There are times in a man's life when being a manly man is important. Moving a table round the garden for an outdoor party is one of them. It was heavy but we manly men managed it for the party last night.
Jan keeps a busy winter garden. This winter has been wet enough his garden has gone underwater repeatedly and his plants struggle to grow in the wettest winter in memory.
Jan's raised mango bushes are flowering, a source of pride for our host:
Jan owns more than one lot and he has a fabulous jungle out back. Cheyenne was happy. 
Her host Satchmo was pretty easy going, sitting in the grass and chowing down on...oyster shells. This is his party trick every time Jan and Lucy have an oyster party. 
Life in the Florida Keys can sometimes be reduced to oysters and beer and a rocking chair in the back yard. Jan has one other attribute, a 1980s BMW R100RT airhead. I sometimes cross paths with Jan when I'm riding into work as he comes home from the Navy base where he has a civilian job. He bought the bike in New England in perfect running condition with the as-new bike cover. Full fairing original saddle bags and only a dead battery to deal with and it runs like a top these days. He loves to tinker. 
Jan has satellite TV and the story of the day was the Chilean earthquake causing a possible "killer tsunami" in Hawaii. I haven't seen live TV since we had dinner at Jack Flats a couple of weeks ago.
The weather people spent the afternoon with a hard on telling TV viewers how dangerous everything was and how huge waves could curl round and wipe out the city of Hilo and blah blah blah. I don't miss the hype. Looking out the window we had weather of our own. The cold front arrived:
The rain passed and 15 minutes later the cool air was moving in. Hawaii was still in crisis because the weather morons were still trying to convince somebody "tragedy" was still possible. Chile is really in tragic shape after an 8.8 earthquake: 
TV renders everything weird. Here we were talking and drinking and waiting for the birthday girl while on television, in the background, millions were displaced and facing a crumbled future. As Chuck said, before instant communications we just never knew about this stuff. 
Carol made salad-on-a-stick, mozzarella, basil and cherry tomatoes. Instead of standing around outside we ate them indoors to avoid the (relatively) foul weather. 
Cheyenne was perfectly behaved as always. 
Chocolate birthday cake with cream and banana filling. I ended up stealing a piece of my wife's slice. I'm not proud of my sweet tooth. 
Cheyenne's traveling dinner plate was in the trunk of her kennel.
It was a bit of scene at the house. 
This is the kind of place where kids play in the street. Very old fashioned I'm sure, tossing a baseball. 
Jan fired up the barbecue with sausages, sweet and regular potatoes and hamburgers. We stood around and criticized, as one does. "That one looks over done..Is that one ready yet?" Zack looks hungry. 
Chuck used to work in an oyster bar in Atlanta. Steve was helping. 
Darkness falls suddenly in the sub-tropics. Jan had some seafood chowder going at this point. The sausages were crisp and superb. I love sausages and mustard. 
I treated this as a meat and potatoes kind of night. Barbara was keeping her distance from my tonsillitis, not the food. 
Cheyenne abandoned me and hung out downstairs waiting for scraps to fall from the barbecue or the oyster shucking. Imagine. People Up North are shoveling snow from their driveways. We aren't. 
The rain had blown away, the sky was clear, the temperature was dropping to around 60 American/15 Canadian, the moon was full.
I needed to go home, too much excitement for a man running a low grade fever and eating far too much. To her credit Cheyenne came when called; at home we turned up the heat as we are wussies. "I would never elect to live in cold climate" my wife mumbled as she wrapped herself in a second blanket and composed herself for sleep.
Jan keeps a busy winter garden. This winter has been wet enough his garden has gone underwater repeatedly and his plants struggle to grow in the wettest winter in memory.
Jan's raised mango bushes are flowering, a source of pride for our host:Jan owns more than one lot and he has a fabulous jungle out back. Cheyenne was happy. 
Her host Satchmo was pretty easy going, sitting in the grass and chowing down on...oyster shells. This is his party trick every time Jan and Lucy have an oyster party. 
Life in the Florida Keys can sometimes be reduced to oysters and beer and a rocking chair in the back yard. Jan has one other attribute, a 1980s BMW R100RT airhead. I sometimes cross paths with Jan when I'm riding into work as he comes home from the Navy base where he has a civilian job. He bought the bike in New England in perfect running condition with the as-new bike cover. Full fairing original saddle bags and only a dead battery to deal with and it runs like a top these days. He loves to tinker. 
