It’s funny that this prompt came up today, because I haven’t had much time to go grocery shopping and ran out of one of my most precious items: coffee creamer. I just love how long that stuff lasts, which real cream does not. And I actually prefer no sweetener in my coffee, but that Italian Sweet Cream sure starts my day off well.
Today’s sunrise also started the day off well, so well it still looked good around 8:30.
What are my other four top grocery items? They squash my self image as a healthy eater. I’m afraid it’s Coke Zero, pop tarts (fruit), cheese, and yogurt. I assure you things like salad greens, tomatoes, onions, and tuna are also present. I eat a wide variety but need my emergency pop tarts.
I could eat dandelion greens in an emergency. We always have them.
On to the good news. I may have mentioned that Drew, the gray teen horse, got kicked in the head by Fiona the donkey a few weeks ago. Since then he hasn’t liked having his head touched, which created a problem due to his habit of eating among cockleburs, which got all over his forelock, the “bangs” on the front of a horse’s head.
This is on a day when I got some of them out.
He had been picking on the other horses, acting unfriendly towards me, and shaking his head if I put on a halter or bridle. I could barely ride him, so I mostly have been doing stuff on the ground. Well, today I had extra time, so I got him some hay, groomed him, and then tried but removal again.
Nice tail.
Yesterday, while waiting for Sara to come look at Apache, he let me get all the burs out of his tail, which looked sort of like a mop in the process of being wrung before I started. I took that as a good sign.
First I did the mane
So today I started on the part of his name farthest from his face and moved upwards. There was some gnarly stuff in there, but I gently separated the mess (wearing my gloves, of course). I gave him lots of rest time and much hay. When I got to the hard part, the top of his head, he got agitated. I had carefully put a web halter on at its loosest setting, but his head still itched. Poor guy.
Note the puff on his forehead!
I eventually got ALL the burs off. I think he eventually figured out I was helping. When I was finished he let me rub all over his little fro. Burs are like tiny hair curlers. Then he let me rub on his face, where the cut had been and I’d spilled oil the first time I’d de-burred him. Wow!
His reward was getting to graze in the round pen.
He was still agitated when we got to Tarrin’s for a lesson. He was hard to lead and his ears were back. So Tarrin did some cranial-fascial work on him and slowly he stopped head tossing. He had obviously been injured and knocked out of alignment. Probably had a concussion or hairline fracture, poor guy. Maybe that has taught him to avoid Fiona’s hooves. He seemed much happier when his skull and jaw were realigned.
Fix my leg, please.
Tarrin then worked with his behavior and got him more settled after realizing his back end also hurt (I’m guessing from rearing and kicking with Dusty). By the time she was done, he was paying attention to her nicely, doing good lateral movements, and acting sweet again.
She told me that if he starts acting mean again that he must not feel good. I’ll bear that in mind. He just needs to be walked over poles for the next week.
What about me?
Yes, it’s true. Neither of my riding horses can be ridden right now. Apache is no worse, and I am to start soaking his feet in epsom salts and water to try to draw out his abscess. He does get to be set free of the pens, though, because walking is good for him.
Must I?
And he will have pain meds for a few days. That boy is on a LOT of medication!
Ow.
I feel bad for both of them being in pain, but I think Droodles is gonna be better soon. Hope Apache is just a few more weeks to get better.
I just noticed in my stats that certain posts are getting lots of hits. Since US Thanksgiving is coming, I should reshare my two recipes using whole cranberries. Make a double batch of the first one and then make the second from leftovers:
I also make really good cornbread dressing that also has some breadcrumbs in it. When affordable, I add oysters. This year I am trying smoked oysters, from a recipe in a magazine.
Dressing before cooking.
I believe these are among the few things I cook well other than New Year’s dinner as my family ate it. Maybe I’ll add black eyed peas and collards to my collection.
I will not cook giant leaf footed bugs.
I do love cranberries, to get back on topic. Anita’s making a cranberry dessert for us on Thursday. I can’t wait. And oops. I forgot to get a can of the sauce other people eat. No worries. The local grocery store will have tons of it.
