fruit so we each end up with a bowl of perfect skinless sections. Takes some time, but it's worth it.
Saturday November 21 -- Writers Club, Workout, Steak Dinner
Today was the monthly meeting of the Gulf Coast Writers Association, and we had an excellent guest speaker -- Charles Sobczak -- who spoke on writing about nature. He is not only a writer who has sold close to 100,000 books, but also also a naturalist who is very versed in the wildlife of southwest Florida with an emphasis on birds and reptiles. He is also concerned about global warming. So his talk was a very engaging mix of the writing and publishing worlds, along with pictures of wildlife, and he included some of his recent trip to Australia, which makes me want to go even more! I got a chance to meet Artis Henderson, who writes a weekly column for the "Florida Weekly" newspaper that I really enjoy. A lovely gal who lost her husband in the first Iraq war and wrote a memoir entitled "Unremarried Widow" that ended up on the NYT Bestseller List. Anyway, a most enjoyable morning.
From there, went to Planet Fitness for the second workout of the week (I also went on Tuesday), and then came back to apartment and collected Dawn for a steak dinner at a neighborhood pub called Buster's. One of their nightly specials they run on Saturday/Sunday is a one-pound sirloin steak dinner with all the trimmings for $11.99. I had enjoyed that dinner there many times during the 2014-15 season, but this evening it was not so good. The steak tasted like it had been brined in a salt solution to tenderize it. While certainly edible, it was overly salty, and we each brought back half our steak, and I think what I will do with it is chop it up and use it in a shepherd's pie. I'll let you know how that turns out.
Sunday November 22 -- Groceries and Another Packer Game
Today I am updating the blog, and the plan is to make a major grocery run, and then head back to "Buckets" for the 4:25 Packer game against the Minnesota Vikings. We had a good rain shower here in the morning, and now the sun is out.
That's all for now.
Bruce & Dawn
Well, another busy and eventful week, so let's get started:
Saturday Nov. 14 -- A Walk in the Park
We did indeed get out to Lakes Park and walked a lap around the "inner track" ... about half mile. Fairly nice day. From there, we did a big grocery run to Publix for deli meat and cheese; and then the Walmart Neighborhood Market for the balance of the list to get the better prices. For dinner, I cooked in and made lemon-garlic shrimp over linguine, and an apple walnut salad from one of those Dole "salad kits" in the produce section. The salad was good, but the other salad kit we bought from them -- pear Gorgonzola -- was better. Meanwhile, Dawn struggled with the healthcare.gov website, and finally made her selection of a Blue Cross/Blue Shield plan here in Fort Myers that will run her about $125/monthly with tax credits. She'll finish out the year with the COBRA plan offered through Great Lakes. It's still all kind of "great mystery" because she still doesn't know who the providers will be, though it's a sure bet it will be through the Lee County Health System, since they are the dominant player down here.
Sunday Nov. 15 -- Green Bay Packer Day
Dawn has been suffering from Packer withdrawal since we left Wisconsin Nov. 2, so we found a local pub just around the corner from us ("Buckets") which airs the Packer games and watched the game along with about 20 other fans. We got there about 12:30 to secure a booth for the 1 p.m. kickoff, and proceeded to order food and drinks. By the time it was over, we had ordered a Reuben sandwich (for Dawn); a small cheese/sausage pizza (for Bruce ... the pizza by the way was sub-par, necessitating a continued search for decent pizza down here); a half bucket of chicken wings with celery and bleu cheese dressing; and four bottles of Michelob "Ultra" beer. The food/drink tab came to a little over $50, and all to watch the Pack get beat (on their own turf no less) by a bunch of hacks from Detroit ... a city forced to declare bankruptcy in 2013. I'm no expert, but the Packers looked awful. The Lions had not beaten the Pack in Lambeau since 1991, but today was their day. I will say it was a nail-biter up to the end. The Pack's botched field goal at the end was the icing on the cake. Dawn and I will need to adjust our "food strategy" to lessen the impact on the wallet. The strategy by the other fans seems to be sip on soft drinks/beer up to the half-time, then order the food.
Monday Nov. 16 -- Car Insurance, New Nike's
Dawn decided on State Farm for her car insurance, so we went to a local agent. He turned us loose on a new admin associate who proceeded to falter through the quote process and came up with a package that will run her $409 every six months, versus the $285 every six months she was paying in Wisconsin, so about $21 more per month. This is about right, based on what I've heard about car insurance costing more in Florida. Mostly because of something Florida requires called PIP insurance which covers bodily injuries to people involved in the accident, no matter who is at fault. Certain states require it, and Florida is one.
After that, we went to DG Chinese Restaurant (in the same strip mall at State Farm) and dined on Dim Sum, including steamed pork dumplings, Terryaki beef skewers, and shrimp spring rolls. All delicious.
From there, we went to the giant Miromar Outlet Stores in Estero, just south of Fort Myers. I went to the Nike store and got myself a spankin' new pair of running shoes ... the "Pegasus 31" model ... in royal blue with a neon green inner liner and soles. Holy crap, there were about 50 different athletic shoes from which to choose, but a very nice lady at the store steered me toward these, and they are totally worth it. Great support and comfort to replace a sloppy pair of "Sketcher's" that I absent-mindedley bought about a year ago that turned out to offer almost no support. Support is a good thing. Dawn didn't buy anything, except for an iced coffee that we each bought at a Starbucks later in the afternoon for a pick-me-up. We got in a very good walk, as we traversed the outdoor mall from one end to the other and back again.
Tuesday Nov. 17 -- A Costly Glass of Wine and a Martian
Tonight is "dinner-and-a-movie" night with the Southwest Younger Widows/Widowers meetup group, and tonight we had dinner at "Cirella's", an upscale Italian bistro in Estero, where I paid the world record price (at least for me) of $11 for a glass of house-brand Pino Noir during supposed "Happy Hour" because the PN was not among those happy-hour priced! This is the deal ... many places rig their Happy Hours so you need to ask precisely what's on sale versus what's full price. So lesson learned. For main course, I ordered the Lasagna at $18, which was some of the best I've had in recent memory. So all in all, a good meal, and good company. Keep it perspective, I guess. For the movie, the group went to see "Missing You Already," a chick flick in which one chick dies of cancer, and I had absolutely no interest in seeing (had enough cancer, thank you very much). So I opted for "The Martian" which has been on the screen for a while, but I didn't get a chance to see before leaving Wisconsin. Because I had read the book, I really wanted to see the movie, and I thought it was AWESOME! Very true to the book, and Matt Damon turned in a fabulous performance. Ice cream afterward. A very enjoyable evening.
Wednesday Nov. 18 -- A New Apartment!
