Fisherman's Hospital

My wife had surgery last week in Marathon and she is now carrying around a screw buried in her shoulder underneath a number of stitches. I was, as usual, the designated driver and because she nixed the Bonneville (on the grounds of inconvenience) I was forced to dust off the Maxima to make the half hour trip North. I am no great fan of the medical profession, I confess, and behind architects, bankers and insurance executives, like Gilbert and Sullivan's Lord High Executioner, I have a little list of society offenders- and they never would be missed. However on this our second visit to Fisherman's Hospital I found myself waiting in a room equipped with all the necessities while my wife was prepared for the cutting board by a bunch of cheerful nursing people. The atmosphere in Fisherman's is much more relaxed and peaceful than the chaotic frenzy I have found to be normal operating procedure at Lower Keys Medical Center on Stock Island, and given a choice this is where I'd rather come.

My wife was first in line for Dr Collin's knife and while I had the waiting room to myself, she amazing to relate was wheeled in precisely on time. Indeed, the operation was scheduled to take ninety minutes with 45 minutes recovery time which gave me all the time needed to go home and do some chores. At least I didn't have to sit around as I have been forced to do in Miami hospitals and have the curse of the idiot box blaring nonsense while I wait. I used the "off" switch in Marathon while I waited for word that I could go home:I find the presence of television screens in every possible public place to be an unwarranted intrusion. If reading is beyond the capacity of those in line you'd think the modern array of electronic gadgetry allied with a headset would provide all the mindless entertainment they need without inflicting bizarre "bread and circus" television drama on the rest of us. When I returned some other person waiting in this room was drooling helplessly while he watched people on the screen arguing about some domestic infelicity in a televised court room. I don't think he was improved much by the experience.I have got bogged down in Robert Stone's latest book and I can't find my way out of a lot of abstruse Middle Eastern religion/politics/psychodrama set in Israel during one of the many intifadas/wars/guerrillas things that beset that drama-loving corner of the world. watching people trade insults on television seemed like a better alternative. Fortunately Fisherman's refused to let me down and my wife reappeared exactly on time, well cared for and drugged out of her mind. I came away making a mental note that come the revolution we will spare Fisherman's Hospital because they might very well be the best hospital in the Lower Keys. Not much competition I know, but this is where I want to be cut open when the time comes.

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I grew up with single payer health care as a way of life and I have lived my adult life making sure health insurance is one of my monthly bills. I have never gone without coverage and for me that has been easy as I am healthy to all appearances and easy to insure. As I grow older I am more glad than ever that I work for the City of Key West that pays my monthly insurance premium and gives me coverage that is affordable and comprehensive. My wife has similar coverage from the School District. We have dealt in the past more directly with insurance companies and we have defeated them at their own game when they have inundated us with paper and refusals to pay for agreed medical bills. I hate our current system of reliance on an unaccountable, opaque, profit driven health insurance monster that consumes more money and produces more incomprehensible paperwork than any health care system of any industrialized nation.

In this case my wife's shoulder injury was caused at work, a classroom exercises gone wrong, and Worker's Compensation covered the costs. We had no co-pays, no out of pocket, no after the fact billing, no arguing, no paperwork. A Worker's Comp nurse took care of everything over the phone, treated us cheerfully and with respect and reminded me just how sweet single payer is. I watch the struggle for health care reform in Washington and I listen to the arguments against comprehensive change and I shake my head in amazement.

We are told that the bail out of the economic system is costing around 24 trillion dollars, imagine that, and a trillion dollar health care reform providing some sort of affordable coverage for all is supposedly out of reach. A surtax of 5% on those earning more than 350,000 dollars that we might pay for affordable coverage for all, is beyond the Pale. What a strange and unfathomable society I live in. I am more glad than ever for my job, my health insurance and my seniority at work. Apres moi, le deluge.

Seventeenth Street

A while back a reader asked about the wide street in New Town which could only be 17th Street, shown here at it's northern tip looking towards the Gulf of Mexico, between Niles GM dealership to the right and the Travel Lodge Hotel to the left in the distance: It is very wide thoroughfare, more like two one way streets in opposing directions, with what they would call Neutral Ground in New Orleans- a median strip in the middle: One might imagine the temptation to attain illegal speeds on this wide street might be irresistible: Despite its appearance as that of a broad avenue, 17th Street is actually a neighborhood and peopleit seems take the time to play here:

With afternoon temperatures hitting about 91 degrees (35C) it seems a bit on the warm side for pedalling but I am it appears, in something of a minority on the subject: And here I found a Harley, yes yet another Harley on the streets of Key West. Zero for originality, though the cover has a certain Bohemian chic: The first house shown here, a modest three bed, one bath bungalow with 1240 square feet of space and a swimming pool is on offer for a cool half million dollars. In 2009 no less: In a space filled with grass this sign is to e expected, along with the box of plastic bags below it:

This dog walker was quite the sight; she with a heavily bandaged arm, the dog limping heavily on it's front paw, both out enjoying the sunshine:

The southern end of 17th Street dead ends abruptly into Donald Avenue, and commuters on electric mopeds, currently all the rage:

And thus we leave bifurcated 17th Street at it's southern end, with a glimpse of water, a pond among the mangroves that separate this piece of land from Ponciana Housing across the way. It's not the open ocean but it is a water view.

Azur

The tourist trade still looks busier than you might think in Key West, though there are caveats to the financial well being one might expect from all the traffic there is still in town. The lodging association reports beds are still getting slept[t in though the nightly rates have dropped considerably from the crazy flights of the boom years. Restaurants still put knees under tables but patrons are choosing cheaper and sharing more, and everyone is running specials of one sort or another... These are hard times and I've noticed at night that Duval Street is wrapping it up early because this is family time, kids are out of school and bar flies just aren't there to get in trouble and start drunken fights and all the nastiness associated with winter revelers. In addition to being the times that try men's souls, these are also the times that favor established businesses and well known, reliable providers.

Thus it was that on my wife's first trip into town following shoulder surgery we met friends at Azur, a café that describes itself as Mediterranean in style and which my wife and I had never previously visited. The weather was crap outside and I previously published pictures of the down pour that accompanied our return home, but inside the restaurant offered a pleasant contrast to the gray outside, warm wooden floors and serene blue decor and a fascinating menu: Frankly I thought Carole's effort to be "good" yielded the least interesting result, a light and colorless frisee and endive salad with some olives and an appearance bland enough I didn't bother to taste it. This next one was my wife's $9 flat bread with lamb and it was as delicious as it looked:

If my wife's lamb had Eastern overtones, Kathy's flat bread was what I called the Jewish Mediterranean plate, based on lox and cream cheese:

My choice was perhaps not so adventurous but I enjoyed every bite of a fresh and genuine old favorite:

While I choose the Caprese sandwich, fresh mozzarella and tomatoes in proper Italian style, the idea was to share, as my wife says sharing food is part of the marriage vows in the Jewish culture. However, it turns out sharing ain't necessarily so if you've got the lamb flat bread and your husband has the very serviceable but not as alluring dish...but at least I got a taste of hers and she admitted my sandwich was entirely delicious, just not as delicious as hers.

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The service was attentive and not intrusive which is how I like it and we got all the iced tea we could have wanted (this was a working day for half the table). I was tempted to ask for a glass of milk to see how the French waitress would take such an outlandish American request, but I was trying to be on my best behavior, so I refrained. I think she would have coped just fine actually. Azur, which is on Grinnell at Fleming, offers breakfast all day and they have lots of standard egg dishes and pancakes along with Key Lime Pie (! for breakfast!!) or something called sweet Portuguese bread and even carbonara pasta (yes! for breakfast!!). It wasn't the day to eat outdoors but we will be back because this place has shot to the top of our short list of interesting, value packed places to eat. And it has a cozy bar to boot:

Furthermore to keep the interest up they offer various special deals to keep one coming back. Too bad they just closed the two-for-one breakfast deal this week. Pasta and Key Lime Pie for the price of one would have been decadence in high gear.

