Narnia

While our friends and relatives in Michigan are buried under tons of snow, with high winds and blizzard conditions, the worst we've had in Florida is frost and freeze. The annuals that are always planted at this time of the year have been bitten and look dead. These palms give an idea of what the foliage looks like around here now.




Round Robin tennis for Dylan this morning at the Martin Downs Tennis Club. It was very much fun to watch. He played four singles matches and one doubles match. Lost the double and won all of the singles :)

Entrance to the tennis club:

Dylan is the tall one in the navy blue:

We went to Laurie's for a sandwich and some WoW ( I took a nap). Then we were off to the movies.

The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader in 3D at the Treasure Coast Mall. We all liked it very much - the special effects were very well done, and we loved all of the main characters. The new young actor who played Eustace Scrubb really did a fine job. Lucy, of course, has always been my favorite. Dick even liked it. Chip was at work.

So full of popcorn that we skipped dinner :) You just have to love it. (Please notice that Dylan is taller than Laurie! How did that happen??)

Friday at the Lake

Laurie, Dick and I drove out to Lake Okeechobee to do some geocaching and sight seeing combined. We're back to having great Florida weather - sunny and 72 :) The drive out to the lake is on a beautiful country road lined with trees and shrubs and palms dripping with Spanish moss - very picturesque.

We walked out on the big pier, which we shared with the birds, and got a great view of the lake.

Dad and daught:


Grandma and Mommy:




It was unusual to see these two (or more) species of birds "flocking together". The darker birds have orange feet and straight orange bills.


There were five caches found, and one of them was big enough for Laurie to place the travel bug she found a year ago - it got packed away with the Christmas things, and so it just showed up this week! It's back on it's travels now! There were a couple of frustrating DNF's, but we had a good time looking anyway.

We ate lunch at Lunker's in Lake Okeechobee, which turned out to be a great place with yummy sandwiches.





This is the only four-legged wildlife we saw today - and they weren't very wild:



We got back to Palm City just in time to pick Dylan up from school, and spent the rest of the day hanging out at their house. Laurie's new computer is all hooked up, and the new monitor is attached, so Dylan was excited when he got home. Our game has a new expansion with lots of changes and additions, and so WoW has become even more interesting this week. On most days he doesn't have much time to spend playing on the computer, but today he made up for it!

In the car line at school this bumper sticker caught our eye - Dylan is in that class too, so we were interested to see it.



Our day of caching:

12/10/2010 You couldn't find Allapattah Watering Hole
Gave it a quick look but our clock was running down and we had to get to Hidden Oaks to pick up the youngest Sharkie.

12/10/2010 You found Allapattah Flats Trail 3
TNLNSL-TFTC No cow pie dodging on this one.

12/10/2010 You found Zeke Made Me Do It BillyBob
I was dodging cow pies and marveling at all the spots where an ammo can could hide when Mrs. Sharkie scored the find. TNLNSL - TFTC

12/10/2010 You found Foxy Brown
After a drive to the lake we had to get back to Palm City to pick up our grandson from middle school. We kept one eye on the clock and the other on the GPS as we drove east. This one popped and we discovered the smallest Lock-N-Lock we've ever found. Some critter likes it, he's been gnawing the camo. We left our card and a lady bug charm. TFTC

12/10/2010 You couldn't find Fire In The Hole
No joy today

12/10/2010 You found Behind the Bell
An AMMO CAN!!! Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! We really like to be able to swap swag.
Today we teamed up with Sharkeie Crew for a drive out to the lake with the goal of finding a cache large enough to hold a TB. That is not an easy task in this part of the world. Our experience so far is that no more than 1 in 10 caches here are in regular sized containers. We've grabbed our share of micros but today we just weren't in the mood. Thanks for bringing us to this interesting neighborhood. It's an old song but, "Were it not for Geocaching, we would never have come here".
Took nothing, left our card and some hand sanitizer. Thanks again for the cache.

12/10/2010 You found Why Here?
Today's goal was to drive out to the lake with Sharkie Crew, enjoy the scenery, and find a regular cache to drop a TB into. This cache accomplished the first goal. As to "Why Here?", it's pretty obvious that at some point in the past, folks were free to drive in the area, perhaps to drop air boats. Now to find one of those rare and elusive regular sized containers.

