Dammit, Jim, I’m a vacationer, not a blogger!

Shameful. Just shameful. Every night, except for that first travel night, I’ve meant to write a blog entry, but nooooo. I just keep being all vacationy and junk.

To catch up a little bit. Friday night we made it past Chattanooga and stayed just north of Atlanta, in a suburb called Kennesaw. I had been to Kennesaw before with my folks, when we went to the Civil War battlefield there. The warm, damp evening and the sound of the cicadas brought back fond memories of my time in north Georgia, where I spent my summers between college with my parents (they bought a house there). When Ken and I left in the morning, there was that same quiet, wet, slightly overcast ‘hush’ that I remembered so well. Like being surrounded by damp cotton...but a good feeling, not a creepy one. Everything smelled fresh and clean. It never fails to amaze me how a certain quality can trigger such intense memories. I enjoyed my time in college, including my summers in the north Georgia mountains, so it was a very pleasant memory.

Then we were off on the final leg of our trip, and got into New Smyrna Beach around 5:30 and got checked in. Due to some changes in management of the timeshare property, we have a short week this time (we’re leaving Thursday morning), and we didn’t get into the building we are usually in. But it actually worked out better! It’s got a different layout, which is fine, and the walls seem rather thin, which is annoying, but we have a nice long balcony and we look out right onto the ocean. The best part is that it is much quieter, because they don’t play loud, irritating music poolside or play stupid games with the guests or make constant announcements about signing up for the tie-dye t-shirt activity. ::sigh:: The pool is right outside our condo, but it’s a small pool and it’s been very quiet. Beyond that is the walkway to the beach, then the beach, and then hey presto! The Atlantic Ocean! I would be happy to stay in this building again, although next time we might get one of the little bungalows.

As you can see in the above photo, it wasn’t exactly nice weather on Saturday. In fact, it POURED that night. We went to our usual first night restaurant, PJ’s SeaShack, and sat in the bar area with open windows and watched the rain just pour off the roof. We also watched a group of people having their 20th high school reunion. I’m guessing that they probably didn’t remember enough to feel embarrassed the next day...but they should have!

Sunday was also a washout weather-wise, gloomy and grey. But it was still nice enough to sit outside and read, and to watch the Olympics when we’d come inside. In the evening, my Aunt June and Cousin Greg were nice enough to come down from Daytona Beach to visit us, and we had a very yummy dinner at a place called Blackbeard’s. (Yarrrr!) All the years we’ve been coming down here, and we’d never gone to that restaurant! It was good enough that we will add it to the rotation. We had a really nice time talking and laughing, and look forward to seeing Aunt June again when she comes up for an extended stay with my Mom.

Oh, Ken told me to let this go, but I said I wasn’t going to let it go until I blogged about it! On the way out to the car to meet up with Aunt June and Greg, we found that someone had double-parked behind us. Someone else was nearby unloading their vehicle, and she said it was a couple who unloaded a couple of coolers and took them upstairs. So there we were, unable to get out of the parking space. There was absolutely no way to finagle it to get out. Ken walked upstairs to see if he could see anyone that might be them, and I waited by the car and fumed. Finally some dude came down and was standing by the car, and by this time, I was spittin’ fire. I was like “Is this your car?!” He said yeah, she’s getting the keys right now. I said, “What were you thinking just parking here? You can’t do that!” The guy just looked uncomfortable and shrugged and said, “Sorry...she’s getting the keys right now.” But I wasn’t done yet. I said, “You don’t just park behind a car to unload your stuff! I mean, you couldn’t even pull over THERE by the curb so that any of these cars could get out? What were you thinking??” Ken finally had to say, “Beth.” I think I muttered one final, disgusted, “Jesus,” and got in our car. I told Ken that actually, he should be kind of proud of me, because I didn’t cuss the guy out. Not a single F-bomb passed my lips. Oh, I wanted to, believe me...but I think I showed remarkable restraint. [wink] But seriously...who does that?! How unbelievably arrogant and rude!

There. I blogged about it, so now I’ll let it go.

Last night, we stayed up to watch the landing of the Mars rover, Curiosity. I’m really glad I stayed up (even though I was so jazzed up I was awake until after 3 am), because it was nothing less than amazing. Science rocks!

Today turned out to be beautiful and sunny, so Ken went for a run while I read. We had a brief appointment with management at 12:30, which we followed up with more reading (Ken had to do a little work, I’m sorry to say), and then a walk down the beach to one of our yearly stops, Breakers, for a couple of beers and burgers. Their burgers are consistently voted as the best in central Florida, and they really are amazingly good. Even when you get them well done (which I do), they’re still juicy and full of flavor. So I got my Breakers burger fix! Then it was back to the condo for some more reading, which soon resulted in what was a combination of a nap and a food coma. A nafooco.

Now it’s more Olympics, and hoping for another nice day tomorrow.

And now you’re all caught up!