Category: Dog Parks and Brew Pubs

Port Charlotte/Punta Gorda Photo Gallery>>
Well thanks again to the travel Budha for allowing us to arrive problem free. I spotted five shoes on the way from Orlando. Well Donnie and Rachie’s wedding is over. (see the photos here) It was a great time, stressful at times but worth it! We got to see so many friends and family. The reverend Marvin “Scooter” Ahrens performed the ceremony, and he did a great job. Nanny even got to come down, we love Nanny and enjoy spending as much time as possible with her, she seems to glow these days, she is all healed and even has a hearing aid! — On Behalf of Sharon and I, also Rachie and Donnie, we would like to give a special thanks to all those that helped make the wedding a huge success, it could not have happened without the help of our wonderful friends and family! — Went searching for a shoe yesterday but did not find one anywhere! Guess they only show up when I am not looking for them. This next story is a portrayal of the dirty part of RVing :) Well Donnie and Rachie rented a porta potty for their party and Sharon and I thought it would be perfect to dumped our black water (sewage for the non-RVer) into that porta potty. Sounds easy, until as we are pumping the hose slips out of the potty and spills nasty stuff all over. We got to it quick so maybe only a gallon spilled out. Still very embarrassing and yucky. So I finished emptying and sprayed it all down with a hose. All cleaned up except tiny wet masses of green toilet paper blow everywhere. In hindsight, that was not a great idea 🙂 🙂 🙂 The next day when the guy comes to get the potty I can see him right outside my window struggling to move it. This was an overweight black guy whose pants kept falling lower and lower as he pushed it. I felt bad for him, but could not help wonder why no one ever told him about belts. He kept looking in to see how full it was. “Whoops”, I thought. I did not realize they moved those things by hand. I came out and asked to help him push it. “Did someone pour water in here?” he asked. I replied with a puzzled look “ I don’t know, I stayed inside last night, is it overly full?” 🙂 “ I need to call and get a truck to come and pump it out. “oh crap” I thought. I figured they would charge Donnie for that so I pushed harder. “No need to do that, we can get this” I said, as water inside the potty sloshed everywhere and his pants fell to his knees . Just about that time Donnie and other guys came out of the house and helped push it to his truck and then we hoisted up onto his truck. Poor guy, his job is bad enough without people like me making it worse. We had too run the kids to Tampa to catch their train back home and finally came across a shoe, or three. Three in a 1/4 stretch actually. All different, it was a gold mine. I also found a small sneaker the next day just a block from Rachie’s house. It must have just “arrived” as it was not there that morning. I would like to ask everyone out there to send some positive energy northward to my brother-in-law who is struggling with life’s obstacles and pitfalls, may he overcome and find a happy existence. The family has being going through alot at this time but I am not going to elaborate out of respect for their privacy. Well another birthday has come and gone for me. I am 37 now and that seems like a number that should not be associated with me in my mind because I still feel in my 20’s. Wait until it says 57, I can only hope I still feel in my 30’s. I got a great gift from Sharon and Rachie. It was basket full of my favorite things, expensive import beers, dark chocolates, hot sauces and more! Thanks to all that helped make my birthday fun! Got to visit two dog parks in one day. The Bonito Beach Dog Park by Fort Myers and the Cape Coral Dog Park. Neither seemed to suit us. The beach park was pretty nice as far as location but there were too many big dogs, pit bulls, rotties and such. Ones that traditionally do not get along with smaller dogs. And the people were not friendly at all, it just had a bad “vibe”. Eventually a bulldog and black lab ran us off because they were getting aggressive with their humping on Jack and Jack was looking at them scrooked, which is his signal for getting ready to attack. The cape coral park went a little better, it was a well kept park, big and small dog sections, a wooded area and an open area for play. But the “vibe” there was not good either, all of the same types of dogs. Something about unfixed, unsupervised pit bulls that makes me nervous 🙂 Anyway, we did learn that we like Venice Beach Park alot better and will just stick to going there. But the day was not all lost as we did find a shoe on the road back. Here is a tip: Be careful what lies you tell in a pub, because you never know who might hear you. For instance I was at the Celtic Ray and this dressed in a brown leather bombers jacket with the collar turned up (straight from the 80’s) was saddled at the bar next to a cute young lady talking her ear off. I heard bits and pieces, like he was being presented an award from the US Senate, was in the movie Dave, yadda yadda yadda right? It was not until he mentioned he played a college sports at Boston College, well this is where I had to call bullshit. I turned to him and asked “I could not help but hear you played a sport at Boston College, what sport did you play?” “Hockey” he said. Okay this is going to be fun. “When did you play there?” I inquired. “Around 91 or 92” he replied. I then asked “What position?” “Goalie” he said proudly. “Wow, my friend Scott LaGrand played goalie at B.C. 1989 to 