Available at your local store. Interestingly, the whole berry sauce is sold out at Amazon.
Few things are as frustrating as reading a cookbook all about a specific ingredient, knowing full well that you are completely out of that ingredient. But I did it, I read this fascinating rice cookbook in one of the very few times in my adult life that I was out of rice.
I thought there was another giant bag of rice in the freezer, but there wasn’t. Luckily, Lee got me some Basmati rice today when he grocery shopped. But now that I’ve read The Simple Art of Rice, by JJ Johnson (with Danica Novgorodoff), I know I need more kinds of rice, like my beloved sushi rice, brown rice, and black rice.
I discovered this book the way I discover so many, on an NPR interview. It’s a good thing I’m not in the car listening as much as I used to, because I found two books in one day driving to and from College Station.
Anyway, this book is gorgeous, with lovely photos of the rice dishes from many cultures as well as elegant watercolor illustrations by the co-author. I love a substantial hardback book.
Sample illustration.
Most importantly, the content is interesting, with a nice mix of rice history, stories of cultural ties to rice, some science, and a well rounded collection of recipes that Johnson collected from workers at the many restaurants where he’s worked.
Now JJ Johnson is a famous rice chef, but I enjoyed how he didn’t re-do traditional recipes, just added a little to some. I enjoyed learning African, Asian, Caribbean, and American traditions and how they are interrelated, often due to the forced African diaspora to North America and the islands around it.
Most of the recipes would be easy to try for the average cook. They all sound very flavorful. Some call for special ingredients from cultures whose grocery stores are not near Milam County, Texas, but maybe I can get some in Austin. I expect I’d be the only one to eat some of the ones I’d like to try most, because they’re full of cilantro, very hot peppers, and the dreaded curry. But that would give me more leftovers!
Extraneous giant swallowtail for you
I suspect my family would love some of the desserts, though. And dishes I know they love are in there…with so many variations of beans and rice! We eat that!
All in all, I had a blast reading the stories, interviews, and cultural nuggets in this book. The recipes are like a delicious bonus! This is a great addition to any collection of cookbooks, especially of home cooking.
This visitor to the ranch is glad there were no turtle gumbo recipes.
Write about your most epic baking or cooking fail.
I’m sure I’ve had plenty of cooking fails, but I must admit that meals I cook don’t stick in my memory, good or bad. It’s just not a part of my life that I think about much.
I have no idea what this is. Meat loaf?
Cooking is something I did a lot of in my younger years. I enjoyed it when I was trying new things and feeding my kids. I’m grateful that the kids’ dad ate pretty much anything I made and seemed to like it. That encouraged me. He ate a lot to fuel his cycling and running.
Something I cooked in 2015. I recognize asparagus.
I don’t have as much fun cooking today, for a variety of reasons. We rarely are all home at the same time. Lee has started wanting to eat at 5 pm or earlier, like the old people we used to make fun of with their Early Bird Specials. The other man here works late and often eats around 8. Then there are all the things various folks can’t or don’t want to eat, healthy eating choices versus other choices.
Aha! A thing I cook well. Pork loin, Brussels sprouts and potatoes.
Every so often one of us will cook a nice meal, and we all enjoy it. I’m quite fond of everyone’s choices. Mostly we just scrounge, as we call it.
This looks icky. 2016 meal. I like beets.
What was the question? Oh yes. I asked Lee if he remembered a particularly icky meal, and he said he couldn’t remember exactly what it was, but that we threw it out and went to a restaurant. That sounds bad.
I think this is stew. 2018.
One cooking error I remember was when I was in my twenties. We made a huge batch of ice cream, and when it was finished we saw the bottle of vanilla extract, which hadn’t been opened. Luckily, the iced cream was still very good.
Dewberry cobbler. It was good.
I’m pretty sure I made banana bread with no sugar once, too.
I make a lot of bean soups. 2019 at my house with Anita.
Sorry this was pretty dull, but hey, I committed to answering each WordPress prompt this month!
