Lazy Way Lane

A brisk cold front finally has broken the back of summer though of course that doesn't mean snowdrifts and permanent cold temperatures until Spring. Cold is a relative term though I was wearing a  wind breaker to take this picture near the waterfront in the strong north wind. Mine is the large shadow to the left, the other one was a woman reading her phone who turned up her nose, literally, when I sat next to her. I wanted to ask her how she did that but she didn't look friendly.

Lazy Way Lane is  an odd street in the city that starts behind Schooner Wharf Bar and for vehicles is a one way meander to Elizabeth Street opposite Kermit's Key Lime Store.

In the afternoon sun of my lunch break yesterday the shadows were long and crisp as my neighbors went about their very important business.

 I was dodging motorized vehicles and meandering with a camera around my neck enjoying the heat out of the wind. The National Weather Service says Key West has been above 80 degrees every day since March, often far above that, so a temperature in the mid 70s with a wind chill is a change. Bye bye humidity for a few days.

The bare arms and Capri pants belong to hardier types. If you want to look like a local in these near blizzard conditions you need to cover up and take precautions. 

 These two have the right idea:

This guy reminded me of an old Key West joke, the city where dressing up never happens unless it's a tutu or an outrageous costume. "What do you call the guy in the suit?" Answer: "Defendant." Ba da bing. The two guys talking in the background are dressed in Key West "suits." Notice their covered up arms...and they probably don't own long pants or else they would have been pulled out of some musty locker and pressed into service.

 I switched to color photography to illustrate tropical death in this picture. Frozen vegetation:

And this avid photographer was using a real camera checking the status of a chicken hunkering in the gravel out of the wind. The translucent dress tells the focused observer she is probably a visitor. Also I am the only local who photographs wild chickens from time to time.

A crowd of people hunkering here buying heat to stimulate their extremities back to life with powerful Cuban coffee. 

And as the sun got closer to the horizon (it gets properly dark around here near six pm) I retreated to my job and my 911 calls and the benefits of an air conditioned office.

Well, air conditioning is very beneficial in the height of summer  which amounts to 8 or more months of the year.

Breaking Key West

Consensus in my neck of the woods is that Spring Break is busy this year. Which is surprising considering you'll be hard pressed to find a room for less than $400 in town. But students are resourceful of course and they tend to pack the over priced rooms the way previous generations packed Volkswagens for a stunt.

 Everywhere you go in and around Key West are packs of young people, and the local bums spot them coming. This guy got a cup of coffee and a cigarette from the kind or fearful young woman he cornered in the passenger seat of the car:

Friday was St Patrick's Day which combined with Florida itself being on break meant Key West was extra busy. I am not a great fan of this weird New England holiday but there agian Hallmark holidays as a whole tend to leave me cold. Especially as I was answering 911 calls Friday night.

Like I said Spring Breakers are everywhere, where you least expect them. At least this one knew how to ride her bike and avoided killing me or my dog.

Daily life plugs on, boaters included, seen here at the dinghy docks getting ready for the chilly ride out to their boat in the windswept anchorage:

Locals have been wearing jackets boots and scarves this past week thanks to strong north winds and temperatures near 60 degrees. Visitors remark on the pleasant weather and show off their short sleeves, not otherwise put to use since Thanksgiving in the unforgiving climates they inhabit.

Schooner Wharf Bar only looked desolate as it was breakfast time and not yet fully populated by people not used to eating breakfast in a bar. The temperatures left me slightly surprised the vegetation hadn't withered.

 Local subject in jacket:

 And another one.

 Visitors in shirt sleeves:

 Cool it may have been but the rain was long gone and the sun was shining on Lazy Way Lane:

 Breakfast al fresco for the future leaders of America:

 And they have another generation already breathing down their necks:

 Rusty is learning to read. I think:

He is a very smart dog. I know because he didn't put his butt in the hammock.