1992, were you his backup? Although didn’t you say you started?” (I became friend’s with Scott and his wife in Pensacola and he was the exact same age as I am so i knew when he went to college because of that) His face lost some color and his posture sunk a little. The stare from the girl he had been feeding bullshit to in order to impress her was all ears, looking for his answer. He continued to try and say he played after Scott left school in 1993. “You mean you forgot what years you played college hockey?” He stumbled and mumbled a lot until I finally let him off the hook and went back outside with Sharon and Rachie. Guess he did not get lucky that night 🙂 Of course later that night I had to go check online the rosters for the B.C. hockey teams and sure enough he was nowhere on them anywhere. What a freaking tool, but he was entertaining. Back to the subject of brewpubs 🙂 we went to get a brew at Steamers Crab and Ale House. They had a great selection of drafts, 24 in fact, but none were home brewed. We had a nice Downtown Brown, it was more like a stout. They bartender was very knowledgeable about beer and very nice. Overall good experience. A new restaurant in Downtown Punta Gorda, Zen, was the choice for our 1 year anniversary dinner. Really good food, we give it two thumbs up. And staying on the subject of food we had a great night of dining at the Peruvian restaurant in Punta Gorda. The Ceviche was delicious and the entree as well. The salad dressing was downright addictive! Well since we are Gypsies sort of, we always are looking for side jobs to make a little cash. We were asked to bar tend and hostess a christmas party in PGI. It was a great time actually, we met so many nice people and the couple hosting the party were good people, Gene and Sharon, thanks for a nice time AND paying us for it 🙂 I have to admit Sharon and I made a great team. I also made a lot of great contacts to help me further my photography and design business here in Charlotte County. Speaking of photography we participated in the Gallery Walk in Downtown Punta Gorda again. It went much better than the last one, we sold several photos and had fun doing it, we will for sure do it again next month! On a quick note I caught my first snook aboard Scooter’s custom 21’ center console boat he built by himself. To see this amazing performance boat go to the Tribal Boatworks website, http://www.tribalboatworks.com , it was so fitting that I would catch it on his boat. Thanks for the trollin’ trip Scoot!

On the trip from Hudson we passed 4 shoes on the road, one being a glittery high heel. Upon pulling up to our site (Thousand Trails, Orlando) they assigned us we nixed it pretty quick and played musical sites for a bit until finally settling into a site which later we found out was sewer free :(
Sometimes you just cannot win. Good thing we have our sewer caddy. We had one neighbor that was near us. They were a really great couple, in the mid 50s, so pretty young as RVers go. They really took a liking to Jack and Jinjer, she would eventually become known as Aunt Margaret 🙂 They invited us over for thanksgiving but unfortunately we had to shoot photos at the pageant that day. We were able to sit with them for a bit the next day and eat leftovers. She made a tasty casserole that Jack and Jinny also got to get a bit of. We would like to thank them for their hospitality and wish them safe travels and hope we can meet again. And now to the opposite end of the personality spectrum. While walking out dogs around the park Sharon and I wondered through the long term section. We had previously met a couple with a beagle in Virginia and we knew they stayed in the long term at Thousand trails so we set out to find them. Well we found their site and checked to see if they were there, meanwhile our dogs walk onto the guy next doors lawn. And I guess that was holy grass or something because he had the nerve to come out and stare at me and watch us walk by. I asked “Can I help you with something?” he turned saying nothing and went back into his coach. I had a few more things to say about his “precious grass” and stood staring back at his coach, hoping he would have the guts to come back out. I am amazed at the audacity of some old people at the parks. I guess that is all he has left to live for in his life. I suppose when he gets in front of God someday, that his immaculate patch of grass will be his key to heaven. Oh well, his grumpy old ass will be off this earth soon enough. Never stops to stun me how some people actually think they own parts of this earth just because a piece of paper says they do. Not much has really happened that week to write about. We worked the pageant every day, all day. Things went smooth except for the last photoshoot in which an old bitchy woman who runs the pageant stood in on the shoot and barked orders at me as I tried to get the girls posed and such. I just about walked out. She is just half of the sister team that runs the pageants, and she is supposed to be the nice one 🙂 The other one is a real piece of work! We did however in between working visit the Winter Garden dog park, met another Puggle there and they played together as puggles do. We also ate that evening at the Big River Brewing company at Disney’s Boardwalk. The food was average, small menu choices. The beer selection was only 5 brews. The red ale was not to my liking, but the Brown Ale was quite good. We look forward to going back to the Boardwalk as it looked like a cool place to wander around. Did manage to add 3 shoes to the diary. Loaded and off to Punta Gorda/Port Charlotte.

