Grinnell From Truman

This is not a bicycle repairman on the streets of Mumbai. This is Key West.I was challenging myself with an unpromising street to photograph and I figured the area south of Truman might yield some pictures and as this week wraps up you will see that it did. This place used to be something else and something else before that. Methuselah was knee high to a grasshopper once and they used to sell pasta dishes and sandwiches for two-for-one. That was about five years ago and it lasted longer than I expected. It's something else pasta related now.Across the street is the longstanding Don's Place. I used to work with a woman who would get off work with me at 6am and then she'd make a beeline here for her first beer of the day at 7am. She was a tireless worker and how she did it I don't know but she viewed working nights as punishment. Whereas I live as normal a schedule as I can, she upended her days and had a beer dinner at 7am.Of course wandering Grinnell Street with a camera isn't exactly normal though happily the noted local author and photographer Tom Corcoran told my wife, when he was speaking to kids in her classroom (very well done, she said), " a camera is perfect cover in Key West." Perhaps I looked like a tourist with a Labrador. It isn't exactly a classic Key West lane is it?According to J. Wills Burke's compendium at my elbow, the Grinnell's were a bunch of merchants from Up North, and apparently they may have helped John Fleeming (sic) fund his quarter share of the purchase of the island from Juan Salas. For whatever reason the Grinnell brothers got a street named for them here, though Burke in The Streets of Key West has a fascinating story about Henry Grinnell who never came to Key West and funded Arctic expeditions, particularly to find the lost Franklin expedition. It seems there are pieces of land in the Far Up North named for the man as well as down here in Key West
If you need beer on the run there is a drive through At Don's Place. Drink and drive and get caught and you will go to jail and get a criminal record. I take pictures, for my amusement to record Key West as I live it today, and my eternal regret is that picture taking was so cumbersome and expensive in the days before digital, not to mention the hassle of taking color pictures and having them screwed up in the development process. There was the alternative of black and white photogrpahy in a do-it-yourself darkroom or of actual drawing by hand. I did not wish to intrude but I hoped that was underway here.They really are everywhere: Dilapidated but lovely. Calling all rich persons of taste who will come to key West and not demand that everything be done as they did it Up North. A Key West palace needs to be made lovely. We will forgive you if your loot comes from the cursed Goldman Sachs.
My kennel has found a place in the sun. At last. I can't get over what a ghastly winter it has been. I fear that if climate change has been sending a message this might not be the last time I shall see 42 American Degrees in Key West (5.5 Canadian degrees).Yum!Not content with chickens we have pelicans:Families.
Naked ladies frozen in a moment of intimate derangement. And one more perfectly good unused porch. Cheyenne just knows there is some delicious tidbit mouldering underneath the floor of this Conch cottage.The Old Firehouse on Virginia. When some locals call 9-1-1 in a panic they may shout "the firehouse on Virginia!" as the location. That confuses new call takers in our dispatch center. Training takes a long time. "El Tigre!" is Glynn Archer school. "The Ramp!" is the corner of Bertha and South Roosevelt. "Dead Man's Curve!" is on South Roosevelt and so forth. In the city of nicknames even locations aren't what they seem. Peter Vega is turning the old firehouse into a museum.
I took this picture at the preview of the museum to come: Not many people bother to put the word "please" on their signs:
A day without road works isn't a day in Key West. I remember when they were putting fresh sewers in around town to give the city the most modern sewage facilities, which was a good thing, but we had to go through hell to get there. This gives me flashbacks.
Indeed......and some people think Grinnell is only to found on the north side of the cemetery.

BPK:Blue Skies, Green Trees

This is Denver in March. Ha ha. But, to paraphrase a phrase about drunkeness, the roads will still be straight and flat in August. I am starting to feel a certain urgency to get Cheyenne out and about in the middle of the day as temperatures have been rising and cold fronts have been weakening.She takes full advantage of all opportunities.My great fear in extolling the virtues of these modest pine forests will lead people to think there is more here than there is. If you are used to sweeping views, there are none because everything is at sea level. You may feel alone in the world, and walkers on "your" portion of the island may be rare, but you unlikely to have been the forst person to have seen anything out here. Homes are never far away: There are bigger trees but these are not your classic "old growth" stands. The dog is eight years and four months so you could say she is.

