laundry is done, we even drove down to st. louis yesterday to see “phantom of the opera,” which i’ve never seen before. i liked it, pretty much.
ok, a couple of photos from the trip. here’s the big TV on the wall of our place in ft. lauderdale that somehow we missed when we arrived because we were so delirious and tired.
and this is our kitchen counter, which we managed to litter with all kinds of food and plastic bags and general vacation stuff.
and this is a view of just some of the many many big fancy boats right outside our balcony.
and here’s kevin and mom and dad, getting ready for dinner poolside.
MFH, grilling, with the boats on the intercoastal right behind him.
there are more photos, but i have to get them off the other camera, or i have to download them from e-mails that MFH took with his camera phone and e-mailed to me. so you’ll have to wait on those. there are some good ones, i’ll tell you, including these incredibly cute little monkeys we saw at the Bonnet House. This is an old place in Ft. Lauderdale, this rich guy who was an artist owned it and they’ve preserved the house and the large amount of surrounding grounds, and it’s almost the only place up the coast that’s preserved instead of being over-developed.
and on the grounds are these 13 little monkeys; the original monkeys escaped from a nightclub in the 30’s. or at least that’s what one of the many guides told us, and guides at places like this are always very earnest so she probably wasn’t lying. but it’s incredible seeing monkeys just hanging out, instead of at the zoo. i do have a great photo, maybe a couple of them that Kevin took, but like i said, not gonna happen just yet.
i realize i also have photos of dad’s birthday festivities, which were a MONTH ago, and my birthday, and yes, i’m very very far behind, getting more so every minute.
right now i have to go take mollie for a run. she’s snoring on the chair across frm me right now. she’s going to be extremely excited to go running, but i have to figure out how to do it without letting her slog through each and every puddle, so at the end she’ll be a muddy mess and will need a bath, because i don’t feel like giving her a bath today.
we only went to the beach once during our trip; we waited till late in the afternoon of our very last day, and the water had been so calm like i’ve never seen the ocean before, but of course because we waited so long, a wind had picked up and the waves were choppy so i didn’t get in the water too much. MFH frolicked around quite a bit, but we didn’t stay to have a picnic because everything would have been promptly blown away.
the first night we were there we went to the hard rock seminole indian casino, because that’s what dad loves. but he wasn’t impressed with it, said they weren’t paying out much money. there were tons of people there, a few actual easy-to-spot prostitutes, but mostly kind of sleazy looking women. plus your usual shuffling around tourists with glazed-over eyes.
we took no photos there of course, because if you do that kind of thing they’ll quickly exterminate you.
we went snorkeling one morning and that was fun except i did realize i was the only person who screamed upon jumping into the water. it’s just a natural reaction i have to jumping into water, i can’t help it, but i was the only one to do it, not even any of the many many children on board didn’t do it.
mom and dad didn’t snorkel; instead they stayed on the boat and watched the fish through the glass bottom. mom also got to witness a woman throwing up. also there was this very very young couple along, who had three very young children, one of them a baby. the woman and one of the kids went snorkeling, but the husband stayed on the boat with the baby and the boy who was maybe three. the boy wandered all around the boat and the baby was just lying there and the dad didn’t seem to pay any attention to them, and mom said the baby eventually threw up (mom got to see all the exciting hurling) but the dad didn’t notice or clean it up or anything.
afterwards we ate at the cafe right there on the dock and the family was also eating there and the little boy kept wandering away and eventually the dad would go get him, but then they walked to their minivan and the kid was just wandering around the parking lot all by himself and we were all quite horrified. it’s like they were a zombie family; we never heard the couple speak, not to each other or the kids, and they didn’t really seem aware that the kids were even there.
strange. people should be required to pass some kind of rigorous screening process in order to be allowed to have kids. at least SOME kind of test.
there weren’t any kids at our hotel, and as a matter of fact, we’re pretty sure we were the only people there. it was a small complex, a condo kind of place with only 10 units, and somebody said that they’re all booked up during the winter. it was nice to be the only ones there.
i really have to do stuff now. wedding plans, they’re going to happen any day now, mostly because of the pressure i’m feeling because people keep saying “how are the wedding plans coming?” i’m going to do some planning this afternoon, except that we’re going camping tomorrow for a couple of days and i have to plan for that because it’s much more imminent.
that is all for now.
ok then,
june grace.