Well we arrived at the Suncoast RV park in Hudson Florida around 2:30 p.m. with no problems and we are grateful for the good travel Karma. But I may have ruined the good karma when upon checking in I asked to use the restroom, and what do I get when I ask the older gentleman working there… “Are you staying here because the restrooms are for campers only”. My answer was “If I were over 55 would you be asking me that question? For your information I am checking in but just wanted to visit the restroom first” The lady at the desk proceeded to be nice to me and directed me to the restrooms and then we checked in. ”Carnies. Circus folk. Nomads, you know. Smell like cabbage. Small Hands.” — Austin Powers . Well we had to get setup at the “arts” festival by 5:00 p.m. so we were in a bit of a rush. Upon pulling into the flea market parking lot and seeing the carnival behind it we got a bad feeling. And it only got worse as we saw some of the other vendors merchandise. It was pretty much all flea market crap. I was one of two actual artists there. We were fortunate to have a very nice neighbor, one of the other few vendors that were selling products they hand-crafted. Her name was Beth, she was from Canada originally and was currently residing in Florida for a spell. She knew all the festival ins and outs and helped us out quite a bit. She was an outspoken woman with a fading Canadian accent, very no-nonsense personality and not afraid to drop a few “F” bombs every now and then. She spoke her mind and her biggest pet peeve is vendors that cheat. Cheating is when vendors try to pass off products that they bought from a wholesaler as their own hand-crafted work. Which happens to be what the person behind us was doing. The vendor I am referring to was selling Iguana Statues that wrap around a wooden post, wooden frog statues that croak when stroked with a stick, and other various trinkets. He was pretty creepy. He just stood around with his fanny pack stroking his wooden frog, trying to draw attention to himself and products. I got sooo sick of hearing those stupid frogs!! What was even better was hearing his story of how he created the frogs on a computer program that sends the 3-D image to a laser cutter to carve the frog where he finishes them by drilling a hole for the stick and staining them. WHAT A LOAD OF CRAP! I’ll tell you why I know it was bullshit in a second but first here is another load of crap I heard about the Iguanas. “When I traveled to the Galapagos Islands while in college studying marine biology I was so inspired by the iguanas I started figuring out ways to carve them. On one trip to Mexico I saw an old man creating lizard sculptures using paper machete and glue mixed with sawdust and just cannot stop creating iguanas, I guess I am obsessed *followed by the creepiest chuckle we have ever heard*” Can you believe he actually said that load of total BS!?!? Upon hearing that, Beth went into action. She too has an aircard in her laptop and starting searching wholesalers and in less than a minute she found all of his products. They WERE hand-crafted…in THAILAND! Somehow she managed to hold her tongue after throwing a few cursing insults under her breath. I however let things eat at me and eventually have to say something. But I did not go the direct route instead I had more fun. I wanted to see him squirm. To keep the story short I kept coming back over to him through out the day asking him specific question about his creation process. At first he tried to answer with vague answers but I pinned in in many times, such as “So how much glue do you mix with the sawdust and how long does it take to dry? Is it like Elmer’s glue or a specialty glue? Does it stick to your skin? How much do you go through when you make an iguana? Does it smell bad, is it toxic? Do you where a ventilator? And I just kept going on, I would have made Columbo proud :) We did no sales on Friday night and very few on Saturday so we decided to bug out and not setup Sunday, instead we could take out time getting to Orlando and setting up. We did meet a few people in the RV resort. Sharon came across another young RV couple traveling fulltime. Mike and Lisa. They were alot like us. They too hate the crap the manufacturers stick in motorhomes. They are currently reflooring their coach with wood laminate to add to the many other modifications already completed such as taking out the passenger seat for alot more room. They had a great little Pug whom Jinny and Jack loved to play with. We wish them safe travels and maybe we will cross paths with them again sometime and go out for a beer. Some final notes. We did find great Sushi at Kozu’s in Hudson and the Buccaneer roll was fantastic! I almost got ran over taking a photo of a shoe to add to the diaries, but made for a cool shot of the blurred pink escort flying by me :) Off to the land of make believe, Disney!