Liver. Yes I cook liver. Well.
My actual day was mostly quite fun. Work was interesting and full of good conversation, and we went and looked at a potential house to renovate later.
I wonder how many meals this oven baked before it conked out? (From the house we looked at)
One negative part of the day was that I got my flu shot for this year, and got it on the wrong arm. No horse lunging today! I also have been enjoying a fever. It’s a tiny price to pay for no flu.
Minor negative. No eggs today.
The other negative part was that a swarm of tiny biting flies attacked me this morning, when I was wearing shorts and had exposed arms. They hurt almost as badly as horseflies and it lingered. The stiff breeze seems to have blown them away.
I’m sure the cows are grateful for the breeze. They are eating sweet honey locust seed pods.
Just in case, I put fly spray on all the horses. I’m sure glad I have such a friendly herd that come right up to me and let me spray them.
That’s it. I’ll leave you with one more meal from my handy photo search for “food” tgat brought you today’s pictures.
New Year’s dinner, 2021. My favorite meal to cook. I do usually add pork loin for those not fond of black-eyed peas and collard greens.
Oh gee, it would be easier to say what I don’t like. That’s tripe, brains, and green bean casserole.
I especially don’t like those onions.
Well, it says “types of food” in the prompt. I’m that case, I’d say I like fresh food minimally seasoned and not full of fat. From that I guess you can figure out that classic French cuisine is not high on my list of cuisines. Too many sauces and other adulterations.
What I love is Japanese food, which is fresh and simple, and dishes that would count as part of “the Mediterranean Diet.”
I even have sushi undies. Hey, at least I didn’t show the matching bra. Thanks, MeUndies.
But honestly, I like most food. Variety is fun, especially with vegetables. I love them. Meat is fine, but I don’t need it every day. If I was cooking just for me, I’d eat more fish and chicken and less beef, pork, or venison.
Lest I sound overly healthy, I do love ice cream, Blue Bell, of course.
I had good food this weekend. The Italian food served at the 50th anniversary party we attended last night was very good. My favorite was the mushrooms in the chicken Marsala. Ooh there was a lot of flavor.
The cake was really moist.
And this morning I enjoyed a nice Mexican breakfast at a San Antonio favorite, La Familia. We were joined by a friend I’ve known since I moved from Texas and her high school sweetheart boyfriend. Eggs and green salsa go so well together.
Hooray for friendship.
I’m impressed I managed to write anything on this topic. I’d rather be telling you that rain lilies and sprigs of grass are appearing back home at the ranch.
For September I’ve decided to do an experiment. I’m going to answer the daily prompt that WordPress keeps asking me to respond to, and see how it fits in with what I want to talk about.
Something is blooming on September 1, at least.
So, how AM I feeling today?
Mostly I’m feeling very old. This has been a hard few weeks among my circles. Today another wonderful friend and role model, Norma, died after a valiant struggle to recover from infections. She was a wise breastfeeding advocate, a wonderful writer, and a font (fount?) of humor, especially Jewish.
Yesterday there was another loss close to our family. It reminds me of all the things that you leave behind for others to deal with. Oh please, family, pick a few things you like and auction the rest off. Just scatter my ashes around some trees. I’d like to help.
Yeah. I’m old. But I don’t feel like it. I have so much more to learn. Sigh. I hope my friends who’ve passed (as well as me) get a chance to come back and learn more. Maybe I’ll be a horse.
I still have so many cute horses to pet and tell them they’re good. (I’m doing that here, as Drew stops like a champ.)
I’m also frustrated. But that’s temporary. It was one of those days where whatever I tried to do didn’t quite work out. For example, I missed my 10am meeting, thinking it was at 11. Then I showed up a half hour early to lunch with Anita. At least lunch at the coffee shop was great!
Soup I had for lunch, and plug for the coffee shop.
And I didn’t get upset about this (on purpose, since horses can tell you’re upset) but the darned horses opened a gate and got out TWICE today! It’s no trouble to get them back in at meal time, but when I was relaxing in the pool and looked over to see Apache walking up to the chicken house, I was not amused.