Jan has satellite TV and the story of the day was the Chilean earthquake causing a possible "killer tsunami" in Hawaii. I haven't seen live TV since we had dinner at Jack Flats a couple of weeks ago.The weather people spent the afternoon with a hard on telling TV viewers how dangerous everything was and how huge waves could curl round and wipe out the city of Hilo and blah blah blah. I don't miss the hype. Looking out the window we had weather of our own. The cold front arrived:The rain passed and 15 minutes later the cool air was moving in. Hawaii was still in crisis because the weather morons were still trying to convince somebody "tragedy" was still possible. Chile is really in tragic shape after an 8.8 earthquake: 
TV renders everything weird. Here we were talking and drinking and waiting for the birthday girl while on television, in the background, millions were displaced and facing a crumbled future. As Chuck said, before instant communications we just never knew about this stuff. 
Carol made salad-on-a-stick, mozzarella, basil and cherry tomatoes. Instead of standing around outside we ate them indoors to avoid the (relatively) foul weather. 
Cheyenne was perfectly behaved as always. 
Chocolate birthday cake with cream and banana filling. I ended up stealing a piece of my wife's slice. I'm not proud of my sweet tooth. 
Cheyenne's traveling dinner plate was in the trunk of her kennel.
It was a bit of scene at the house. 
This is the kind of place where kids play in the street. Very old fashioned I'm sure, tossing a baseball. 
Jan fired up the barbecue with sausages, sweet and regular potatoes and hamburgers. We stood around and criticized, as one does. "That one looks over done..Is that one ready yet?" Zack looks hungry. 
Chuck used to work in an oyster bar in Atlanta. Steve was helping. 
Darkness falls suddenly in the sub-tropics. Jan had some seafood chowder going at this point. The sausages were crisp and superb. I love sausages and mustard. 
I treated this as a meat and potatoes kind of night. Barbara was keeping her distance from my tonsillitis, not the food. 
Cheyenne abandoned me and hung out downstairs waiting for scraps to fall from the barbecue or the oyster shucking. Imagine. People Up North are shoveling snow from their driveways. We aren't. 
The rain had blown away, the sky was clear, the temperature was dropping to around 60 American/15 Canadian, the moon was full.
I needed to go home, too much excitement for a man running a low grade fever and eating far too much. To her credit Cheyenne came when called; at home we turned up the heat as we are wussies. "I would never elect to live in cold climate" my wife mumbled as she wrapped herself in a second blanket and composed herself for sleep.
4 comments:
Morons? You know the 1960 9.5 Valdivia earthquake flattened Hilo, right? Forgive them for being a bit paranoid this time.
Those who forget history...
D
Please hold the seismic events in the KW area this week... traveling with several (male) freinds to your fair city and neck of the woods today and tomorrow.
The girls are back home in the Ohio snow, and we are shivering in the 60 degree warmth of Orlando. Go figure.
Doug C
I am no fan of television, especially tv hyping a non event. We in Florida had no need of endless coverage of nothing happening in Hawaii. In Hawaii itself a civil defense warning would be sufficient to let people living in low lying areas to make their own arrangements. Then move on to regular programming (such as it is) until something actually happens.
Modern wall-to-wall television breeds fear and uncertainity and helplessness. The best way to restore civic dialogue in my opinion is to kill television news.
We ate and drank while they showed pictures of devastation in Chile. Fat lot of good it did us or them. I do not miss television reception.
Weather in the Keys is completely unreliable. The worry now is that if climate change is going to permanently alter the weather landscape we may to get used to repeated 50 degree winters until we sink underwater.
Dear Sir:
Sausages and oysters constitute 2 out of my four food groups. (The other two are rum and cigars.) This is the first time you truly piqued my interest in Key West food category. Were the oysters local to Key West, or flown in from someplace.
This post was a reminder to me that the Maryland Crab season is only 3 months away. There is a joint ten miles distant, called "Ludwigs Corners." It is a rather upscale restaurant and bar. They offer four or five kinds of oysters flown in daily, but they are $3 apiece.
Sausages of a local nature are much cheaper.
Fondest regards,
Jack • reep • Toad
Twisted Roads
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