View St Augustine Photo Gallery>>
We arrived to St Augustine without incidence, which is ALWAYS good 🙂 We stayed at Beachcomber RV resort on Velano Beach, a nice park because of its location but the roads through the park are rutted and potholed. The place could use some TLC but it is right across from a great beach. Which is awesome because…. it allows dogs!! Well we really took advantage of taking the dogs to the beach, we walk about 3 miles every morning up and down, it has been gorgeous days! I wish i were not so swamped with work I really wanted to get out and enjoy more. I did get out to fish a couple days, catching a pompano each time. We met some of Sharon’s family, ones Sharon has not seen for ten years or so. I know it seems to be a re-occuring theme lately. We met Aunt Shirley, her daughter Brandy and her daughter Christina. Along with Brandy’s husband Steve. The first night we just met Shirley and briefly Christina at Shirley’s house. I want to thank Shirley for her hospitality she whipped up homemade corn muffins, and leftover chili with a side of real mac and cheese in a matter of minutes! The chili was what I call “craveable” I could have kept eating and eating. The next night we went to dinner with Shirley, Brandy, Steve and another couple they were friends with. Started out we were going to eat at the AleWerks brewpub, but the brewery is closed for upgrades, then it was the Sunset Grill, but they were closed for two weeks, the next choice was Gypsy Cab Company which turned out to be a great choice. We had a nice time, everyone was so nice and interesting. Seemed I could have talked to everyone there for hours. The coconut crusted tofu Sharon got was awesome and we picked up a bottle of their house dressing, the Gypsy Dressing :) We finally managed to get to a dog park, something it feels we have not been able to get to in a few weeks. The park was in Treaty Park, St Augustine. A nice park, good size, two areas for different size dogs, water fountains and plenty of seating. At first no dogs were there so we hiked the boardwalk and trails for a bit, but come 5 o’clock, dogs came out of the woodwork. Jack and Jinjer played with the big dogs for a bit until another little puggle showed up, Sophie. She was cut puggle, one year old but 20 lbs lighter than Big Jack 🙂 She was very energetic, a little unfocused but sweet, our puggles fell in love with her instantly. They ran and ran, and Jinny showed how she runs like the wind. I thought at first looking at Sophie she would outrun Jinny, but Jinny kept up stride for stride and where Sophie would slip taking a corner, Jinny hugged it like a porsche. She was so much stronger. Although in the long run Sophie may have more endurance because she is the same height as Jinny, just 10 lbs lighter. On the way home from shopping for frames for the HudsonSeaFest we found a Thai restaurant on the edge of Jacksonville. Thai Palace had great food, we have added it to the lists. The peanut sauce we believe had cinnamon added to it, and the yellow curry was the bomb! The prices were great, atmosphere and service were top-notch. We highly recommend it.

We wanted to see some friends in Destin so we agreed to make a stopover in Holt, Florida. What we found was a little southern charm hidden just a mile from I-10. The Eagle’s Landing RV Park was a nice surprise, level sites, great grass, and very clean wih full hookups. And the owner was a very friendly face who made us feel welcome right away. We asked where we could get lunch at and they pointed us to “downtown” Holt. It was really a very small “blink and you’ll miss it” town. “Downtown” was comprised of a gas station, small grocery and a restaurant called Cozy Corner Grill. So as having no choice and always up for something different we pulled into the restaurant. There were a couple of young girls working that were so nice with very cute, small-town personalities. Almost innocent. But probably not since there is not much to do in a small town right? The owner was hanging around joking with staff. A heavy-set cook (kinda like Jack) was manning the kitchen, which was a good sign because you know what they say about a skinny cook. When I ordered the blackened grouper I knew it was going to be done right because the cook asked me if I wanted it on the grill or in an iron skillet with a little olive oil. That is just the way I love fish cooked! Then he asked if it was okay if he used garlic salt on Sharon’s grilled shrimp to give it some zing. Now this was service. Our meals were so good! The experience brightened our day so much and now we cannot wait to get back to Holt and the Cozy Corner Grill sometime so we can enjoy some yummy banana pancakes (that all the staff touted as being awesome) for breakfast :) The next day Sharon got to shop with Alice. I went to play volleyball at the boardwalk in Fort Walton Beach. I played alot better this day than I have been playing recently. I played with Lab and we won 4 games before I practically fell down from exhaustion. The day was sunny and low 80’s with no wind, perrrfect. I additionally managed to stumble across two shoes for the diaries as well. That night we took Alice and Wayne to dinner at Elephant Thai. Seemed I got the best dish because Alice and Sharon kept stealing bites from my plate 🙂 We went back to their house, played some Rummycub and just had a nice time hanging out. That next morning we headed out to St. Augustine.