Fisherman's Cafe

I met JW a former dispatcher on my night shift at the Lazy Way Lane eatery opened by a friend of his family. We worked nights together for more than a year until he got a daytime job working at city hall, much better for his wife and child. Because JW grew up in Key West working days means he gets to spend time at family functions and keeps his eyes open as well. Night shift can be hard on a family man.

Fisherman's Cafe is where you go for Conch food, which is to say foods enjoyed by people who have been born and grown up in Key West and these foods are remembered as staples of the hard times in the past. Key West suffered badly during the Great Depression, a time when most of the city was unemployed, and when the city declared bankruptcy the Federal Government considered shutting the Keys down and evacuating them to save time and money.

Tourism turned that around when a Federal Administrator Julius Stone came to Key West and fired up the tourist industry that feeds the beast today. Yet when Conchs ("konks") reminisce about times they on't really remember they speak fondly of those simple foods that kept the city going. Mind you grits and cheese and fish are good stuff and were eaten even during the hard times of the 1960s when the Navy withdrew most of their sailors from Key West and  downtown went through another depression, saved this time by the arrival of gay guesthouse owners...

None of which mattered to JW or me. He had battered conch and I had hogfish he with spicy fisherman's fried and I with crunchy yucca fries. I love yucca, known locally as yuca, the Spanish spelling of the white starchy vegetable that tastes bland yet easily absorbs any passing flavor. 

I lied the food, especially the touches they add like avocado slices and a sprinkle of green onion along with the use of paper containers instead of the horrid Styrofoam which can't be recycled.

It was a good lunch and JW  got me up to speed with his job adventures and I shared mine such as they are,; who's been promoted and more importantly who hasn't, and so forth.

Rusty was perfect, curled up out of the traffic waiting for his walk. He really enjoys being involved and I like having him with me everywhere I go. He is not trouble at all.

An unassuming spot. I want to come back for the breakfast MENU. And now it's winter so sitting out is a pleasure. Which is just as well as there is no inside seating.

Waterfront Market

It came as a bit of a shock when Buco Pantelis fell out with the city over the rent charged for his organically inclined market and then he was gone. Wha...? The building has been empty ever since a small northern grocery chain had a go and failed. This summer new plans were unveiled and approved by the city which is the landlord, and the last we the people heard was that a brew pub was going in.

Renovation work on the building ruined the old mural by the marine artist known only as Wyland but a new rather more colorful, possibly garish, mural has taken its place. Like most people who live in this town of constant change I get a bit leery when something new pops up - again! - and my first question, a reflexive question really is why do they have to change it? In this case the garish stripe at the top suddenly looked like a tropical sunset when my brain cleared and I realised that the top of the building looks west when seen from this side and the sunset ... Well, you get my point. In my defense I am no artist and it takes me a moment to see these subtleties.

I ignored the no trespassing signs and peered through the dusty window and of progress inside there wasn't much to be seen. However I have come to realize that construction apparently stalls out from time to time for some mysterious reason, then hey presto! the job is equally mysteriously done and everyone goes home after packing up their tools.

There was lots of fussing about the brew pub proposal at first when neighbors learned of plans for a rooftop terrace facing the water but music restrictions were written into the permit, so that calmed people down. Some talk of a bowling alley had raised its head but according to the developers of the property a bowling alley wouldn't make enough money to sustain the property. So brew pub it is, we think.

I actually quite like the idea of a brew pub. Which if it is anything like The Porch, owned by the same people, means there is a chance we'll get a second adult watering hole in a town devoted to juvenile drunkeness. The mural seems like a good start.

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Commercial Fisherman Goes Funky

Seen on Lazy Way Lane, a Honda Metropolitan scooter with a pair of white rubber boots on the floorboards.

The striking thing about this picture is the boots, normally worn only by tough commercial fishermen in Key West. Short white rubber boots are the badge of their trade. And here we have a pair painted with flower designs? Hmm... I wonder what the owner might have been drinking at the nearby Schooner Wharf Bar after a long day on the water...Shirley Temples?

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