Florida critters...

 As part of our adventuring around Florida, we drove on "Alligator Alley" and came upon a National Preserve in the Everglades.  I had never been in the Everglades before so we stopped at the information center.  A nice young ranger there was talking to a gentleman in front of us about a loop drive through the back country which also sounded interesting to us.  So we got a little more information, followed directions and found the entrance to the loop.  We were told it would be a two hour drive and it was. The first several miles were  a dusty dirt road and so bumpy that you really couldn't go faster than 10 mph.  This was fine for seeing animals. 

We saw these big boys sunning along the road.  I took this picture from the car.

This relatively little fellow was in the road.  I did feel brave enough to get out of the car for this shot.  

On another day, after the loop adventure, we stopped at a rest area where this sign was posted "WARNING BEWARE OF VENOMOUS SNAKES."  We decided to risk the quick walk to the restrooms.  Having safely made it there, I was standing in a stall, latching the door when I felt something wet and cold on my leg a little above my ankle.  My immediate thought was SNAKE!! but before I went into full panic mode, I looked down and saw a curious puppy who had snuck under the wall with the adjoining stall.  

And that concludes my Florida animal adventures.

I'm back....

 My Wonder Spouse and I returned yesterday from our ten day driving trip to and around Florida. The purpose was to visit friends and family on both sides of our newly merged families, and also to see some parts of Florida I've never seen before.  I'll be hitting the highlights in the next few blogs, in no particular order.  Our general travel plan was to stop and visit with people, take them to lunch or dinner, then spend our nights in convenient hotels.  My WS, being the super organized sort, had the whole trip laid out on a spread sheet, all of the hotels reserved and when possible prepaid.  The other thing that made my WS so wonderful was that he did all the driving.  Believe me, driving I75 in Florida is risky business at best.  If you long for thrills, I recommend it.  He quickly realized that the posted 70 mph speed limit was merely a suggestion that seemed to reflect the minimum realistic speed.  The other fun thing about driving in Florida is that when you exit the interstate you don't end up on a quiet little side street, just another super fast four to eight lane highway.  We have already decided that our next trip to FL will involve flying.  But enough about roads.  Out first stop in FL was to visit friends of mine who live in The Villages (population 150,000).  They have lived there for 14 years and love it. It has many lovely features including 50 golf courses and country clubs, many restaurants and nightly music in the squares, lots of groups and activities. It also has cute little golf carts running all over the place.  My friend admitted though that it's faster to get places in their car.  It was a nice place to visit, but not my cup of tea. More about the places I really loved will follow in the next few blogs.

read a book

 My west coast brother informs me that today is "National Librarian Day." As you might assume, I have many fond memories of librarians.  There was Naomi Tremp, librarian in our small town, who had been there since my father was a child.  The librarian in our high school who let me spend study hall hours in the library shelving books, and discovering wonderful books, including my favorite ever "A Town Like Alice."  There was also the bookmobile driver and many more.  Tomorrow I'm leaving on a 10 day driving trip to visit friends and family to, from and in Florida.  I will not be blogging, so your assignment while I'm gone is to visit your local library and find a great book to read.  Enjoy!

picture this

 Once again my west coast brother has nudged some memories with his daily text.  First of all, because it made me laugh, today is "Tax Day" and also "Take a Wild Guess Day."  I hope none of you had to do any wild guessing.  But enough about that sore subject. The special day that stirred memories for me is "Art History Day."  I've always loved Art History.  When my children were very young I was hired to teach Art History at the Fort Wayne Art School, which later merged with IPFW.  It was a part time job with lectures twice a week but it kept my brain from turning to pablum.  Fortunately I had a wonderful mother-in-law who was only too happy to baby sit on those days.  We started with prehistoric art and worked our way through modern art in four semesters.  This was back in the days of slides and slide projectors and some of each class was spent looking at appropriate slides from the school's extensive collection.  After two years I had a complete collection of lecture notes and was ready to start the series again, feeling much more confident than the first time around.  Then we moved to south eastern Ohio for my husband's new job.  That was the end of my lecturing career.  But happily, over the last fifteen years, I have been able to travel in several European countries, visit some excellent galleries, and see the originals of many of the works of art I used to lecture about.  It's always a joyful jolt to come upon a piece I remember, like seeing an old friend, and it's fun to see their true size, often much larger or smaller than their projected image.  Fair warning, if you're ever touring a gallery or museum with me, I will be lagging behind.

my roles....