After Styx River we shuffled back across the highway to Wilderness RV for a few days, encountering the RVers ritual known as a Rally. It was a Samboree for Mobile Alabama RVers. They looked like they were having a blast visiting each other, and they were extremely nice and friendly, made for a nice atmosphere. And we met some other young travelers, Ralph and Nan. They were a very friendly couple that after talking to them for just a few minutes Sharon and I connected with them because they were alot like us. Young, free spirited, in-shape and outdoors oriented people as well as dog lovers (They had a great looking Dalmation named Panda whom I am sure Jack And Jinny would love to have as a friend.) They gave us great info on places to visit in Texas, we gave them info on Florida, we exchanged contact info and hope to find them again out on the road where we can share more stories. They seem to have some great ones tucked in their log books I bet.

Well we “shuffled” back over to Styx River RV Resort. It is getting chilly up here, in the 40s last night, time to get going south soon! Well I am really upset at the media, specifically the Pensacola News Journal. I heard a rumor that a good friend of mine (one who will remain anonymous) in Pensacola was arrested and there was a write up about it in the paper. So i went online to check the archives to read it. When I found it I was shocked!! The newspaper had the facts so wrong. How can a newspaper print so many false statements. Dont they investigate?!?! I mean they did not even get his age right! Anyway, eliminating the details, he was the one that was attacked and defended himself by rendering the man unconscious. What is a man who is in fear for his life to do? Stop and ask the man if he is done trying to kill him? No he does what he has to do! So why is he the one charged! And to read the feedback the readers put on the New Journal website were so appauling. Especially knowing what a great husband, father and person he is. This is a man who has a sparkling clean record. He is a professional career man that adds so much positive energy to our community. To everyone that knows him, which is quite alot of people, he is considered one of “The Good Guys.” I wish I could get into specifics but at this time it would not be right. It will all come out in the end and the community probably will never know the truth, because how would that help to sell newspapers?!?! Be very careful, just because the media reports something, does not make it true. Sharon and I respect he and his wife so much, they are showing a lot of class in the way they are reacting to this, but I would not have expected anything less from such class people. And if they are reading this, we look forward to visiting you when you get set up in your new place. The Beaches to Woodlands final weekend of events took place and we got some pretty nice shots to add to their collection. We visited the Navarre Beach Bash, toured historic Bagdad and went on the Milton Ghost Walk tour. Wish I would have had time to listen more about the stories but I was busy capturing shots (sorry no eerie lights or apparitions caught on film :( Went to play some volleyball with friends, felt so good to be back on the beach playing. It was a dream day, zero wind, 80º, no humidity and the bluest skies you can imagine. I played pretty well, and had a great time with my Pcola buddies. And I also got another photo of a shoe for the diaries. Got to take the “kids” to a dog park for the first time in a bit, we went to the Roger Scott Park and had a great time, the park itself is nothing great, but it does have small and big dog sections with a water fountain for them. Met some really nice people and a 6 mo. old Pug named Peanut. They all ran for quite some time and then it was time to head out. It is really getting nice out, had the chance to play some ball on the beach with my friends, it felt so good to play no matter how out of practice I am. Quotes of the day: “Jimmy jumps high”. And this one came up when we saw an “interesting” friend of ours coming down the beach with a girl: “I guess even a nut finds a blind squirrel every now and then”. Being stuck out here in Styx River Alabama without a car can really limit my options for getting food. My only option is to get on my bike and ride a mile and a half to the truck stop with a restaurant at the highway exit ramp. It is a fairly large truck stop, the type which has a complete truck and accessory store, a fast food (fried chicken) restaurant and a full-service restaurant. I opted for the full-service. I decided to sit at the bar section since I was alone. And I could see my bike out the window from here to keep it from being stolen since I had forgotten my lock. It, the Oasis Cafe as it is named, had the typical truck-stop crowd. Slightly large men with tattooed arms, a little old couple taking a break from their RV, a couple of migrant workers with their supervisor, a few older gentlemen with camo hats on, and of course a very hungry, young good-looking artist guy (that would be me of course :). But what i never realized before now is that there are regulars that come into a truck-stop restaurant. One was so regular, to the point where the servers all know his birthday was coming up and invite his family to come eat on thursday for free. Thursdays are prime rib nights and I heard they sell out of prime rib almost every time so get there early. I was half tempted to go see this event in person. I had a typical meal for a place like