We got a tip from my former landlord, Heather, about a condo unit for rent at Summerlin Trace, off Summerlin Road at Lakewood. Great location ... right across from the back entrance to Lakes Park, and a couple miles closer to the beaches than our current location. The property owners -- John and Kim Regets -- met us at the property, and we fell in love it. After a little negotiating, we got the place for $1,250/month (completely furnished)with a $500 security deposit, and our lease will start April 1. Here are some photos:
The rub will be getting out of the current lease before July 15. I am hoping the current landlord will work with me in releasing me from the lease early. I have offered to help by showing the current apartment to prospective renters.
Anyway, we are very happy about this, and celebrated by going to Pincher's Crab Shack, were I had a pound of stone crab and Dawn had deep fried scallops.
Thursday November 19 -- Seminole Casino
Now that the Big M casino ship is no longer in business, I thought we might check out the Seminole Casino in Imokalee, about a 45 minute drive east of here. We arrived about 11 a.m., did a walking circle of the casino to check it out, then had lunch at the "First Street Deli," one of three eating establishments in the casino. We each had a mile-high deli sandwich, me a corned beef and pastrami combo Reuben sandwich, and Dawn a corned beef on Pumpernickel with Swiss and cole slaw. Both were delicious. From there, we each played slots, because there were no $5 gaming tables; the minimum was $10, and this is too rich for my blood. I won $16 playing two different slots, and Dawn lost just shy of $20, so it was about a wash between us. It was interesting to drive to Imokalee to see the vast difference between a seaside city (Fort Myers) and a landlocked one. Not a whole lot going in in Imokolee besides the casino. Big agricultural town with lots of fruit/vegetable pickers. Businesses with bars on the windows, and bilingual signs everywhere. I'll let you use your imagination. I don't know that we'll be back, but good to know there's a casino nearby if we get an itch to play slots.
Friday November 20 -- Farmer's Market and Fleamasters
Per tradition, Friday is farmer's and flea market, and we arrived Lakes Park about 9 a.m. for breakfast and commiserating with my group of buddies from the bicycle club. We had a few good laughs with them. After that we stopped at Chase Bank; we both had a little business to do. I had to obtain some additional "counter checks" because I forgot to bring the checkbook from Janesville. From there, we went to Fleamasters. Not much on our shopping list today, but I did pick up a book from Chris the Book Guy, and a battery for an Accutron 214 watch that I will sell on eBay. We also had lunch in food court ... I had a gyro platter, and Dawn a Nathan's hot dog. On the way out, we grabbed a 10-pound bag of Indian River ruby red grapefruit which I prepare for our breakfasts by peeling and sectioning the fruit so we each end up with a bowl of perfect skinless sections. Takes some time, but it's worth it.
Saturday November 21 -- Writers Club, Workout, Steak Dinner
Today was the monthly meeting of the Gulf Coast Writers Association, and we had an excellent guest speaker -- Charles Sobczak -- who spoke on writing about nature. He is not only a writer who has sold close to 100,000 books, but also also a naturalist who is very versed in the wildlife of southwest Florida with an emphasis on birds and reptiles. He is also concerned about global warming. So his talk was a very engaging mix of the writing and publishing worlds, along with pictures of wildlife, and he included some of his recent trip to Australia, which makes me want to go even more! I got a chance to meet Artis Henderson, who writes a weekly column for the "Florida Weekly" newspaper that I really enjoy. A lovely gal who lost her husband in the first Iraq war and wrote a memoir entitled "Unremarried Widow" that ended up on the NYT Bestseller List. Anyway, a most enjoyable morning.
From there, went to Planet Fitness for the second workout of the week (I also went on Tuesday), and then came back to apartment and collected Dawn for a steak dinner at a neighborhood pub called Buster's. One of their nightly specials they run on Saturday/Sunday is a one-pound sirloin steak dinner with all the trimmings for $11.99. I had enjoyed that dinner there many times during the 2014-15 season, but this evening it was not so good. The steak tasted like it had been brined in a salt solution to tenderize it. While certainly edible, it was overly salty, and we each brought back half our steak, and I think what I will do with it is chop it up and use it in a shepherd's pie. I'll let you know how that turns out.
Sunday November 22 -- Groceries and Another Packer Game
Today I am updating the blog, and the plan is to make a major grocery run, and then head back to "Buckets" for the 4:25 Packer game against the Minnesota Vikings. We had a good rain shower here in the morning, and now the sun is out.
That's all for now.
Bruce & Dawn
Saturday, November 14, 2015
Update Nov. 7-14
Hi Friends and Family:
Today is Saturday the 14th, and it's an absolutely gorgeous day out here. The heat and humidity have broken, and the high today is supposed to reach 80 degrees, which is normal for this time of year. But it will be short-lived. We are supposed to be back in the oven again on Monday, with high 80s to low 90s. Everyone around here is baffled as to why it has been so warm. There are worse things.
It's been a busy week .., but fun busy. I'll pick up where I left off.
Saturday 11/7 -- Goodbye Big M Floating Casino :-(
I bought the Yamaha Clavinova piano. The folks who had it for sale live in the Reflection Lakes community, a short hop from my place. It was purchased by the original owner as a "mood piece" for a home, and hardly ever (if ever) played. Perfect cosmetic and playing condition. I didn't haggle, and paid their asking price of $600. I called a delivery service, and it will be delivered Wednesday for a fee of $75
We learned the sad news today that the "Big M" gambling ship sailing out of Fort Myers Beach, is no more. Apparently, the boat left for the summer to go to its usual sister port at Myrtle Beach, and without telling anyone here, decided not to come back to FMB for the winter, citing dwindling revenues down here. What a wicked shame. This was something that I really loved to do, and sailed with them weekly, rarely missing a turn. And Dawn was really looking forward to it as well, having done one sailing with me over last Christmas. Holy cow, where else could you get a five hour sailing out on the ocean on a nice ship for $5? I guess there were too many people like me who took advantage of the bargain sailing but didn't spend enough time in the casino. We will be hard pressed to find something to fill the gap with something of equal value.
I fixed lemon garlic shrimp over linguine for dinner, and it was delicious, topped off the peach sorbet for dessert.
Sunday 11/8 -- No Packers for Dawn
\
We bought a Sunday paper today, hoping to look over the rental listings, only to find there are no rental listings, only homes for sale! Bummer. But I guess Craigslist and other Internet venues have take over that category, so we will search there. A preliminary search finds that the pickings are pretty slim right now, as "high season" is in full swing and most landlords have their properties occupied. My friend (and former landlord) Heather informs me that we will have much better luck as we approach then end of high season in latter March and April.
Dawn was looking forward to watching the Packer game (against Carolina Panthers) today, but the Fox network does not run the Packer games down here, at least as channeled through Comcast cable, So while doing a workout at Planet Fitness, I was trying to use my phone to find a sports bar around here that aired the game. But by the time I did, the game was too close to being over. So we'll try again next Sunday (Packers v. Detroit Lions) at the "Sandy Parrot," which apparently shows the Packer games, and has quite a few fans from Wisconsin in weekly attendance.