Mmm. Lots of green grass over by the septic field. It’s a place I’m not supposed to take them, but they took themselves.
Note that it’s much harder to entice horses away from what they perceive as better food after they ate their rations and supplements. Still, I was very surprised to see Apache, Mabel, and Fiona come when I called. Dusty came close, so I haltered him and got him in.
I found Droodles hiding between the tack room and Kathleen’s RV, where the grass is quite nice, because it’s shady. He indicated that he’d like to stay, but accepted a cookie and a halter, so I succeeded in not losing my cool (once, a little — I’m human).
I put a bungee cord around the gate they keep opening. I’ll be interested to see how it holds up overnight.
Here’s why the horses are breaking out.
I’m sure the horses are just as annoyed with me as I am with them, because I didn’t give them a bale of hay today. That’s because as I was moving their saddles back to the tack room from the horse trailer, my wagon blew a tire. I can’t carry hay. I’ll empty the wheelbarrow and use it in the morning. I’d love to use the utility vehicle, but it’s bed is full. Woe is me, ranch lady problems. But, hey, I can now open the shipping container doors to get hay out and have figured a way to get to more bales, so I’m a semi-competent ranch lady.
Yesterday, I was floating in my pool float, a thing I do most days after horse activities. There are often various insects in the pool. So far it’s mostly been flying ants, pill bugs, and scorpions (which float to the bottom). For a while there were tiny moths and crane flies. I’d never seen a butterfly, though, until I saw one floating between my legs.
I first tried to shoo it under the float, but it wouldn’t go anywhere. So then I scooped it up with my hands. I saw that it was a fiery skipper, a common little visitor around here.
Fiery skipper on basil, from 2018.
As soon as my finger touched the butterfly, it took hold of it. At first, Skippy (I got to know it so well that I named it) didn’t look too good. Its wings were wet, its abdomen was droopy, and its legs were flat. Poor waterlogged little thing! I felt the least I could do was let it recover a bit.
This may be my only other non-blurry photo of one of these.
So, I floated around, sipped on my water, and watched Skippy. The first thing Skippy did was stick out its proboscis and drink some water off my finger. That was fun to watch. Soon, the antennae started moving a bit. I thought maybe Skippy was ready to get off, so I tried to encourage it to go onto the patio by shaking my finger. Skippy held tight.
So, fine. I watched the clouds and birds, and kept floating. Soon, Skippy’s abdomen raised up and looked perkier. Its legs unfolded a bit, and it moved around a little. That was encouraging.
I’d say it took another ten minutes before Skippy started walking around on my finger. I guessed it was waiting for its wings to dry about. I enjoyed looking at its big black eyes and checking out the little bulbs at the ends it each antenna. This was about as good a chance to study a live butterfly as I will ever get.
Suddenly, Skippy pooped, or peed, or something. The abdomen bobbed up and down a couple of times, and poof! Skippy skipped off across the grass, headed towards the trees. I think helping this creature made me feel better about not helping the armadillo yesterday.
I also saw this most excellent beetle yesterday, good ole Enaphalodes taeniatus. A beetle this cool deserves a fun common name and a long Wikipedia article. But nope. These mainly live from around here south into Mexico.
Today was a fine day. Horses were great, other than Apache not wanting to get caught. It’s hard to catch him, since all three other horses and Fiona come right up and mill around me. It’s pretty comical. They think they should all get treats for being so good, I guess. Fiona just about glues herself to me and Dusty is not much better!
So many grapes
The most fun thing today was that I picked 5 cups of mustang grapes across the road from us. I’m sure Hank across the street thought I was crazy for standing in the heat picking weeds. I thought he wasn’t wise to be jogging in a heat advisory, so we’re even!
Fresh grapes! I had to dodge a lot of garden spiders to get them.
I cooked the grapes with a bunch of sugar and a little lemon. When grapes popped out of their skins, they looked like floating eyes (great Halloween trick, because it sort of looked like eyeballs in blood). Luckily it all cooked down.
