We wanted to skip dinner tonight but then we remembered that our waiters were in possession of a partially consumed bottle of wine of ours. The all-consuming question “Could we go for the appetizer and then sneak off with our bottle?” We gave it a fair bit of consideration and decided that we would continue with skipping dinner. We have just returned from the buffet. Apparently “skipping” has a lot in common with “later”.
Just listening to Aimee Mann’s latest album “Mental Illness”. Aimee won the Grammy for Best Folk Album back in January for this album. I bought it right after the Grammy's but had not really had a chance to plug it into a good pair of speakers until tonight. What a lovely album. She has been around for 25 years and I had purchased her music in the past, but this is her best work.
Stopped for a minute to unload the camera, clean up some shots and post them to The VOX. We are cruising for three weeks back-to-back on the MSC Seaside. It is quite the boat operated as a pizza bistro. Breakfast pizza, lunch pizza, dinner pizza - pizza 24 hours a day. Very nice though. So far we have had a beer in Antigua, US Virgin Islands Amalie, Grand Turk, and Jamaica. Tomorrow Grand Cayman, then Cozumel, Nassau, Antigua, Amalie, Grand Truck and home to Miami. We will start the drive home. Here are some photos:
Have you been following the kids from Stoneman Douglas those that survived the mass shooting. I have been following everyday and contributing whatever support that I can to each of their tweets. They are brilliant. Everyday they get stronger and their message is reaching more and more people. They have started movements to eliminate the sale of automatic rifles and bumpstocks that turn automatic rifles into machine guns. They have taken on the National Rifle Association in a forceful way, convincing corporate sponsors to drop their sponsorship - Delta Airline, United Airlines, all of the car rental companies and on and on. When trolled by right wing nut cakes they effectively counter their arguments and quietly put the them in their place with well considered responses, but they fearlessly attack politicians with statements like “The AR-15 should be renamed the Marco Rubio because it can be bought so cheaply.” I am very impressed. Follow JaclynCorin, Emma4Change, sarahchad_, cameronkasky, davidhogg111.
If you go the Twitter route you might consider following Sarah Beattie a long lost relative of mine. Her handle is nachosarah. Careful though she is not droll.
We are driving to Miami to go on a cruise. Well, not a cruise but cruises. Since October we have been living in a beautiful AirBNB in Scarborough near Katie's home. We were to stay for 10 weeks, then we expanded it to 14 weeks and finally added another two weeks so that it would be a total of 16 weeks. Staying this long would allow us to do our drywall inspection at the new house and then head south for a bit before we take possession. So we are driving to Miami.
This morning we woke up in downtown Savannah - walking distance to the historical centre of the city. It is really quite a fun place. Savannah has an "open carry" law - no, not guns, but you can carry up to 16 ounces of beer in an unconcealed plastic glass. My kinda town - beer to go - you can drink a beer will shopping in the clothing stores, you can bring an unfinished beer into a restaurant to have dinner. Very civilized.
Dinner at the Flying Monk. They had me at "Succulent"
2017 has been a heck of a year. Here are a couple of websites that have helped me maintain my sanity.
For Glenn's viewing pleasure:
I thought that I would throw in a little food pornography for these cold and windy days.
These are photos of our AirBNB. Carol and I are living here while the house in New Hamburg is being built. It is a really comfortable unit. It is not much bigger than what one could built using a shipping container but it has been very well done by the owner. Speaking of the owner they are husband, wife and a teenage son. I have been teasing my own family that we have been adopted as new grandparents by the owner's family and that we are weighing our Christmas offers. Of course I am joking, the units are completely separate and we seldom see or interact with them. There is a lot of discussion about AirBNB in Toronto at this time. We are very happy and thankful that this unit has been available to us. I hope the various governments do not screw everything up.
I think that I see Dave standing on his head to take the picture. A true friend.
Originally when this photo came to me it was upside down and no matter what I tried to do to show the picture upright it would be upside down. Now for some reason it has righted itself and I can not display it upside down. What is going on?
Carol and I went to see Catherine MacLellan at Hugh's Room last night. It was a beautiful show. She only sang songs written by her father and between songs she showed photographs and talked about him. Her research covered his life from age 6 until his death. She performed about 20 of his songs, wonderfully accompanied by lead and bass. Our seats were one row back - a very up close and personal experience. Hugh's Room is the best venue in Toronto.
I am not certain why the neighbours have erected the orange fence. Are they disrespecting us already? Wait til they see what we really have planned.