Monday 11/9 -- Eatin' Out
It was an eating out kind of day; we had both lunch and dinner out. For lunch, we went to DG Chinese, at a strip mall along 41, just a short hop from the apartment. This is the place that has great Dim Sum, but for this time we just opted for one of their $7 lunch specials. For dinner, we went to Mel's Diner for Grouper. Best deal on Grouper around. For $12.99 you get an 8-ounce fillet on a bun, served with fries and coleslaw. Nice to be back at Mel's again!
Tuesday 11/10 --- Shaken, Not Stirred
Busy day today. I did a workout at Planet Fitness, and I took a load of laundry to the wash-n-fold because our washer is still broke, but scheduled for service today. Brought back a smoked beef brisket sandwich from "BurgerCue" on McGregor to the apartment for Dawn and I to share for lunch. Appliance guy came at 3 p.m. and found our washer had a broken drain/spin switch. He had one on hand, and replaced it. We are in the laundry business again! The bill came to $202, which I wrote a check for and Bob (the landlord) is supposed to send me a check to reimburse me.
That evening, I had a dinner/movie engagement with my meetup group, so left for that around 4:15 p.m. and met up with the group at the "British Open Pub" in Bonita Springs for 5 p.m. dinner. I had a couple of beers, and something called a "Cottage Pie," which is their version of the shepherd's pie, only made with beef instead of the usual lamb. It was served in a crock, and was delicious. Afterward, we all adjourned to the Prado 12 Cinemas, just a short hop away, to see the new Bond flick, "Spectre." It's been getting mixed reviews, but as a die hard Bond fan, I really enjoyed it. Afterward, we stopped for ice cream at "Bob & Teryl's Ice Cream" right next to the theater for a post-movie treat. It was great seeing all my meetup friends, and all the people from last season remembered me. We had a really nice time. Got back to the apartment about 10 p.m.
Wednesday 11/11 -- Veteran's Day --- Dinner in Naples
Piano delivered about 10 a.m. Two guys and a big Budget Rent a Truck. Piano was in perfect condition. Awesome to have a piano down here to stay in practice.
In my ongoing search for decent pizza down here, Dawn and I tried LaMotta's Italian Restaurant and Eatery, by the wash-n-fold laundry off of San Carlos. We ordered a small pie with sausage and mushroom. It was just OK, Sufficient cheese, but crust was supremely soggy in the middle part of the pie, which was a bit of a mystery, but I think the sauce was too runny and maybe the mushrooms were soaking in a water bath and weren't patted dry before putting on the pie. A single waitress was running the whole show, including waiting tables and cooking. The only other employee we could see was "Carmello" who must have weighed in at 350 pounds or better, and was seated at the cash register playing with his tablet computer the whole time, occasionally taking customers' money. I don't think we'll be back. My kingdom for a decent pizza down here.
This evening, we were invited over to Karen's and Craig's (Dawn's friend) in Naples. We left around 4:15 p.m. and made the 40 mile or so trip to their place inside a gated community there. They have a beautiful 3-bedroom home there (four if you count their office room) and an in-ground pool which is right off their living room. We brought a couple of salads, and they furnished rest, which was a big 8-ounce burgers on the grill with toppings. We brought fresh fruit, and a pear/Gorgonzola lettuce salad. There were chips and deviled eggs, for dessert Karen made scratch biscuits for strawberry shortcake. Margaritas all around, and all the beer we could drink. We had a very lovely dip in the pool before dinner. It was great meeting Craig for the first time, and Dawn had a chance to catch up with Karen and Craig. I took four watches from them that needed various servicing, and this of course will give us an excuse to get together with them again!
Thursday Nov. 12 -- Damn the Heat, Let's Go to the Beach!
In spite of the heat, we decided to go to Fort Myers Beach today. We left around 10:30, and secured a couple of chaise lounge chairs and umbrella by the Gulf Shore Grill, one of our favorite spots for lunch. We both swam in the ocean, beautiful temperature, and we watched the endless parade of people walking, jogging, bike riding, etc., up and down the beach. Chair and umbrella rental came to $24 for the day. I finished the book, "Following Atticus" and enjoyed it very much. Lunch was fried Grouper fingers and bacon-wrapped shrimp at the Gulf Shore, washed down with a couple of rum 'n' Cokes. We sat on the beach for a while after lunch, then packed up and took a short walk up the beach to the "Sunset Beach Tropical Grill" which used to be the "Top O' Mast" bar. My, they have really fixed up the place, and I hardly recognized. They have built a huge deck over the former "sand pit" which was always an eyesore on the beach. Menu looks terrific, and lots of happy hour specials. We will be back.
Friday Nov. 13 -- Farmers' Market and Flea Masters
Today, we went to the farmers' at Lakes Park for breakfast, and each had a bagel sandwich and fresh fruit salad, and coffee, and it was delicious. I met up with my buddies from the "Peckerheads Bicycle Group" and it was great to see them again, and Dawn enjoyed seeing them again as well. We bought some fresh guacamole from one of the vendors, then returned to the apartment. We headed out to Flea Masters at about 11 a.m. Due to the ongoing heat, we only visited a couple of vendors, We went to the watch repair guy to drop off Karen/Craig's watches for repairs/battery changes. We then visited Chris the Book Guy to exchange pleasantries, but bought no books this time. We then had lunch at one of the food vendors and each had a fried clam platter, and it was delicious.
Back at the apartment, we each took a nap, then had chicken/cheese quesadillas with the fresh gauc we bought that morning. Delicious. Watched TV. What a sad, sad day in Paris. What is the world coming to?
Saturday Nov. 14 -- Aching to Get Out
I am finishing up the blog, while Dawn is trying to pick insurance off the health.gov website for 2016. We really need to get out and enjoy this day with rare comfortable temps. Perhaps we'll go over to Lakes Park and walk around.
Hope everyone is doing OK!
Love,
Bruce & Dawn
Today is Saturday the 14th, and it's an absolutely gorgeous day out here. The heat and humidity have broken, and the high today is supposed to reach 80 degrees, which is normal for this time of year. But it will be short-lived. We are supposed to be back in the oven again on Monday, with high 80s to low 90s. Everyone around here is baffled as to why it has been so warm. There are worse things.
It's been a busy week .., but fun busy. I'll pick up where I left off.
Saturday 11/7 -- Goodbye Big M Floating Casino :-(
I bought the Yamaha Clavinova piano. The folks who had it for sale live in the Reflection Lakes community, a short hop from my place. It was purchased by the original owner as a "mood piece" for a home, and hardly ever (if ever) played. Perfect cosmetic and playing condition. I didn't haggle, and paid their asking price of $600. I called a delivery service, and it will be delivered Wednesday for a fee of $75
We learned the sad news today that the "Big M" gambling ship sailing out of Fort Myers Beach, is no more. Apparently, the boat left for the summer to go to its usual sister port at Myrtle Beach, and without telling anyone here, decided not to come back to FMB for the winter, citing dwindling revenues down here. What a wicked shame. This was something that I really loved to do, and sailed with them weekly, rarely missing a turn. And Dawn was really looking forward to it as well, having done one sailing with me over last Christmas. Holy cow, where else could you get a five hour sailing out on the ocean on a nice ship for $5? I guess there were too many people like me who took advantage of the bargain sailing but didn't spend enough time in the casino. We will be hard pressed to find something to fill the gap with something of equal value.