Eyeballs had not appeared yet when I took this.
After it was cooked, I strained it through a mesh colander and got pretty purée. It thickened well in the refrigerator, and it was delicious over vanilla ice cream. The color was bright fuchsia. The sauce is tart but has a nice grape flavor, too. If I was good at canning, I’d have made jam.
Purée
That was a great ending to a pleasant evening of swimming and eating sloppy joes with friends. Now on to another work week!
We are all alive! Me, Lee, the rest of the local family, horses, dogs, and chickens. It’s a lot worse in other parts of the US, so I’m thankful for my knowledge of how to dress for really cold weather and that it only got down to 10° F last night.
It helped that it wasn’t rainy.
I brought the chickens fresh water and received cold eggs is return. The horses appreciated me opening up their water troughs and giving them some energy-filled food. My snow gloves made that hard, so I ditched them. I’m glad Fiona has extra food dishes, because hers blew into the next field. Yow. So much wind.
Our heat stopped working, just like last year, so I went up to the landing and finished my work where the sun was shining. It confused the dogs. Then we went shopping for holiday food in the warm car. We had fun!
We figured the propane would get better soon as it got a little warmer, which it did. We weren’t alone. The same thing happened all over the area. It’s not like we suffered! We have dogs and many handmade items to keep us warm. And whiskey.
Harvey kept Lee warm. Note his tail. Goldie kept me warm this morning. Story about this below.
So, I went in the kitchen to pour myself some medicinal Jameson’s Irish whiskey with a little water. Then I sat down to crochet on my unfinished Christmas gift. First, I checked Facebook. Guess what the first damned ad I saw was for? Jameson’s!!
Can one of my conspiracy theory friends explain that? I didn’t SAY what I was doing. I haven’t mentioned that stuff, perhaps ever, except when Lee tells people he prefers Clontarf instead. (Which is why I am drinking the perfectly adequate other stuff.)
That was today’s mystery. Tomorrow’s big agenda includes cooking pork chops. I lead an exciting life when the polar winds blow.
Yesterday’s daily expedition in the Carlsbad, California area was to the Buena Vista Audubon Society’s nature center in Oceanside. It’s on the Buena Vista lagoon, which is a former saltwater marsh that was dammed 50 years ago to create a freshwater pond. One of the things we learned at our visit is that the nature center folks and friends are about to open it back up to its original state.
Quiet in the middle of urban beach world
The center is surrounded by plantings of native vegetation, which attract lots and lots of birds. We saw California towhees, brown-headed cowbirds, hummingbirds that were too distant to identify, and something green (kept hiding).
Shy towhee
We also saw many butterflies. There were many monarchs and fiery skippers, plus whites and some other skippers.
Hooray for monarchs. My fiery skipper images are too blurry to share.
I have to say the highlights of the wildlife were this gorgeous lizard, an ornate tree lizard, and one resident we only heard, an American bullfrog. It had a lot to say, that’s for sure, and was so loud! Ours don’t make that much noise.
She posed for me. Look how well the colors blend in with wood.
The docent we spoke with was full of information. She said the lagoon will no longer be crammed with cattails once the salt water comes in, which will be welcome to observers. The center itself was just beautiful and obviously well loved by society members. They also had prepared beautiful maps of the trail with important plants labeled, and a really good guide to the plants for young people that encouraged them to interact with some of the more interesting specimens like the lemonade berries and the rushes. I learned from the brochure, too, about how pickleweed traps salt in little growths and then drops off the stored stuff in little red segments.
Views of the nature center trail
I also learned a bit more about that alkali water. It comes from an aquifer under Carlsbad and is full of calcium. Now I want to try some!
They cut down some cattails to provide a view.
After we left, we drove by Oceanside beach and watched some surfers. It was a beautiful day at the beach, which meant not much parking. We took a wrong turn and ended up at the entrance to Camp Pendleton, where my dear friend Mike spent many years. He shared some stories with me and told me all about the cool Osprey planes I saw practicing landings and takeoffs as we drove past the base. That made our wrong turn worth it. I’d never seen an Osprey (the plane, not the bird) in person.