this, a philly cheese steak with crinkle fries, good stuff! My waitress, yes they still call them waitresses down here, was in her late 40’s or so, and looked like she has worked hard over her life to survive. She was everything you want in a waitress though, no frills, she was courteous, efficient, and knowledgeable. She seemed to know everyone and everyone seemed to know her. Quite a nice little restaurant that Oasis Cafe turned out to be. As I waited in line to pay, the waitress ringing up the fellow in front of me was taking some grief from him about the amount. He was acting like an ass. When she looked at me all she said as she shrugged her shoulders “He was a yankee what do you expect?” I always chuckle when the people down south still call people from the north yankees. I payed my bill, biked back to the coach and began working again. NOTE: Saw an Island off of Africa called Mauritius on the TV show amazing race, I looked it up on Wikipedia and it seems like we need to add it to our must visit list. Since I have this platform I feel like I must vent something. Nothing erks me more than when people are elitists, and nowhere is it more apparent than in RV parks due to the mix of $5,000 RVs and $1.5 million dollar RVs and everywhere in between. Well our first strike against us is our young age. Most RVers are older adults (60+), it is a fact that no one can argue. The second is that we have a coach that is over 5 years old. Well yesterday a really nice coach ($200,000+) pulled into the site next to us, they have been there for over a day now and have yet to say a word to us. Twice we have made eye contact outside and I said hello, he blatently ignored us. Giving him the benefit of the doubt the first time we tried again, and again he ignored us. So now I am on a mission to get him to acknowledge us. As he was outside bucket-washing his car, (which I believe many old people have become slaves to their coaches and vehicles and they demand to be washed twice a week. Some kind of Jedi mind trick the vehicles use, but I digress 🙂 so anyway I walked right up to him and said hello, nothing at first, then I got him to speak by asking him a direct question. “how long you here for?”. All I got was “not long”. And as he walked away, I gave him a “That’s good” and he was gone inside in a flash. What is wrong with people, I do not want to be his best friend or anything, just say hello for god’s sake, “we are living in a society!” But when I speak about people like this, remember there might be 10 others in the park that are VERY nice and that is something I have to learn, only I have control over whether or not someone like him can make me have a bad day. 5 days later and still the neighbors have yet to speak with anyone here in the park. Why travel in a motorhome and live like hermits? Well time to shuffle again 🙂

We had to move out of Styx River RV Resort because we stayed our 2 week maximum. And we just headed across Highway 10 to Wilderness RV, another RPI park where we can stay for $8 per night, even had wireless internet, SCORE! The park itself is… well…not aesthetically pleasing, but like I said it worked out budget-wise and functionality-wise. Sharon and Rachel continue to do bridge-building with their “new” family. It has been tough at times, and joyful at times, but overall very exciting and positive. I cannot wait to meet them, as Sharon has already brought into my life some wonderful people and look forward to having more. You can never have too many friends and family! On a note, we have Hurricane Katrina families on both sides of us in FEMA trailers, which we can spot right away because of various similar characteristics. It is sad when you get accustomed to seeing the FEMA trailers. Sometimes arranged as small communities with over 100 trailers lined up in a large parking lot. They try to make it livable, they add playground equipment and such, but I hear it is not a great place to be, basically in limbo between places to call home. It is hard to stop the tailspin when you become homeless overnight. Good luck to all that know that feeling. It is a horribly humbling feeling. We started trying to promote our site and find other young RVers by subscribing to various dogpark, brewpub and RV forums. The brewpub forums seemed to be the most friendly, maybe people who drink beer make nicer people 🙂 And in the RV forums it became hostile at times and really cool at other times. We did find a few couples like us, full timing, living on the road. One thread at a particular RV forum proved to be quite comical as we apparently yanked a few older RVers chains. It went a little like this (click here to read transcript and comments) Art night at Cocodries went well, we made enough money to at least enjoy the weekend. Sold a Signature Series Image of the Dolphin jumping, No.3 in the series. Well we had to go photograph some festivals and such in Santa Rosa County. And being stubborn when i went to a gas station the gas was 2.39 @ gallon and right now we can get it for 1.98 @ gallon in other places. But since I needed gas, I had no choice, but I only put in $5 worth and would get more when I saw a better price, or at least that was my intention. Time went by, we drove place to place taking shots, and then when we were finished headed to a friends to have dinner with them. As we were just about to crest over the bridge to Ft Walton, the Jeep started to sputter and stalled out, out of gas that IS! So we spotted a gas station at the bottom of the bridge. We picked up momentum on