I fixed lemon garlic shrimp over linguine for dinner, and it was delicious, topped off the peach sorbet for dessert.
Sunday 11/8 -- No Packers for Dawn
\
We bought a Sunday paper today, hoping to look over the rental listings, only to find there are no rental listings, only homes for sale! Bummer. But I guess Craigslist and other Internet venues have take over that category, so we will search there. A preliminary search finds that the pickings are pretty slim right now, as "high season" is in full swing and most landlords have their properties occupied. My friend (and former landlord) Heather informs me that we will have much better luck as we approach then end of high season in latter March and April.
Dawn was looking forward to watching the Packer game (against Carolina Panthers) today, but the Fox network does not run the Packer games down here, at least as channeled through Comcast cable, So while doing a workout at Planet Fitness, I was trying to use my phone to find a sports bar around here that aired the game. But by the time I did, the game was too close to being over. So we'll try again next Sunday (Packers v. Detroit Lions) at the "Sandy Parrot," which apparently shows the Packer games, and has quite a few fans from Wisconsin in weekly attendance.
Monday 11/9 -- Eatin' Out
It was an eating out kind of day; we had both lunch and dinner out. For lunch, we went to DG Chinese, at a strip mall along 41, just a short hop from the apartment. This is the place that has great Dim Sum, but for this time we just opted for one of their $7 lunch specials. For dinner, we went to Mel's Diner for Grouper. Best deal on Grouper around. For $12.99 you get an 8-ounce fillet on a bun, served with fries and coleslaw. Nice to be back at Mel's again!
Tuesday 11/10 --- Shaken, Not Stirred
Busy day today. I did a workout at Planet Fitness, and I took a load of laundry to the wash-n-fold because our washer is still broke, but scheduled for service today. Brought back a smoked beef brisket sandwich from "BurgerCue" on McGregor to the apartment for Dawn and I to share for lunch. Appliance guy came at 3 p.m. and found our washer had a broken drain/spin switch. He had one on hand, and replaced it. We are in the laundry business again! The bill came to $202, which I wrote a check for and Bob (the landlord) is supposed to send me a check to reimburse me.
That evening, I had a dinner/movie engagement with my meetup group, so left for that around 4:15 p.m. and met up with the group at the "British Open Pub" in Bonita Springs for 5 p.m. dinner. I had a couple of beers, and something called a "Cottage Pie," which is their version of the shepherd's pie, only made with beef instead of the usual lamb. It was served in a crock, and was delicious. Afterward, we all adjourned to the Prado 12 Cinemas, just a short hop away, to see the new Bond flick, "Spectre." It's been getting mixed reviews, but as a die hard Bond fan, I really enjoyed it. Afterward, we stopped for ice cream at "Bob & Teryl's Ice Cream" right next to the theater for a post-movie treat. It was great seeing all my meetup friends, and all the people from last season remembered me. We had a really nice time. Got back to the apartment about 10 p.m.
Wednesday 11/11 -- Veteran's Day --- Dinner in Naples
Piano delivered about 10 a.m. Two guys and a big Budget Rent a Truck. Piano was in perfect condition. Awesome to have a piano down here to stay in practice.
In my ongoing search for decent pizza down here, Dawn and I tried LaMotta's Italian Restaurant and Eatery, by the wash-n-fold laundry off of San Carlos. We ordered a small pie with sausage and mushroom. It was just OK, Sufficient cheese, but crust was supremely soggy in the middle part of the pie, which was a bit of a mystery, but I think the sauce was too runny and maybe the mushrooms were soaking in a water bath and weren't patted dry before putting on the pie. A single waitress was running the whole show, including waiting tables and cooking. The only other employee we could see was "Carmello" who must have weighed in at 350 pounds or better, and was seated at the cash register playing with his tablet computer the whole time, occasionally taking customers' money. I don't think we'll be back. My kingdom for a decent pizza down here.
This evening, we were invited over to Karen's and Craig's (Dawn's friend) in Naples. We left around 4:15 p.m. and made the 40 mile or so trip to their place inside a gated community there. They have a beautiful 3-bedroom home there (four if you count their office room) and an in-ground pool which is right off their living room. We brought a couple of salads, and they furnished rest, which was a big 8-ounce burgers on the grill with toppings. We brought fresh fruit, and a pear/Gorgonzola lettuce salad. There were chips and deviled eggs, for dessert Karen made scratch biscuits for strawberry shortcake. Margaritas all around, and all the beer we could drink. We had a very lovely dip in the pool before dinner. It was great meeting Craig for the first time, and Dawn had a chance to catch up with Karen and Craig. I took four watches from them that needed various servicing, and this of course will give us an excuse to get together with them again!
Thursday Nov. 12 -- Damn the Heat, Let's Go to the Beach!
In spite of the heat, we decided to go to Fort Myers Beach today. We left around 10:30, and secured a couple of chaise lounge chairs and umbrella by the Gulf Shore Grill, one of our favorite spots for lunch. We both swam in the ocean, beautiful temperature, and we watched the endless parade of people walking, jogging, bike riding, etc., up and down the beach. Chair and umbrella rental came to $24 for the day. I finished the book, "Following Atticus" and enjoyed it very much. Lunch was fried Grouper fingers and bacon-wrapped shrimp at the Gulf Shore, washed down with a couple of rum 'n' Cokes. We sat on the beach for a while after lunch, then packed up and took a short walk up the beach to the "Sunset Beach Tropical Grill" which used to be the "Top O' Mast" bar. My, they have really fixed up the place, and I hardly recognized. They have built a huge deck over the former "sand pit" which was always an eyesore on the beach. Menu looks terrific, and lots of happy hour specials. We will be back.
Friday Nov. 13 -- Farmers' Market and Flea Masters
Today, we went to the farmers' at Lakes Park for breakfast, and each had a bagel sandwich and fresh fruit salad, and coffee, and it was delicious. I met up with my buddies from the "Peckerheads Bicycle Group" and it was great to see them again, and Dawn enjoyed seeing them again as well. We bought some fresh guacamole from one of the vendors, then returned to the apartment. We headed out to Flea Masters at about 11 a.m. Due to the ongoing heat, we only visited a couple of vendors, We went to the watch repair guy to drop off Karen/Craig's watches for repairs/battery changes. We then visited Chris the Book Guy to exchange pleasantries, but bought no books this time. We then had lunch at one of the food vendors and each had a fried clam platter, and it was delicious.