We ended the expedition with another piece of culinary luck. We found a real taco stand hiding in the same shopping center where I bought my yarn (though I didn’t realize it at the time, since we approached from the other direction). I got to eat real fish tacos, and Lee had a most impressive burrito. We were the only Anglo customers the whole time we were there, and we could watch the cook make everything from scratch. Now, that’s some Cal-Mex cuisine! I’m doing pretty well at choosing random restaurants on this trip!
So fresh, even the taco.
Hilton humor
One more piece of humor for any of you who aren’t on Facebook with me. This sign has been on the door of our condo since we arrived, but I’d only read “no smoking” and the fine until yesterday. I got such a good laugh out of it that I had to share it with a family member, who shared it with all the nurses who came to her room. I cheered up an entire hospital!
Otherwise, I’m continuing to rest a lot, crochet away, sit in the quiet hot tub area, and work on my mental health. It’s going well.
When I finally get a day off, I can cram a lot of fun into it, that’s for sure, and yesterday I even stepped outside my comfort zone successfully, more than once. I’m so proud.
Announcement! Suna is proud!
One thing I’m happy with myself for doing is finding my own fun by myself. As Lee has gotten more and more into the Hermit Life, I’ve found myself slipping into it as well (and COVID helped form the habit of being solo). Since I wake up ridiculously early here, I usually have five hours or so to kill before Lee is able to do anything. I sit on the balcony, read, or knit, but I’m so used to getting up and doing a bunch of chores that I’ve taken to just leaving and finding stuff to do outside.
Pretty kites, and look, way out there is a BOAT! You don’t see many boats here.
Admittedly, some of the stuff I do involves fruity drinks and beach chairs, but I wander around, take pictures, and talk to folks. I swear I’m turning into my dad with all this talking to folks stuff. Not very hermit-like.
I got to have the first pineapple slice of the day.
When Lee was awake, he suggested we go take advantage of the free putt-putt golf we get as part of our stay. I think the hotel chain bought this sorta run-down course, since it’s right across from one of the properties and counts as an amenity. Here’s an admission. I had NEVER played putt-putt before, or any other golf-like activity.
A Chapter for My Memoirs
Backstory: In my horrible only year at Plantation Middle School, some person without much forethought had the great idea of having a bunch of young girls, many from backgrounds that didn’t include elitist sports like golf (back then, well-to-do white people played golf), learn the sport in physical education. Golf includes golf balls and golf clubs, both things that needed to be treated with respect. There were rules, like only swinging your club behind a certain line, not swinging without checking your surroundings, and not driving the ball while people were out retrieving their shots. Good rules. Who can guess what happened?
Golf has rules for good reasons. Photo by @Thaninee via Twenty20
Yep. I had finally hit my ball far enough to get an extra point (a thing I needed because PE was my worst class) and was about to pick it up when WHAM, one of the little darlings in class swung her club onto my head. I was so focused on getting my extra point that I simply went back to the teacher to report my success. She asked me what was on my gym outfit. That would be blood. I had to go to the nurse’s office, which was hard to do when you had no idea where that was in the crazy building and you were dripping. I was so angry that I smeared blood on the exterior wall of the school, quite an act of rebellion for the rule-follower I was at the time.
I can’t believe I found a picture of the wall. The school is now the home of the Patriots and being renovated. Much different demographics, too.
The nurse washed me up and called my mom to come get me. Mom was in the middle of her nervous breakdown from having to move away from Gainesville, so she was not happy to have to drive down Sunrise Boulevard (she didn’t like four-lane roads) to come get me. She looked at the hole in my head and declared something like it was just a flesh wound and took me home with no doctor visit or anything. Mom was frugal and didn’t want to waste health care dollars on us kids when she needed so much (thus, we had no trips to the dentist until our teens, my brother’s lazy eye was not addressed until too late to fix it, etc.).