 Seeing the Shakespeare scenes yesterday made me think about my various roles in Shakespeare's plays and I want to share a few memories.  Our previous director at First Presbyterian Theater loved Shakespeare, and produced one of the bard's plays per year.  Happily, I was able to get parts in some of them.  The first was my role as Romeo's mother.  I had five lines.  There's a bit of a back story here.  Before I auditioned for the play I was substitute teaching for an English teacher at a local high school.  One class was studying Romeo and Juliette and I was really into it.  At one point I was explaining that Juliette was no dummy.  She insisted on marriage before she let Romeo into her bedroom.  Just as I finished expounding on this I glanced down and realized that a girl in the front row appeared to be about eight months pregnant.  I was so embarrassed.  After Romeo and Juliet came Henry IV.  I played the nurse in the king's death scene.  Again about five lines.  Then there was Anthony and Cleopatra where I played the soothsayer.  I delivered lots of warnings and pithy advice and also delivered the asp to Cleo.  There were others but you get the idea.  Sadly, I had landed a really good role in a Shakespeare play and we had just started rehearsal when Covid struck and everything was shut down,  By the time that was all over our director had left and, while we hired an excellent new director, he doesn't do Shakespeare.  I have been in many other plays over the years and enjoyed them all, but there's something about Shakespeare.  By the way, if you ever want to see truly excellent performances of Shakespeare's plays go to Stratford, Ontario.  The summer theater actors there do an amazing job.

fun at the Phil...

 This evening's Philharmonic concert was, in my opinion, one of the very best this season.  The first half was fun because Elgar's "Falstaff, Op.68" was performed with an interesting addition.  Between each movement actors performed short scenes featuring Falstaff (Bob Haluska) and Prince Henry (Kevin Torwelle) in short scenes from Shakespeare's play, "Henry IV."  I actually had a part in a First Pres Production of Henry IV and this brought back some fun memories.  In case you're wondering, I played King Henry's nurse in his dying scene.  It took me longer to get into my costume than the total time I was on stage.  

All of that was great, but the second half of the evening was simply amazing.  The music was Beethoven's "Concerto in D major for Violin and Orchestra, Op. 61." While I admit that I enjoy Beethoven more than Elgar, what made this performance simply outstanding was the guest soloist.  Philippe Quint is the most amazing violinist I have ever heard.  The fact that he was playing the 1708 "Ruby" Antonio Stradivari violin didn't hurt either.  I can't really describe his music except to say that it was sublime.  If you ever have a chance to hear Philippe Quint perform, don't miss it.  

long ago and far away...

 Today is National Dive Bar Day, among other things, according to my west coast brother.  Thinking about that has brought back a long-ago memory to share.  It was the summer of 1967 and I had arrived early in upstate New York to begin a new teaching job, middle school art.  It was six weeks before the beginning of the school year because I had spent earlier weeks of the summer helping care for a dear aunt in Pennsylvania.  After I paid the deposit and first month's rent on my very cute third floor attic apartment, I realized I was out of money.  With eight weeks to go before I could expect a pay check, I went looking for a job.  There was an ad in the little local paper that said "Wanted, attractive barmaid, no experience necessary." You could run that kind of ad in 1967.  Well, the 'no experience' part certainly fit, and, at 22, I was still pretty confident about my looks.  So I strolled into Joe's Bar and Grill (name changed to protect the innocent), a dark little bar that was as close to a dive bar as I will ever come.  I said I was answering the ad, got the job, and started that very afternoon.  My hours were 4pm to midnight Monday through Friday. My customers were almost all men who worked in the nearby Catskill resort hotels in the summer and went home, somewhere in the south, in the winter to work in the chicken processing plants.  Consequently they had the strangest mixed accent I had ever heard.  Joe invited me to go to Florida with him for the winter when he closed the bar.  I didn't say yes, but I also didn't tell him that I would only be there for six weeks. The patrons only tipped on Fridays when they got paid but were a very friendly bunch.  Joe carried around a huge wad of money to cash their checks.  We only served straight shots and beer, so I learned the barmaid job pretty quickly.  I can tip a mug and get just the right amount of foam with the best of them.  And, as the weeks went on, I began to understand their accent, which proved very helpful when school started and I met their children.  I quit at the end of the summer with some made-up excuse, not a problem since Joe was going to be shutting down anyway, and started my year of teaching. At the end of the first day of school the custodian came into my classroom to clean, took one look at me, and burst out laughing.  He was a regular at Joe's.