Back at the apartment, we each took a nap, then had chicken/cheese quesadillas with the fresh gauc we bought that morning. Delicious. Watched TV. What a sad, sad day in Paris. What is the world coming to?
Saturday Nov. 14 -- Aching to Get Out
I am finishing up the blog, while Dawn is trying to pick insurance off the health.gov website for 2016. We really need to get out and enjoy this day with rare comfortable temps. Perhaps we'll go over to Lakes Park and walk around.
Hope everyone is doing OK!
Love,
Bruce & Dawn
Saturday, November 7, 2015
Arrival Fort Myers 2015
Hi all:
Another adventure begins. Dawn and I arrived Fort Myers Wednesday, Nov. 4. The "great ice maker flood" of September has left its aftermath in terms of mold/mildew smell in the kitchen, and a layer of plaster dust pretty much everywhere else from the drywall being replaced. The wooden legs on the recliner are stained from where the water stood on the floor. The first batch of ice from the ice maker was coated in a layer of gunk. Pretty much everything needs a scrubbing. There is a new cabinet the kitchen, and a new vanity in the bathroom. Both of the old ones were ruined from the water and humidity.
We unpacked our essentials, then made a list of stuff we needed, both groceries and cleaning supplies, and set out on errands. We also fetched our mail from the private mailbox place up the street, and I had several packages waiting for me, including a repaired watch, an AC adapter for my Microsoft Surface RT tablet, and my new Amazon $50 tablet computer, which I'm trying out and may use as a replacement when (not if!) the Surface craps out on me. Our "lunch" that day consisted of a stop at the Love Boat Ice Cream Parlor! We bought $20 worth of cleaning supplies and a few other misc. items at Target.
For dinner that night, we had chicken burritos, salsa, and chips. With the Internet and basic cable running, we watched a little bit of Netflix and some TV, but then turned in early. We were both tired from driving from Tifton, Georgia.
Thursday 11/5
Errands this morning, and Dawn came along also to get acclimated to the geography. We stopped at Planet Fitness to get my membership switched over, and turned out they could not (or would not) do the switch, so I ended up getting a new "black card" membership, which will now cost me $20/month instead of $10/month, but now I won't have to worry about switching every six month. FM will now be my "home base" location, and the black card will get me into any Planet Fitness in any city for unlimited use, and I just needed to write a letter to the Planet Fitness in Janesville to cancel my membership there so that I'm no longer billed the $10/month here.
Also, this morning, we found out the washer/dryer unit in the apartment is broke. The washer washes, but will not drain or spin. So a call to the landlord is bringing a repair person to the apartment next Tuesday, 11/10. In the meantime, we had a load of soaking wet clothes to take to a wash-and-fold laundromat, which cost Dawn $13.50.
We treated ourselves to dinner at Pincher's Crab Shack out on San Carlos, Blvd. I had a pound of the large stone crab claws, and Dawn had deep friend scallops. Delicious. Man, I have missed those crab claws, but must make them only an occasional treat, as they are $40 for the one-pound dinner. Maybe just weekly .., ha ha. We bought a half of a key lime pie at Publix, and brought it home and each had a slice for dessert.
Friday 11/6
A few more errands this morning, but in the afternoon I left Dawn on her own, and went to Planet Fitness for a much-needed 2-hour workout, then to the CVS pharmacy for some refills, and also got my flu shot while there. For dinner, I made some chicken quesadillas, and we had fresh salsa and guacamole from the farmer's market that morning. They were delicious. We split the rest of the key lime for dessert.
Saturday 11/7
Today, we just finished breakfast here at the apartment, and now are going to a residence at the "Reflections" community up the street on Cypress Lake Drive to look at a Yamaha Clavinova piano for the apartment. At some point today, my plan is buy a nice piece of fresh fish at Publix, and tonight pan sear it and top it with a homemade mango salsa, with beans and rice on the side and perhaps a fruit sorbet on the side. Beyond that, the day is clear so far.
We see Wisconsin's little November heat wave has come to an end. It's been unseasonably hot here (upwards of mid-90s) these last three days, but by next week is supposed to return to normal lower to mid 80s, with 60s at night.
Take care,
Bruce & Dawn
Another adventure begins. Dawn and I arrived Fort Myers Wednesday, Nov. 4. The "great ice maker flood" of September has left its aftermath in terms of mold/mildew smell in the kitchen, and a layer of plaster dust pretty much everywhere else from the drywall being replaced. The wooden legs on the recliner are stained from where the water stood on the floor. The first batch of ice from the ice maker was coated in a layer of gunk. Pretty much everything needs a scrubbing. There is a new cabinet the kitchen, and a new vanity in the bathroom. Both of the old ones were ruined from the water and humidity.
We unpacked our essentials, then made a list of stuff we needed, both groceries and cleaning supplies, and set out on errands. We also fetched our mail from the private mailbox place up the street, and I had several packages waiting for me, including a repaired watch, an AC adapter for my Microsoft Surface RT tablet, and my new Amazon $50 tablet computer, which I'm trying out and may use as a replacement when (not if!) the Surface craps out on me. Our "lunch" that day consisted of a stop at the Love Boat Ice Cream Parlor! We bought $20 worth of cleaning supplies and a few other misc. items at Target.
For dinner that night, we had chicken burritos, salsa, and chips. With the Internet and basic cable running, we watched a little bit of Netflix and some TV, but then turned in early. We were both tired from driving from Tifton, Georgia.
Thursday 11/5
Errands this morning, and Dawn came along also to get acclimated to the geography. We stopped at Planet Fitness to get my membership switched over, and turned out they could not (or would not) do the switch, so I ended up getting a new "black card" membership, which will now cost me $20/month instead of $10/month, but now I won't have to worry about switching every six month. FM will now be my "home base" location, and the black card will get me into any Planet Fitness in any city for unlimited use, and I just needed to write a letter to the Planet Fitness in Janesville to cancel my membership there so that I'm no longer billed the $10/month here.
Also, this morning, we found out the washer/dryer unit in the apartment is broke. The washer washes, but will not drain or spin. So a call to the landlord is bringing a repair person to the apartment next Tuesday, 11/10. In the meantime, we had a load of soaking wet clothes to take to a wash-and-fold laundromat, which cost Dawn $13.50.
We treated ourselves to dinner at Pincher's Crab Shack out on San Carlos, Blvd. I had a pound of the large stone crab claws, and Dawn had deep friend scallops. Delicious. Man, I have missed those crab claws, but must make them only an occasional treat, as they are $40 for the one-pound dinner. Maybe just weekly .., ha ha. We bought a half of a key lime pie at Publix, and brought it home and each had a slice for dessert.
Friday 11/6
A few more errands this morning, but in the afternoon I left Dawn on her own, and went to Planet Fitness for a much-needed 2-hour workout, then to the CVS pharmacy for some refills, and also got my flu shot while there. For dinner, I made some chicken quesadillas, and we had fresh salsa and guacamole from the farmer's market that morning. They were delicious. We split the rest of the key lime for dessert.