There are more and more untended, abandoned homes for sale. It's probably not as widespread as Up North from what I've heard but they are here.

What prompted the home owner to stick this root on the fence I can't say, but I found the effect striking. With flash...

...and without the flash:

It's been a while since I was at the Blue Hole and Cheyenne was tugging to check it out so...here is the famous Green Hole, a former quarry filled with rainwater off Key Deer Boulevard. There used to be an alligator here and the warning signs remain but the last I heard Bacardi hasn't been replaced. The alligator choked on a child's plastic toy dropped off the viewing platform. I doubt that ignominous death was reported alongside the dork who was swimming in a suburban canal and got drowned by a gator. She died and so did the gator for it's trouble. Bacardi died without redress. Two young men who killed two other gators here got jail time for their cruelty. It's hard to beat a human for the ability to be dangerous.

These guys don't feed your television fantasies of danger in the wild but they snap their hardest to impress.We'll let riepe decide exactly what this unfortunately shaped head looks like.Key Deer. They saw Cheyenne long before she saw them. She is not a trouble maker happily for me.

Nick, a tourist from England got over his fear of pink crocs (He later admitted they put him off engaging with me. Doing their job!) and stopped me to ask what I thought of buying real estate in the Keys.

He's been visiting for a while and we talked at some length about real estate, health care (he buys additional private insurance for his family) and the oddities of life in the US. His solution for healthinsurance reform is to lower the eligibility age for medicare. It seemed simple enough to an outsider I laughed. He was not impressed by my generally gloomy outlook and he thinks he wants a house on Big Pine Key because he thinks the market has bottomed out. I hope he's right.

Watson Street

This window high above Watson Street, just off Truman Avenue, looked like it was covered by marine canvas. I thought it was not only unusual, but clever. I have never translated my sailing experiences so neatly to landlubber use.This is a more conventional window cover in the Southernmost City: Truman used to be called Division Street because it divided Old Town, the inhabited part of Key West, from the Outer Darkness of the rest of the island. Nowadays Truman divides the touristy part of Old Town, around the cemetery, from the residential part of Old Town that tourists tend to see a lot less of, Packer and Watson and Grinnell Streets among others. El Siboney the famous Cuban Restaurant lurks in this part of town (on Catherine Street) and tourists view it as "hard to find."Off street parking is available, if you are looking to park a scooter and not block a driveway. And here is a view of just how close houses are set in Old Town. I always ask people who think they want to settle in Key West if they could get used to living this close to their neighbors, European style:
I love cactus and admire anyone who can grow one this big: A Key West garret purpose built you'd think for the artist lurking within each of us. Run away (with a lot of money) and write the great American novel up here: Or own a nice multi apartment rental:

Classic Conch home in cement and tropical shades: Guess who she just spotted:

This home is for sale. You could be here, on your porch admiring your scooter and wondering why that dog walker is twisting around so much with his camera and leash.Perhaps you'd prefer a two storey home and a Jeep in the driveway. Another fantasy Key West home, not for sale as far as I could tell.Another Jeep on the street boasted this wheel cover. Party till you die perhaps?

Cheyenne liked the shade of the wall. This picture is dog height for those that need to know what Key West looks like to ankle biters.

Bougainvillea at human height (5 ft 6ins or 168 cms).

Check the light pole to see where you are:

The family that jogs together runs and shouts together. She was yelling out "M'Bubba!" at the baby to reassure it that it has a place in Key West I guess. It all seemed terribly energetic and healthful. We lumbered on aimlessly, shamed by their forceful sense of purpose.

This used to be a dilapidated building describing itself as Wesleyan Holiness but now it is smart and refurbished and is home to Key West Unity. A friend of my wife is a member and when pressed she advised me one pretty much gets to believe what one wants at this church. Sounds unsuitable for one like me who has an opinion about anything and everything. I would make a terrible nuisance of myself in their heaven. The building looks lovely and and crisp and clean. I'm glad the Unity people saved it from premature decomposition. We should all be so lucky.