Chris and Dennis

This was the first rainy day we've had since we've been here. It was overcast, chilly and drizzly the whole day. Chris and Dennis drove down from Cocoa Beach to check out the city of Stuart - they think they might like to live here next winter. It wasn't the best of days to show off the city, but what can you do.

Met them for lunch at Duffy's in downtown Stuart, and had a great two hour visit - catching up on Belleville news and family info, and a little politics :)

Then we spent a nice afternoon and dinner with Chip and Laurie. She made terrific meatballs!

Here she is draining the pasta. Thanks, Laurie.

Dylan showed us the computer aided floor plan he made for class. I hope we didn't tease him too much about his 60 foot "dinning" room!

Ocean Caching

This was a glorious day to be outside. Perfect for geocaching! We began with breakfast at Perkins, and then drove out to Hutchinson Island to see what's new.

Found it 12/07/2010 You found [Traditional Cache] Rx Mag-Lite

We love our Nuvi but the downside is that when the cache saturation is high, it "Dings" constantly. Today's goal was to thin out caches along Federal by either finding them or putting them on our Ignore list. This was a find. TFTC

Found it 12/06/2010 You found [Traditional Cache] You Can't Always Count On Rain

This was our first extensive caching expedition on this year's Florida trip. We chose this brisk sunny day to drive out to the island. Grabbed this one on our way north. TFTC

Found it 12/06/2010 You found [Traditional Cache] Optical Illusion

Unique hide, a little scary though. TFTC

Found it 12/06/2010 You found [Traditional Cache] Uncle Johnnie's Kayak Ramp

We pulled up and noticed that there was a muggle sitting in a pick up at the top of the ramp. We scouted the area and then were about to call the search off, when I returned to the car, the truck left. A quick search yielded the prize. The problem I have with this type of container is that it often takes me longer to replace the log than it does to find it. TFTC

Found it 12/06/2010 You found [Traditional Cache] Just Ducky

After spending the morning seeking caches out on the island, we decided to grab a few on the way back to our rental. Neat hide, we got lucky. TFTC

Found it 12/06/2010 You found [Traditional Cache] Sewall's Point Meadow

Thanks for bringing us to this beautiful neighborhood. It certainly is a pleasant area. For me it was more difficult to get everything back into the container than it was to find it. TFTC

Found it 12/06/2010 You found [Traditional Cache] Grim Graham

Since we are just visiting, it took us a while to figure out what GRIM means. This was a great day for a drive. TFTC

Found it 12/06/2010 You found [Traditional Cache] Walton Rocks Entrance

A nice brisk, sunny day for a drive to see the island. TFTC

Found it 12/06/2010 You found [Traditional Cache] The Longest Day

The men and women of that generation pulled together as they faced and defeated the Great Depression and then the Axis Powers in WWII. By the 1950's the US was by far the beacon of hope for the world. They left us a great heritage. We think of them often as we watch the rancorous efforts of today's politicians dealing with our nations problems.

The log book is soaked, we replaced it with an emergency log but it will need attention. Took nothing, left a Juneau Steamboat token. TFTC

Write note 12/06/2010 You posted a note for [Traditional Cache] Crackers and Milk

After reading the past logs, we passed over this one.

Found it 12/06/2010 You found [Traditional Cache] Going Greene

An ammo can? What are you thinking? Surely you could have found a place here for a micro. We loved the hide, the find, and the cache but then we are renegades from up north. Thanks for breaking the mold! The only green thing we had in our cache bag were some Off insect wipes. Traded for a small notebook. Thanks for the fun!

Didn 12/06/2010 You couldn't find [Traditional Cache] Blue Orchid

Ouch! We just aren't cacher enough for this evil one.

Found it 12/06/2010 You found [Traditional Cache] My Home Away From Home

Sneaky, Sneaky, Sneaky! We found it as we were wrapping up our tour of the island. We're glad to see the beach has reopened. It's scary to see the power that the ocean has along the shore line.

Found it 12/06/2010 You found [Traditional Cache] Rub a Dub Dub.