My nightmare: a child with a giant golf club. Image by @Moondrop via Twenty20
The results were that I had headaches for years and sharp pains if I moved a certain way. I have avoided golf entirely. I wasn’t the only one permanently damaged by middle school golf. Another classmate had a chunk of her chin removed by someone who didn’t check her surroundings, and as far as I know, still has a nasty scar. I believe that was the end of the golf program at Plantation Middle School.
Back to Put-Putt
Anyway, Lee likes golf and used to be really good at mini-golf, so I agreed to go. I’m so glad I did. It was great fun, and I was nowhere near as horrible at it as I feared I would be. In fact, I was even under par on one hole, and made par on a couple more. The first hole was pretty bad, since I had to figure out how hard to hit the ball to make it do what I wanted it to do, but after that, I found it most amusing to see where the ball would go and what it would do.
Not too fancy but does the job.
I declare that I would do it again, perhaps at a nicer course. But, we got a lot of laughs out of the outing and it was great to see Lee actually enjoying an activity on a trip.
Lee having fun.
Off to Calabash
We decided we wanted some good seafood, so we motored off to North Carolina (barely) to the beautiful little town of Calabash, where we’d had a great meal last year. Once again, I knitted a lot. I am trying to get that baby blanket finished before that baby is born. We tried the restaurant next door to the one where we ate last year, and were not disappointed.
We were at the far left corner. Isn’t it pretty?
I got a huge amount of food in my platter, unlike the small serving we had in Murrell’s Inlet a couple of days ago. And it was fried so beautifully that my grandmother would have approved (the great connoisseur of Florida seafood). The oysters were immense and the scallops delicate and tender. The shrimp were local (from right next door!) and the fish was glorious.
See, even grackles can be pretty.
While the service was a little slow, I could not complain, since there was quite a show among the local bird population for me to enjoy. Grackles were mating and building nests, so they were in great form (and loud, being grackles).
Lady grackles unimpressed by display of male grackles
The seagulls were also in squabbling mode, so there was lots of action. Plus, there were pelicans zooming around and catching fish. They are so beautiful to me.
Bird action shots
After the meal, I went for a walk on the little boardwalk and boat docks, where I got to enjoy pelicans having some kind of bird party next to a party boat, which cracked me up (easily amused).
Pelican Party Time
I also realized why all the birds are so dang happy right there in Calabash. The water was literally teeming with little fish. No shore bird could go hungry with all those fishies everywhere they looked!
Future dinner for birds or people if they live long enough
While I was gone, Lee was paying the check, and since he was alone with our leftovers, the laughing gulls got bolder. He got a great shot of a laughing gull taking one of my shrimp.
Mine! Mine!
Once we got home, I needed to burn off that fried food, so I walked on the boardwalk until I got all my steps in, then decided to enjoy an Old Fashioned and knit a table at the upstairs bar (I had been outside until a loud family arrived). A lady said I shouldn’t be sitting alone and invited me to the bar to sit with them. I ended up talking to them and another couple for a long time. Lee even came down for a while.
And in talking to the staff, I discovered that Kevin the bartender is also a history professor who specialized in my very own ancestors in Florida! His family is also from north Florida with deep roots there. Who would have guessed? This condo has the best staff, that’s for sure.
Beautiful ending to a fun day, even if I overindulged.
I ended up meeting another couple and stayed too long and had three drinks, so I was not at my best when I got home. Lee said I was cuddly, so I must have been out of my mind, ha ha. It was worth it, though. I truly enjoy hearing the stories of all the people I run into and finding our commonalities without ruining things by getting into politics or religion. Granted, anyone I meet here fits certain criteria or they wouldn’t be here. Hilton sure does check your credit scores and incomes. But I’ve met people from many places and backgrounds, and that’s what I like and have missed so much the past few years.
While I’m still primarily doing outdoor things (we’ve been eating on patios), at least I’m no longer scared to talk to people. I’m back to having a nice balance of being alone and in peace and interacting with others.
The Hermits' Rest 