our way down, if we do not have to stop we may be able to make it all the way to the pump. But we had to turn right and there was a lot of traffic. Luck was on our side as i braked without power brakes and steered through obstacles and other drivers, coming to a slow stop right next to the pump. Just like I planned it, I meant to do that. I have done that before but this was the first time with another person in the car with me. We would like to give special thanks to Alice and Wayne who treated us to dinner at Bitburger, a great German restaurant. We got to see and enjoy company with Frank his son Scott, Wayne, Alice their son Keith and girlfriend Kristina, Greg and Song. We had really fun time. We continued to stay the next day for breakfast; waffles, eggs and bacon. And then for dinner; quesadillas and burritos. They finally “kicked” us out around 6:00. Thanks again for all the hospitality! We also saw photographed two more shoes for the diaries. One was gym shoe in the middle of highway 98 with a pornographic DVD lying next to it “Big, Natural and Bound 2”. The other shoe was actually a large rain boot torn in half from wear and tear. For the fun of it we weighed Jack who is now officially “jacknormous” at 36 lbs! Maybe we need to cut back his food a bit 🙂

We made it to Alabama, just outside Pensacola, without incidence. Spent a night in the parking lot of the Flying J truck stop and got in early the next day. Nice to have gas prices back to reasonable again! We will be at the Styx River RV Resort for two weeks. Spent the weekend on Pensacola Beach and had a nice relaxing time. Visited all of our favorites spots and people. Shane made us a special sushi roll using wasabi oil that was spicy and delicious. We puppy sat a friend’s new puppy, Miss Olympia, a very cute 10 week old american bulldog. Other than geting the pecking order established with her, Jack and Jinjer had a great time running with her on the beach. I started compiling photos for my new photo essay I have been wanting to do for a long time now, the One Shoe Diaries. Check it out. It will be a great and fun project to do. Finished another underwater dolphin painting. It is a much larger one this time. I hope I can sell it at the Navarre Art Festival this weekend. Painted yet another underwater dolphin painting, the best one yet. I started on my “Gulf from Overhead” hyper-realistic painting, kinda hard to shift gears from quick oil painting to slow detailed acrylic painting. The Navarre show went pretty well. Met some nice people who created chimes, charms and mmore with fused glass. I did not sell my large dolphin painting but it garnered a ton of attention. We sold the usual treefrog, dragonfly and sunsets. The collage we did of the tree frog sold immediately! And the small collage eventually sold also. Here is a great example of the power of the internet. Most people have heard of the website, MySpace. For those who have not it is a place where people can display a profile of themselves for others to look at, it is a great way to track down or keep up with friends, even make new ones. I guess even find “romance” 🙂 So anyway, Sharon has had a profile on MySpace for a couple of months now. Periodically she has found old friends from high school and such, well this week she located someone much more dear to her. Her half-sister whom she has never met! Let me start with some background. When Sharon and Rachel were little girls, ages 1 and 3, their father left their mother. The reasons of why and the circumstances surrounding it I am not going to get into. They randomly saw or heard from him for a few years then all contact was lost. The last time she heard anything involving him was around 1998 when he attempted to contact Sharon through her Nanny. And Nanny did not get a phone number for her to call him back, and Sharon never heard from him again. Now it is 8 years later and through a small miracle Sharon has been able to contact her lost sister over the internet, Elise. When she realized she did in fact locate her sister, she immediately burst into tears. She looked over every inch of Elise’s profile, wanting to know all she could learn about her and the other siblings, Doug and Leslie. Finally she sent a message to her, just hoping Elise would respond positively. That day passed and Sharon did not receive anything back. It was not until that next morning when she logged on to MySpace to find a message from Elise. A very warm and inviting message. Elise too had thought about Sharon and Rachel and always wanted to get to know them and build a relationship. This was the best news Sharon could have asked for. She was going to get to have a relationship with the siblings she always thought about. The email went on to give information about her and her siblings lives. Sharon soaked it all in. That night Elise called and Sharon for the first time spoke to one of her sisters she has never known. It was an amazing moment for her, and eventually for Rachie as well as Elise called her as well. A new family has started to grow. As of yet they have only spoke with Elise but they are all invited down to Rachie and Donnie’s wedding in December and we are all hoping they can make it. As for their father, Sharon did learn from Elise that he became totally blind and suffered with many health problems, eventually succumbing to heart complications in 1998, the same year that was the last time he last tried to contact her. I am sure somewhere he is smiling now, knowing all his children will get to know each other.