We are touring the spots we love in this part of Florida. Today's goal was a drive up Hutchinson Island and back. (And to gather up the caches which have been placed since our last trip.) We have been keeping track of the efforts to preserve and protect Bathtub Beach. It is our grandson's favorite. We are happy to see it reopened. We found your cache on a beautiful, brisk, sunny day. TFTC

(This is what the last hurricane did to Bathtub Reef. The powere of the ocean is awesome.)


We had lunch at Prawnbroker, which was kind of a joke for us because we thought the name of the restaurant was "Pawnbroker", and I thought that was an extremely odd name for a rstaurant. It was a beautiful place in Sewall's Point. Not until I saw the menu did I realize that it was actually Prawnbroker, which is kind of a cute name for a seafood place!


Our first Christmas card! We're having our mail forwarded to Laurie's house and it takes a while for it to get hre - so we haven't had much mail yet. But in our Cricket Court mailbox was this anonymous card in a blank envelope - Happy Holidays to you too !

I love the purple shrubberies that are so popular down here. The color is just amazing, and it's a treat to see the flowers in December.

We Have Achieved Grill

Dick really likes to grill outside when he has a chance. We didn't see a grill here on the premises, so we bought a small one at Walmart. Dick spent many hours putting it together, and finally....yaaay...we have a grill. Chip will store it for us when we leave. As soon as Dick got it put together, we saw a grill in our garage - it was covered up, so we never noticed it before. We're happy to have our own anyway.

While he was putting it together, he had assistance from a little green friend:




Dylan has to have enormous powers of concentration to focus on his math homework while Laurie and I are chatting!

When his homework was finished, I had a chance to watch him play Halo. I like WoW better.

Seabranch

Today we went geocaching east of Federal Highway, starting at Seabranch State Park. The sign there says that Florida State Parks are the best in the Nation! I had no idea. This Seabranch Park is still being developed - they've put in some nice paths.

This is an actual sign believe it or not. The store is called "Step In Food". Does that really seem like a good name for a food store? Of course not - it sounds really sticky :)

This statue is in front of the Sumerfield Golf Club Clubhouse. I like it - it looks like a real person.

The Ocean Calls

When you're this close to the Atlantic, it doesn't take long for you to respond to the call of the ocean. It's so powerful, beautiful and smashingly loud that you really can't stay away.






Then we were lucky enough to go watch Dylan at tennis practice.

In Which We Arrive at Cricket Court

Hooray! Here's our home away from home for December. We love Summerfield.








It's great to be down here near the kids and far from the snow that's piling up in Traverse City!

We went over to Chip and Laurie's and waited for Dylan to complete his home work. Then we all went out to dinner at Pei Wei (Pay Way)



Dylan ate his entire meal with chopsticks - we were very impressed.

Rain and Trucks

My two least favorite things on a road trip are rain and the eighteen wheelers which splash mist into the air making it very hard to see even cars that are well lighted. This is how we spent the major portion of today's trek through North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia (From Statesville, NC to Brunswick, GA).

We got an early start and were very optimistic. We thought it would be an easy travel day - we had planned for an early stop in Brunswick to rest up from yesterday's trek.

Right away we ran into rush hour around Statesville. It was stop and go for 15 for 20 minutes - bumper to bumper, complicated by heavy rain and more trucks than you can shake a stick at. There was a parade of red tail lights as far as the eye could see ahead of us - a little disconcerting!

After we cleared that mess, the weather let up some, and then it rained off and on for the rest of the trip. The trucks didn't let up though. Trying to share the road with the big truckers makes you a big fan of sending freight by rail.

In South Carolina we saw two bizarre incidents along the highway. In the first case, a police car was checking out a wrecked new model car on an exit ramp. The front of the car was badly smashed in and it was just sitting there - no indication of ambulance, wrecker, etc.

The second event was even more unnerving - the car was on the right shoulder of the freeway, headed right at us on an upward curve to the left. There wasn't a lot of shoulder because of the guardrail along the curve. A man appeared to be getting out of the car - almost as though this had just happened. It appeared that the car went out of control on the curve, hit the guardrail, was smashed in the front, and was turned around backwards. At 70 mph it's hard to take it all in, but it was definitely interesting to say the least. Again, no evidence of wrecker. Bizarre.