Saturday 11/7
Today, we just finished breakfast here at the apartment, and now are going to a residence at the "Reflections" community up the street on Cypress Lake Drive to look at a Yamaha Clavinova piano for the apartment. At some point today, my plan is buy a nice piece of fresh fish at Publix, and tonight pan sear it and top it with a homemade mango salsa, with beans and rice on the side and perhaps a fruit sorbet on the side. Beyond that, the day is clear so far.
We see Wisconsin's little November heat wave has come to an end. It's been unseasonably hot here (upwards of mid-90s) these last three days, but by next week is supposed to return to normal lower to mid 80s, with 60s at night.
Take care,
Bruce & Dawn
Wednesday, April 29, 2015
Home Again
I arrived back in Janesville April 28 (Tuesday) about 3:30 p.m. local time. Figured I should close out this blog series for my "Winter in Fort Myers."
Except for the last couple of weeks, the winter in Fort Myers was, in a word, FANTASTIC! I enjoyed myself very much. Lots of new experiences, and great fun enjoying old experiences over again. I felt much more "social" this time around, having connected with two different "meetup" groups, and having a met a very nice woman by the name of Nora through "ourtime" which resulted in several pleasant outings. Meeting new people certainly expanded my horizons and knowledge of local venues.
I would be hard-pressed to name a favorite activity, but certainly the Royal Caribbean cruise, the week with Dawn, the little side trip to St. Pete, and the Everglades adventure were right up there. Fort Myers Beach, Sanibel Island, the Lakes Park farmer's market, Big M floating casino (all told, won $475 at the table games there during my visit), and the Fleamaster flea market remain as favorites.
I took ill about April 15 right after returning from a second trip to St. Pete where I visited with friends. And from that point to April 26 when I left, I was pretty much miserable the whole time. Since I last blogged on April 21, I continued to nurse my cold, and didn't go out much at all. I tried to eat as much as I could of what remained in the fridge, freezer, and cupboards to minimize waste, and would supplement that a few times with some food out when I absolutely did not feel like cooking. Thank goodness for Mel's Diner, which is big on comfort food. Their chicken noodle soup is homemade and I swear is as good for a cold as penicillin. I also had a roast turkey dinner there one night, which was really the first solid food I'd had in a couple of days. It literally brought a tear to my eye.
My feeling crappy was also not helped by the fact that the weather in Fort Myers during the last couple of weeks turned unseasonably hot and humid; even to the point where the locals were complaining. I really could not enjoy the lanai room, and going outside anytime in general was like getting hit in face with a hot, wet sock.
I did go out on Thursday April 23 to buy a new Smart Phone because the old one was starting to act weird, and I absolutely need a reliable cell phone, especially for the upcoming trip home. It's another Samsung, this time a "Galaxy Prevail" operating on the Android system, with even more features that I don't understand or use, but it has larger screen, better camera, and bigger buttons. With tax, it came to $149. I am staying with the same carrier, which is the "Boost" network, which gives me unlimited talk time and data for $40/month plus tax.
I did make it to the flea market (Fleamasters) one last time on Friday April 24. I was in search of a watch band (which I did not find) and a clear cover for the screen on the new phone (which I did find) and I had a chance to say goodbye to my book buddy ("Chris the Book Guy") who provided me with many pleasurable hours of reading, in addition to the 1st edition copy of Sanibel Flats. I figured I read a least a dozen books while down here, which is a pleasure I don't get to indulge in as often as I'd like when I'm in Wisconsin. I also stopped one last time at Sun Harvest Citrus, because the first crop of Florida peaches were in, and I bought four of them. They were delicious ... sweet and juicy and taste like a peach should taste, as opposed to those mealy, tasteless shot puts we get in Wisconsin. God, I am going to miss the delicious produce here.
But for those minor complaints about feeling lousy the last couple of weeks, I had a truly wonderful time. I renewed the lease on the apartment, so I'm all set for next winter and I'm sure the sunny warm temps will be welcome as the cold winds of November start blowing here in Wisconsin.
I left Fort Myers on Sunday April 26 at about 7:30 a.m. with a fairly light load in the Prius (compared to what I had come down with, because I wasn't hauling a big screen TV with me, nor the inflatable bed, which I left at the apartment). Made it to Macon, Ga., about 4:30 with a couple of quick stops for lunch, and for $30 worth of pecans at Adcock Pecans in Tifton, Ga. Abby was a wonderful traveler, sleeping through most of the drive. Dinner was at a place called "JL's Open Pit BBQ" next to the motel (Day's Inn ... very adequate), and I felt compelled to write a review of them on Trip Advisor (click on the link if you're interested in reading; my review is the one titled "I Demand a Recount!). Bottom line, the ribs were just so-so, but for $13.99 for AYCE pork ribs, I certainly couldn't complain about the price.
Monday night was spent in Paducah, Ky., at another Day's Inn. Played it more conservative for dinner that night and simply ate at "Steak and Shake" and enjoyed some of my candied pecans back at the motel. The next morning I had breakfast at Cracker Barrel because I didn't want another carb explosion at the motel's breakfast bar. Arrived Janesville as stated earlier. Mileage 1,436 door to door, and the Prius averaged 53 miles per gallon by keeping the speed at around 65 mph.
No regrets on the trip. I think this is going to be the "plan," at least for the foreseeable future. I did notice my body complained more with general aches and pains. Bicycle rides seemed more difficult; I definitely bicycled less and drove more. I also didn't visit Planet Fitness nearly as often as I had hoped to. Had thought I might lose a little weight while I was down there, but the best I managed to do was to maintain my present weight, which I still consider a "win," what with all the delicious food down there. If I had stuck around here during the winter, I have little doubt I would have put on 10 pounds. At least in Florida, I did engage in some exercising and bicycling, even though it wasn't as much as I had hoped to do.
So that closes the books on another winter in Florida. I hope you have enjoyed reading my blog!
Bruce
Except for the last couple of weeks, the winter in Fort Myers was, in a word, FANTASTIC! I enjoyed myself very much. Lots of new experiences, and great fun enjoying old experiences over again. I felt much more "social" this time around, having connected with two different "meetup" groups, and having a met a very nice woman by the name of Nora through "ourtime" which resulted in several pleasant outings. Meeting new people certainly expanded my horizons and knowledge of local venues.
I would be hard-pressed to name a favorite activity, but certainly the Royal Caribbean cruise, the week with Dawn, the little side trip to St. Pete, and the Everglades adventure were right up there. Fort Myers Beach, Sanibel Island, the Lakes Park farmer's market, Big M floating casino (all told, won $475 at the table games there during my visit), and the Fleamaster flea market remain as favorites.