Rainy Season

The picture from the National Hurricane Center yesterday showed two areas of disturbed weather, neither of which promises to develop into a tropical cyclone as they merged into one big blob. Therein lies some good news as we get into the meaty part of hurricane season in the South Atlantic, Western Caribbean and Gulf Of Mexico. However, for two wheeled riders this week, Key West was a moderately unfriendly environment as streets flooded and cars became wave making machines on city streets:It so happened I was in Key West ferrying my wife around and I got to point and shoot from the comfort of the interior of my Nissan, and I have to admit the thought did cross my mind that it was nice not to be out and about on the Bonneville:Hard core BMW riders take their lumps, with a foul weather jacket, a helmet (of course) and bare legs and shoes to limit their exposure to the weather. I suppose this is what he has been waiting for with his go-anywhere GS: The rain came down suddenly around lunchtime and by the time we pushed our empty coffee cups away the streets were still being pounded and the storm drains had given up trying to move the water out of the streets. I have sat on my motorcycle in enough downpours to know that sitting and waiting can be the worst part, which was what I imagined this guy was thinking as he waited for cars to move along on Eaton Street:
And when they did move they created more waves such was the depth of the water. This is rainy season, though I haven't seen a decent down pour at Mile Marker 27 in ages. The rain has battered neighboring Summerland Key, and Big Pine Key but my island has been spared these scenes all of which I shot in Key West: It's actually rather annoying as my vegetable beds, holding on grimly through the heat of summer could use some rain, not to mention the fully grown palm trees and other shrubbery around my house...We drive home from key West in this appalling down pour and found ourselves barely able to see the traffic through the rain we had high hopes that ramrod key would be showered and fresh and wet. No such luck. It was like the gods were making rude faces at us and the rain petered out as we drive through Summerland key, still wet from recent rain. By the time we were on the bridge separating Summerland from Ramrod the rain was gone, the asphalt was dry and our hopes for rain at home were shriveled up.
They tell us this hurricane season should be lighter than usual, whatever that means, but all it takes is one direct hit and that makes for a rotten hurricane season for you. Nevertheless the wild guess/estimate of a light season is curiously heartening. "Phew! No storms this year, for the third year in a row!" I say to myself as though predictions were reality... And then suddenly a yellow shaded area appears in the Caribbean Basin and the reality of hurricane season is upon us, from now till November 30th. And the more immediate reality of summer thunderstorms, summer winds and summer rains. I want the rain, not the hurricanes.

Waves and Rocks

My wife recently took a week off in one of our favorite Central American destinations. No, not Costa Rica, but the Pacific Coast beach town of San Juan Del Sur, and one of the nicest hotels we've stayed in:

Piedras Y Olas means Rocks and Waves and is the brainchild of a friend of ours who sailed to Nicaragua decades ago and never got around to leaving. It's been a long struggles but Chris has created a world class hotel on the slopes above the little town of San Juan, using his hotel to improve the lives of locals and give visitors a world class destination resort:The hotel is built of local materials in the local style, a cascade of paths and vegetation between the rooms, the pools and the two restaurants on the property:

Chris keeps an assortment of refugee animals on his hotel grounds, local residents abandoned or ill treated who find refuge at Piedras Y Olas, including a pelican who I am told helps in the raising of kittens born on the property. Apparently the pelican keeps an eye on them and if they wander he scoops them up in his bill and returns the kittens to their mother:

Monkeys are frequently to be found abused and abandoned, often suffering severe personality defects as a result of their treatment by humans:

You get extraordinary views from the three infinity pools scattered around the grounds of the hotel, whose website is http://www.piedrasyolas.com/: The pools also offer ringside seats for the sunsets, as famous in San Juan as they are in Key West:

Part of the hotels raison d'etre is to provide a place for locals to train and learn how to work in first world hospitality industries. The American chef teaches Nicas how to cook gringo style using local ingredients:

All served under the Ramadas:

Development has come to San Juan, not only in the variety of businesses around town but also at the government docks that used to be pretty much moribund but nowadays see recreational boats lined up for maintenance:In the hills above the waterfront sits the Pelican Eyes resort, Piedras Y Olas, hidden in the foliage while on the beach there sits a multi story monstrosity that prosperity has brought to the town. San Juan's first high rise bang on the beach:

Hotel guests can opt for a day long excursion on the hotel sailboat, the 43-footer that Chris sailed down from California and that he has used to offer Nicaragua's only sailboat excursions ever since. The sailboat lives at anchor in the harbor and guests board via a trip from the docks on a motorboat.The sailboat is again met by the lancha, at the destination beach down the coast. The crew on the motorboat has previously landed the fixings for a beach side picnic and then takes the guests safely to the beach through the swells, from the anchored sailboat:Classic Pacific Coast shoreline in the tropics, abundant vegetation, granite rocks and long sandy beaches washes by tall tides and strong waves:

To gringo eyes I think it takes a certain amount of bravery to contemplate spending the best part of a day braving the swells of the Pacific Ocean in a wooden fishing boat with an uncertain outboard for company:

A view of San Juan Del Sur in the approaches. Beyond the last hill, twelve miles from the town lies the shore of Lake Nicaragua, a huge body of fresh water that generates powerful down drafts of wind along this section of Pacific Coastline:The ride back from the beach is usually less windy than the ride out but sailors will notice the double reefed main and scrap of head sail only, which is the remnant from the wild ride out to the beach:

And so, back to the anchorage, a final ride in the lancha to the docks and a short cab ride back to the hotel for a drink and dinner and a sunset view:

My wife admitted I was right, it was the restful week long vacation she needed and the boat ride was the highlight as always of a vacation spent in San Juan Del Sur.