After we rested, we drove around Brunswick to see what we could see. There's a huge bridge to Jekyll Island. We found a middle school with some event going on - cars were parked everywhere - the lot was full and so were the surrounding streets. We had no idea what the attraction was.

Drove down streets of really nice, big homes reminiscent of 6th Street, and other streets that were woe-begone and God forsaken. I noticed that the residents, black, white and in-between all like to sit on the porch in the evening.

Back to the motel and over to Sonny's Real Pit Bar-B-Q for dinner. Luscious ribs - comfortable family atmosphere - it was a pleasure to be there.

The accent in Georgia sounds to be the typical southern stereotypical accent. At Sonny's I heard a man ordering - "I'll have this here...that there." Huh?

Heading South

From Marion, Ohio to Statesville, North Carolina - this was a long haul - too many hours in the car!

We finally made it through Ohio, by way of Columbus. Our neighbor, Tom Mc. said he never thought that Dick woud ever go anywhere near Columbus. I told Tom that we kept our eyes shut all the way through.

Then we were in West by God Virginia - beautiful mountain scenery. It was mostly enjoyable, except that in one small town where we stopped for coffee there was a sign on the bridge saying "Only one bus or truck at a time". Doesn't give you a lot of confidence.

Four States today - Ohio, West Virginia, Virginia and North Carolina. In southern Ohio, WV and VA forget about looking for an NPR station. I think most likely the mountains make for bad recepton anyway. North Carolina has lots of NPR.

We stopped for lunch north of Beckley in West Virginia at a Biscuit House, which is a chain of little restaurants in the area. I had a sausage biscuit with egg on the biggest biscuit ever. I may never eat another biscuit in this lifetime!





Across the street from the Biscuit House is the Omelet Shoppe - shades of T.C. !



On the way to Virginia the highway takes you through two long, long, magnificent tunnels. As you exit the second tunnel, the East River Mountain Tunnel, you're suddenly in Virginia.

Observation: In WV and VA the locals speak with a definite southern accent - very noticeable. In North Carolina, not so much. The service people that we met up with sounded just like us.

Sunshine on Our Shoulders

Great travel day. You just have to love moderate traffic, blue skies and sunshine.

It was such a great day that it was hard to imagine what had happened to the rollover we saw on US 23 by Ann Arbor. A small gray car had rolled off the road, down a slope, and ended up quite a long way into a field - it must have rolled several times. People were there checking it out - we couldn't tell when it had happened. Go figure.

The trip was pretty much uneventful, except for the gas station incident at the Dundee exit.

The bathrooms were closed and the sign said "Use the bathrooms on the other side of the building". This involved a cooperative search with other seekers. Those available bathrooms were not marked with any recognizable signs. The hallway said Big Riggers. There was eventual success. The bathrooms were back by the showers for the long haul truckers. What a treat!

Even more memorable was the coffee station where I wanted to get coffee for Dick. A young man was there with a pressurized cannister of something and he had it hooked onto the machine. When he turned it on, the pressurized hose nozzle blew off with quite a bit of force, hitting an employee in the face. She seemed to be OK after a few seconds, but that has to leave a mark! He said, "Let me try it this way", so I decided to move on out of the store and just keep going.

We're in Marion, Ohio - a nice motel, but no elevator. Tomorrow we get to drive through Columbus (wince).

Ohio is not the most scenic State you can drive through - (cornfield, cornfield, mosque, cornfield). At the risk of repeating myself, here's part of one of my favorite poems from my blog of July. 2008:

When I go back to Michigan I drive through Ohio.
There is off I-75 in Ohio a mosque, so life
goes corn corn corn mosque, I wave at Islam,
which we're not getting along with
on account of the Towers as I pass.
Then Ohio goes corn corn corn
billboard, goodbye, Islam. You never forget
how to be from Michigan when you're from Michigan.

Any Port in a Storm

Driving around town after the game we spotted this old freighter anchored in West Bay.

Turns out it's The Maumee, one of the oldest freighters still operating on the Great Lakes. It was seeking shelter from 40 mile an hour winds and 15 foot waves out on the big lake.

Dick took this great picture of the ship, which is much better than the photo that the Record Eagle ran, if I do say so myself!