Well we arrived at Forest Lake, a Thousand Trails Park in Lexington, North Carolina. I would love to say we arrived without incidence, but on the way we had to stop at a rest area and take the passenger side front wheel off, regrease the bearing, take off the pads and caliper and fish out some parts from the melted ABS sensor that created a huge grinding noise all of a sudden. Well we are getting good at this stuff because we pulled off and did all that and got back rolling in less than 15 minutes! Looks like we hit this town at just the right time. The Childress Winery we saw when we came in was celebrating its harvest with a festival! So we had to go. The winery was gorgeous! Rolling hills with grape vines blanketing it. Although storm clouds were brewing it was a great evening. Still warm at least 🙂 I am glad we arrived early as the line for getting into the buffet grew quickly to an impressive size. We found ourselves in line next to a very nice couple from Winston-Salem whom offered us to share a table with. There too were quite the travelers, except more worldwide doing cruises in Europe, Asia, etc. We had a great time eating, drinking good wine and exchanging tales of travel. After dinner we moved outdoors but the storms that were brewing were now dumping copious amounts of rain, and the wind was downright cold! But the excellent house sangria helped warm our insides. After that we had a couple set down a half bottle of wine for us since they were heading home. What a nice crowd. Unfortunately we already had enough to drink so we passed the gift on to someone else. Time to head home, but first I had to reactivated my shoplifting skills so that we could smuggle out the logo imprinted wine glasses we have been drinking from. I needed something to smuggle them out in…how about the little shopping bags they give out in the gift shop? But I would need to buy something cheap to get a bag. And of course I picked the dark chocolate shaped like a bunch of grapes. A $1.49, perfect. Then back at our table I used a few slight of hand tricks and…voila, the glasses were in the bag and operation glass extraction was half way finished. The walk out the door was a piece of cake, noone knew and were we home free. But where is the Jeep? perhaps the 16 foot kayak perched atop of it might make it stand out in the lot just a tad :) [Note: Warsteiner Premuim Dunkel gets a 8 on the beer scale] On sunday we went out to find the Dog Park at Country Park in Greensboro. It was a slight adventure finding it but it was worth it. The park itself was large and beautiful with a great lake to walk around. There were dogs everywhere, also in abundance was Jack and Jinjer’s favorites snack, Goose Shit. The dog park proved a little tricky to find in the park as there were no signs directing you. We did find it and it was quite large with both wooded and grassy. There was no little and big dog section, they were all in one area today. We meet a nice couple with two bulldogs, Beemis and Peaches. They gave us a nice lead on a good Thai restaurant in the area so after the dogs played for some time it was time to go search out the restaurant. The restaurant, Rearn Thai, was great! The building was classy, it had nice flowers and plants around the outside with tables intermixed. The building had large glass windows, prob 15’ high overlooking the gardens. The food was really good [I had red curry of course, Sharon had pranang curry], it makes the list for sure. The server was so sweet, and our thoughts are with her, as she just lost her father whom she was very close to 🙁 She was actually from the Eastern Shore of Maryland, such a small world. And extra points go to this place as they had Newcastle :) Its amazing the contrast between people in regards to what they find is important to them. It becomes more apparent in older individuals I believe because they have started on their paths a long time ago and are well into being who they are. Take this comparison for instance. While at the Forest Lake I ran into an the older gentlemen who sold me my sewer caddy for a great deal. And now after recognizing me as soon as he saw me, he told me he had something for me. I waited there as he rummaged through several of his rubbermaid bins in his hatches until he finally found what he was looking for, some sort of metal tubing item. When he got back to me and handed it to me. “Here is the attachment for the sewer caddy to hook it to your trailer hitch so you do not have to haul that heavy thing by hand. I saw it the other day and realized I forgot to give it to you in Cincinnati” he stated. “Well thanks a bunch,” I replied. Here is someone who could have not even bothered and just threw it away some time ago. But instead he held on to it, hoping he would run into me again and give it to me because it was bugging him that he may have shorted me of it. He and his wife were so nice to us, he was a soft spoken guy, but talked my ear off once he got going. But I did not mind at all as he had many interesting stories and great RV’ing tips. Kinda reminded me of my father. Now the other side of human personality traits. In the same park, just a few lots down a man spent almost every day either washing his coach or his car. Now I am sure a lot of people would think “what is wrong with that?”. Well nothing, I just have too many other things I want to do with my life, but hey, to each his own huh? But this guy goes a little too far. He actually hoses down the gravel road that goes by his lot so that dust with not kick up and get on his coach. Again, not too bad, if he wants to waste his life worrying about such stuff let him right? It is just himself he is hurting. Where he goes to far is that he argues and runs off the elderly couple in the space next to him. All because they are getting ready to have an RV wash service pressure wash their coach for them. And he does not want any spray to land on his nice clean coach. ARE YOU KIDDING ME!?!?! He is going to have this little old couple pack up everything, and move to a new space just so he does not get some water spots on his precious coach?!?! This is when I realize that some people are way too wrapped up in their own little meaningless existences. There are so many other things to worry about, I mean come ON!!!! What total polar opposites. I do have to say, for the most part we have found more people lean toward the nice, courteous spectrum of human ethics, but not by much unfortunately :( I digress…time to finally head south.