I took ill about April 15 right after returning from a second trip to St. Pete where I visited with friends. And from that point to April 26 when I left, I was pretty much miserable the whole time. Since I last blogged on April 21, I continued to nurse my cold, and didn't go out much at all. I tried to eat as much as I could of what remained in the fridge, freezer, and cupboards to minimize waste, and would supplement that a few times with some food out when I absolutely did not feel like cooking. Thank goodness for Mel's Diner, which is big on comfort food. Their chicken noodle soup is homemade and I swear is as good for a cold as penicillin. I also had a roast turkey dinner there one night, which was really the first solid food I'd had in a couple of days. It literally brought a tear to my eye.
My feeling crappy was also not helped by the fact that the weather in Fort Myers during the last couple of weeks turned unseasonably hot and humid; even to the point where the locals were complaining. I really could not enjoy the lanai room, and going outside anytime in general was like getting hit in face with a hot, wet sock.
I did go out on Thursday April 23 to buy a new Smart Phone because the old one was starting to act weird, and I absolutely need a reliable cell phone, especially for the upcoming trip home. It's another Samsung, this time a "Galaxy Prevail" operating on the Android system, with even more features that I don't understand or use, but it has larger screen, better camera, and bigger buttons. With tax, it came to $149. I am staying with the same carrier, which is the "Boost" network, which gives me unlimited talk time and data for $40/month plus tax.
I did make it to the flea market (Fleamasters) one last time on Friday April 24. I was in search of a watch band (which I did not find) and a clear cover for the screen on the new phone (which I did find) and I had a chance to say goodbye to my book buddy ("Chris the Book Guy") who provided me with many pleasurable hours of reading, in addition to the 1st edition copy of Sanibel Flats. I figured I read a least a dozen books while down here, which is a pleasure I don't get to indulge in as often as I'd like when I'm in Wisconsin. I also stopped one last time at Sun Harvest Citrus, because the first crop of Florida peaches were in, and I bought four of them. They were delicious ... sweet and juicy and taste like a peach should taste, as opposed to those mealy, tasteless shot puts we get in Wisconsin. God, I am going to miss the delicious produce here.
But for those minor complaints about feeling lousy the last couple of weeks, I had a truly wonderful time. I renewed the lease on the apartment, so I'm all set for next winter and I'm sure the sunny warm temps will be welcome as the cold winds of November start blowing here in Wisconsin.
I left Fort Myers on Sunday April 26 at about 7:30 a.m. with a fairly light load in the Prius (compared to what I had come down with, because I wasn't hauling a big screen TV with me, nor the inflatable bed, which I left at the apartment). Made it to Macon, Ga., about 4:30 with a couple of quick stops for lunch, and for $30 worth of pecans at Adcock Pecans in Tifton, Ga. Abby was a wonderful traveler, sleeping through most of the drive. Dinner was at a place called "JL's Open Pit BBQ" next to the motel (Day's Inn ... very adequate), and I felt compelled to write a review of them on Trip Advisor (click on the link if you're interested in reading; my review is the one titled "I Demand a Recount!). Bottom line, the ribs were just so-so, but for $13.99 for AYCE pork ribs, I certainly couldn't complain about the price.
Monday night was spent in Paducah, Ky., at another Day's Inn. Played it more conservative for dinner that night and simply ate at "Steak and Shake" and enjoyed some of my candied pecans back at the motel. The next morning I had breakfast at Cracker Barrel because I didn't want another carb explosion at the motel's breakfast bar. Arrived Janesville as stated earlier. Mileage 1,436 door to door, and the Prius averaged 53 miles per gallon by keeping the speed at around 65 mph.
No regrets on the trip. I think this is going to be the "plan," at least for the foreseeable future. I did notice my body complained more with general aches and pains. Bicycle rides seemed more difficult; I definitely bicycled less and drove more. I also didn't visit Planet Fitness nearly as often as I had hoped to. Had thought I might lose a little weight while I was down there, but the best I managed to do was to maintain my present weight, which I still consider a "win," what with all the delicious food down there. If I had stuck around here during the winter, I have little doubt I would have put on 10 pounds. At least in Florida, I did engage in some exercising and bicycling, even though it wasn't as much as I had hoped to do.
So that closes the books on another winter in Florida. I hope you have enjoyed reading my blog!
Bruce
Tuesday, April 21, 2015
The Burmese Pythons of the Everglades
Hi everyone. Not your usual blog entry today. I am not aboard the Big M casino, nor is this about my past week's goings-on. The fact is, I haven't done shit this past week, due to catching a nasty cold, the likes of which I haven't seen since returning from my Germany trip a year ago (to the month, in fact).
I'll spare you the unpleasant details, but basically I have been pretty miserable since last Wednesday. I've been confined mostly to the apartment, going out only to get some food in tummy or buy some OTC meds to try and alleviate symptoms. I did not go to an urgent care center, because when I've gone in the past, I am told there is nothing they can do. Antibiotics are useless, so basically it’s a waste of half a day sitting in a waiting room with other sick people, and the best you can hope for is to leave with a scrip for a 4-ounce bottle of Robitusen-C (which lasts about a day!) and the usual instructions to rest and drink plenty of fluids. Blah, blah, blah. I feel I’ve gotten over the worst of it, but what I crave most right now is just solid, uninterrupted sleep because all I've gotten lately is just one- to two-hour bursts, where I wake up with a coughing fit, and usually laying in sweat-soaked bedsheets.
So this is a little story about the Burmese Pythons that inhabit the Everglades. It is not a rant, really, as much as an observation. But if these little departures from my usual format do not interest you, you may wish to skip this blog entry.
OK, first I need to emphasize that I do not consider myself an environmentalist for various reasons that I won't go into here. I realize this may surprise some of you, even anger some of you, but that's the way it is. I'm a lot of other very nice things, just not an environmentalist. I can hear some of you say, "But, hey dude, you drive a Prius." OK, true confession: I drive a Prius because of the great money it saves me, both on gasoline and amazing mechanical reliability of Toyota products in general, which keeps me out of the repair shop. The fact that it emits virtually no hydrocarbons into the atmosphere is incidental to me. It's cool that it does that, but it's not the reason I bought the car!
OK, that said, there is some environmental shit going on down here in Florida that is just so amazingly weird and interesting to me, that I simply can't resist it. My top pick is the Burmese Python, which has taken up residence in the Florida Everglades, and is wreaking havoc on a scale that has pretty much every environmentalist down here upset. I learned about this during my airboat ride in the Everglades several weeks ago.
