I really need to be writing, but I think I have Island Fever. It’s a common malaise that attacks people here in the Florida Keys, and its biggest symptom is that you are just so relaxed that you don’t give a damn. I just don’t want to do anything productive. I’d much rather sit outside and read, watch the boats passing by, and listen to the breeze in the palm trees. That’s great for the blood pressure, but when you make your living crunching words, it’s not much help for the bottom line.
Although it looks like sitting outside might not be much fun for the next day or two. It was down in the low 60s last night with strong wind gusts, and though it is supposed to start warming back up, the winds are supposed to be 25-30 MPH for the next couple of days.
Yesterday afternoon we drove into Marathon to do some banking, mail some orders off at the post office, and to drop off sample bundles of the Gypsy Journal at a couple of RV parks. RV park rates are not exactly cheap here in the Keys this time of year. Monthly rates for the winter range from a low of about $850 at small, spartan mobile home parks with a few RV spaces, to over $2,000 here at Sunshine Key. I like it here in the islands, but not that much! There are times I wish I had made the Army a career, if for no other reason that that I could stay at the FamCamp at Key West.
While we were in Marathon we stopped at K-Mart for a few things, then to check out Crane Point Museum and Nature Center, which includes a couple of historic homes, a wild bird center where injured birds are rescued and cared for until they can be released back in to the wild, and nature trails. The lady at the admissions desk didn’t seem to understand what I was saying when I told her about the Gypsy Journal and that we’d like to include a story about Crane Point in a future issue, so we didn’t get a tour. Maybe we’ll try to get back again before we leave the area.
By then it was getting late in the afternoon and our stomachs were growling, so we went to Keys Fisheries for dinner. They had the big plastic wind screens rolled down over the outside seating area, and the infrared heaters on, but the wind was blowing so hard that we were both shivering by the time we had finished eating. We made a quick stop at Publix, and then it was home for the night.
With all of this wind we have a tree branch scraping the top of our motorhome, and added to the fact that a palm tree is partially blocking our rooftop TV dish (yeah Greg, I pushed the darned button), I think I’m going to see about moving to a different site today. When I mentioned that last night on Facebook, my friend Joe Jones suggested I just cut the branch off. Sure Joe – it’s dark, it’s windy, and I’m up on a ladder with a saw. What could possibly go wrong?
Thought For The Day – You know that little thing inside your head that keeps you from saying things you really shouldn’t? I don’t have one of those.