Humble Pie in Columbus

GO BLUE!

Wolverines Fall in Regular-Season Finale at No. 8 OSU

11/27/2010

Denard Robinson rushed for more than 100 yards (105) for the ninth time this season, Jordan Kovacs notched a team-high 17 tackles and an interception, and Michael Shaw scored U-M's lone touchdown in a 37-7 loss at No. 8 Ohio State.


Paraphrasing the words of John Denver re: The coach who shall not be named:

Country roads, take him home, to the place he belongs -
West Virginia, mountain mama, take him home, country roads.

Thanksgiving Day

Thanksgiving dinner with family - yay! Barb, Jim, Adam, Melanie, Lydia, and Izzy - thank you :)

Lake City

Time to head home. We bought a map and took back roads all the way home - very enjoyable. Ate lunch in Lake City at the Hometown Cafe.

Their front windows are painted with decorative snowmen. Waiting for our food, all of a sudden I noticed the theme of the snowmen and it cracked me up. The MSU snowman is skating along proudly and competently and smiling. Check out the Michigan snowman - he's very unsure of himself, he has weak ankles, and he's in danger of a fall. The look on his face is exactly the way we feel today! We got a good chuckle out of these paintings. The waitress said that they are done by "some lady" in town. She's a crackerjack, whoever she may be.

Beautiful Saturday

Long underwear, jackets, scarves and mittens - we were very bundled up for this game. It was supposed to be in the low 30s at kickoff with a high of maybe 42 at the end of the game. Instead, the sun was brilliant and very warm, and the people were packed in cheek to cheek, so to speak. We were never even a little bit chilly. The sky was blue, and it was really a very nice day, weather-wise.

It was Senior Day - the last home game. The introduction of the senior players was very well done - they walked the gauntlet one at a time, accompanied by their families, and in one case by the player's high school coach. It was very enjoyable and there was cheering during the entire parade. That will be remembered by them forever.

All of our seatmates were there, except for Noah and Holden. Kim came by herself. Heather and Justin used our extra tickets. It's always very much fun to see everybody and hear all of the latest news. I especially enjoyed talking to Kim and Heather.

I wangled an invitation to Holden's Bar Mitzvah next fall - we would love to be there - we've known him (sort of) since he was a babe in arms. Evidently their temple shares space with an Episcopal Church, and according to Kim, the Bar Mitzvah there is not quite so formal - not everything the boy does is in Hebrew, just special parts. Holden has been going to Hebrew school since the third grade.

Heather is a genuine Harry Potter fan. She hasn't seen the newest movie yet, but we had a great discussion of the series, the movies, and the Deathly Hallows. She's usually very quiet, but she got animated talking about Harry, and it was a real treat for me. I had a very pleasant, social afternoon.

Oh yes, we lost the game. It was 24-0 at the half. I asked Dick to take this picture to prove that our team actually came out for the second half - that's how intrepid our team is:

Robinson Breaks Two NCAA Records, U-M Falls to No. 6 Wisconsin

Nov. 20, 2010
Site: Ann Arbor, Mich. (Michigan Stadium)
Score: #6 Wisconsin 48, Michigan 28
Records: U-M (7-4, 3-4 Big Ten), Wisconsin (10-1, 6-1 Big Ten)
Attendance: 112,276 (sellout)
Next U-M Game: Saturday, Nov. 27 -- at Ohio State (Columbus, Ohio), Noon (TV: ABC)

ANN ARBOR, Mich. -- Sophomore quarterback Denard Robinson (Deerfield Beach, Fla./Deerfield Beach HS) racked up 360 yards of total offense (239 pass, 2 TDs; 121 yards, 2 TDs) to become the first NCAA quarterback to rush for 1,500 yards and pass for 2,000 yards in the same season while breaking the NCAA record for most rushing yards by a quarterback (1,538), but the University of Michigan football team could not overcome a 24-0 first-half deficit in a 48-28 loss to Wisconsin (No. 6 AP/No. 5 Coaches) on Saturday afternoon (Nov. 20) at Michigan Stadium. The Wolverines closed the deficit to 10 points twice in the third quarter before the Badgers used their relentless running game -- 357 yards and six touchdowns -- to pull away in the final stanza.