First of all, the Burmese Python is NOT native to the Everglades, nor to any part of Florida for the that matter. As subtropical creatures, it is too cold for them here during the winter (but read on; they have learned to adapt). Thus, they are labeled an "invasive species" here. They don't belong, and they are unwanted. The experts figure the pythons were introduced to the Everglades as the result of being kept as pets. Some idiots just release them into wild when they become too large to manage. Other times, hurricanes hit and destroy homes, with "domesticated" pythons escaping their enclosures and evidently honing in on the Everglades as their preferred residence, no doubt because it most closely resembles their own "hood" down in the Amazon and jungles of Asia. A sufficient number of males and females gathered to create a colony, and they have multiplied like, well, like pythons, with no natural enemy here in Florida to curtail their population. Occasionally, a black bear or alligator or wild boar (also another invasive species here) will kill one if they're under 8 feet in length, and the birds will go after the hatchlings. But if they make it to 8 feet, they're pretty much at the top of the food chain.
Experts "estimate" (estimate in quotes here) that there are somewhere between 10,000 and 100,000 Burmese Pythons slithering the marshes and waterways of the Everglades. I'd say that "estimate" pretty constitutes a "no fu**king clue" as to how many of these are out there. What IS known, however, is that they are eating everything in sight, including many rare and endanger species. They survive the winters by finding borrows created by other creatures (raccoons, etc.), evicting the existing tenant (if any) by eating them, and then more or less hibernating during the coldest couple of winter months.
OK, so finally in 2013, the Florida Department of Fish and Wildlife put its foot down and decided enough is enough. They sponsored a "Python Challenge" to rid the Everglades once and for all of this heinous creature. There was a $50 bounty offered on every python. On top of that, a $1,500 prize was awarded to the person who brought in the largest python, and another $1,500 prize to the person who brought in the MOST pythons. The contest brought in 1,600 hunters during the two months that the contest ran. Most of the folks were pros, referred to as "swamp apes" by many people. These are folks who hunt alligators for a living, who if you saw them coming your way on the street, you'd cross over to the other side.
Exactly 68 pythons were captured and humanely euthanized during the two-month event.
The Fish and Wildlife Department issued a brief press release after the event: " ... there will not be another python hunt next year."
They have basically given up. They figure the only thing that will eliminate these creatures, short of an asteroid striking the earth, is when they run out of food and presumably start eating each other.
So there you have it. Unintended consequences. Florida probably has more of this going on than in any place in the country, which is one more thing that makes the Sunshine State so dog-gone interesting. It used to be all Florida had to worry about was Anita Bryant. But at least we knew how many there were of her and her intention of overturning Roe v. Wade. Now they have Burmese Pythons, with no earthly idea of how many there are, nor of their ultimate intentions.
Bruce
I'll spare you the unpleasant details, but basically I have been pretty miserable since last Wednesday. I've been confined mostly to the apartment, going out only to get some food in tummy or buy some OTC meds to try and alleviate symptoms. I did not go to an urgent care center, because when I've gone in the past, I am told there is nothing they can do. Antibiotics are useless, so basically it’s a waste of half a day sitting in a waiting room with other sick people, and the best you can hope for is to leave with a scrip for a 4-ounce bottle of Robitusen-C (which lasts about a day!) and the usual instructions to rest and drink plenty of fluids. Blah, blah, blah. I feel I’ve gotten over the worst of it, but what I crave most right now is just solid, uninterrupted sleep because all I've gotten lately is just one- to two-hour bursts, where I wake up with a coughing fit, and usually laying in sweat-soaked bedsheets.
So this is a little story about the Burmese Pythons that inhabit the Everglades. It is not a rant, really, as much as an observation. But if these little departures from my usual format do not interest you, you may wish to skip this blog entry.
OK, first I need to emphasize that I do not consider myself an environmentalist for various reasons that I won't go into here. I realize this may surprise some of you, even anger some of you, but that's the way it is. I'm a lot of other very nice things, just not an environmentalist. I can hear some of you say, "But, hey dude, you drive a Prius." OK, true confession: I drive a Prius because of the great money it saves me, both on gasoline and amazing mechanical reliability of Toyota products in general, which keeps me out of the repair shop. The fact that it emits virtually no hydrocarbons into the atmosphere is incidental to me. It's cool that it does that, but it's not the reason I bought the car!
OK, that said, there is some environmental shit going on down here in Florida that is just so amazingly weird and interesting to me, that I simply can't resist it. My top pick is the Burmese Python, which has taken up residence in the Florida Everglades, and is wreaking havoc on a scale that has pretty much every environmentalist down here upset. I learned about this during my airboat ride in the Everglades several weeks ago.
First of all, the Burmese Python is NOT native to the Everglades, nor to any part of Florida for the that matter. As subtropical creatures, it is too cold for them here during the winter (but read on; they have learned to adapt). Thus, they are labeled an "invasive species" here. They don't belong, and they are unwanted. The experts figure the pythons were introduced to the Everglades as the result of being kept as pets. Some idiots just release them into wild when they become too large to manage. Other times, hurricanes hit and destroy homes, with "domesticated" pythons escaping their enclosures and evidently honing in on the Everglades as their preferred residence, no doubt because it most closely resembles their own "hood" down in the Amazon and jungles of Asia. A sufficient number of males and females gathered to create a colony, and they have multiplied like, well, like pythons, with no natural enemy here in Florida to curtail their population. Occasionally, a black bear or alligator or wild boar (also another invasive species here) will kill one if they're under 8 feet in length, and the birds will go after the hatchlings. But if they make it to 8 feet, they're pretty much at the top of the food chain.
Experts "estimate" (estimate in quotes here) that there are somewhere between 10,000 and 100,000 Burmese Pythons slithering the marshes and waterways of the Everglades. I'd say that "estimate" pretty constitutes a "no fu**king clue" as to how many of these are out there. What IS known, however, is that they are eating everything in sight, including many rare and endanger species. They survive the winters by finding borrows created by other creatures (raccoons, etc.), evicting the existing tenant (if any) by eating them, and then more or less hibernating during the coldest couple of winter months.
OK, so finally in 2013, the Florida Department of Fish and Wildlife put its foot down and decided enough is enough. They sponsored a "Python Challenge" to rid the Everglades once and for all of this heinous creature. There was a $50 bounty offered on every python. On top of that, a $1,500 prize was awarded to the person who brought in the largest python, and another $1,500 prize to the person who brought in the MOST pythons. The contest brought in 1,600 hunters during the two months that the contest ran. Most of the folks were pros, referred to as "swamp apes" by many people. These are folks who hunt alligators for a living, who if you saw them coming your way on the street, you'd cross over to the other side.
Exactly 68 pythons were captured and humanely euthanized during the two-month event.
The Fish and Wildlife Department issued a brief press release after the event: " ... there will not be another python hunt next year."
They have basically given up. They figure the only thing that will eliminate these creatures, short of an asteroid striking the earth, is when they run out of food and presumably start eating each other.
So there you have it. Unintended consequences. Florida probably has more of this going on than in any place in the country, which is one more thing that makes the Sunshine State so dog-gone interesting. It used to be all Florida had to worry about was Anita Bryant. But at least we knew how many there were of her and her intention of overturning Roe v. Wade. Now they have Burmese Pythons, with no earthly idea of how many there are, nor of their ultimate intentions.
Bruce
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