Grocery Store Outing
Posted on June 17th, 2008 by Chris.
Filed under: Absurd, Florida Living, Friends, Rant, Weird Nights Out, Youtube.
The wife’s pregnant, and she needs milk for breakfast in the morning. We’re out of milk. It’s 9:30, Sweetbay’s not closed yet. I’m off.
The first thing I head for’s the milk, because I know where it is. I rarely shop in this grocery store. I’m usually at the dirt Publix three blocks from the house because it’s closer. But, they’re closed by 9 and Sweetbay’s open, so I’m in a strange grocery store with a mission to find some nonstandard items.
On my way to the milk, I see Edy’s Grand ice cream is on crazy sale, two for seven bucks. Lunatic flavors, too… Coconut Pineapple? Cherry Chocolate Chip, red velvet style? Shit. (more…)
Divebombers at Dusk
Posted on May 1st, 2008 by Chris.
Filed under: Animated, Chris' Stuff, Florida Living.
Photo used without permission from Birder’s World Magazine - hope they’re cool with it
It’s dusk in my backyard and I’m meandering around with my dog Oyster. Hotdog, our old-man Maine Coone cat, lounges in the neighbor’s yard, twitching and flipping his tail contentedly. It’s a lovely Spring evening.
Out of nowhere, a smallish, feathery silhouette flutters near my cat’s head and zooms back to the telephone wire hanging above. At first, I think it’s a bat, but realize it’s too big for a bat. It is the bat time of evening, and I look skywards and see a few actual bats careening around the evening sky and realize that whatever is swooping down near Hotdog is too big to be a bat.
It’s a Burrowing Owl (Athene cunicularia), a tiny little raptor that lives in mazes of underground tunnels, usually in open fields. In Southwest Florida they’re very common, though I’d never seen them before.
This little owl is attempting to snatch, and presumably haul away for a tasty snack, my 16 pound male cat, Hotdog. He’s unfazed, and appears to not even notice the terrifying brushes with death he keeps enduring. The owl swoops near him again and again, returning to his perch on the wire, sometimes on the shed, where I get a halfway-decent look at him. They’re very pretty.
Then…. THREE MORE of them show up, all on the wire overhead. By now, my wife’s outside with me, marvelling and laughing at the fact that these tiny little birds are attempting to murder our cat, when all of a sudden, they start divebombing us! Coming within inches of our heads, we duck and cover as they assail us from above. Hands-down this is one of the funniest and most amusing thing I’ve seen in ages. We’re okay, and nobody’s injured. In fact, Hotdog’s back inside now and probably doesn’t even know how close he came to being carried away and pecked to death.
Disc Golfing in Sarasota - Lakeview Park
Posted on April 19th, 2008 by Chris.
Filed under: Chris' Stuff, Florida Living, Friends, Sports.
After my disc golf passion was resurrected last week at Wanee, I did what I should’ve done years ago - google around to find out if there’s a course in my area. After a swift smack to the forehead, seeing the results indicating not one, not two, but THREE courses in my area, I make plans to get out there. I left my discs with John in Gainesville. Damn.
An enthusiastic phone call to a friend later, I’m in Play it Again, buying “factory second” discs at $10 apiece. Then, I’m driving through parts of Sarasota I didn’ t know existed, winding through a residential neighborhood until coming upon Lakeview Park, with its 18 hole disc golf course.
I am intimately familiar with the Gainesville course on 34th Street but few others (I’d played Lake Wauburg in Gainesville, and of course Spirit of Suwanee’s Grateful Dead course last weekend). The excitement of a new course, this close to home, was almost unbearable.
Unfortunately there wasn’t a map of the holes, and we ended up meandering like tourists through 18 holes of challenging, at-times-heavily wooded, swampy dream for any disc golfer. We never found holes 11 or 12.
The course is fun, with creative pin placement and lots of water. The park had restrooms, water fountains, a fenced-in dog park, and picnic tables. Nice.
This whole thing’s got momentum. I’ll be playing the North Watertower Park course tomorrow morning, which is apparently either on-par with (no pun intended) or even better than the Lakeview course. I’m learning all of this from the Sarasota Sky Pilots web page. Yep, a full fledged disc golf community, which I’ll duly be looking into. Tuesday and Thursday night handicaps? Count me in!
Disc Golfing at Wanee
Posted on April 16th, 2008 by Chris.
Filed under: Florida Living, Friends, Sports, Youtube.
Disc Golfing at Wanee 2008
06:26
After many years, I heard from an old buddy of mine, John. On short notice, I found myself at the Spirit of Suwanee music park fo After many years, I heard from an old buddy of mine, John. On short notice, I found myself at the Spirit of Suwanee music park for the Wanee Fest, featuring some unbelievable music and a perfect chance to catch up with an old friend.
They had a DISC GOLF course at the park (among other things) that John and I and his fiance Tracy took the opportunity to play. We both scored well, considering we’d never played this very narrow, challenging course before. I also got bit on the ankle by something with fangs, but I survived and am doing okay. Thanks for asking.
If you’re unfamiliar with disc golf, don’t be surprised… it’s a hippie sport that most people haven’t heard of. It entails throwing specialized frisbees into chains. It scores just like golf, you play it where it lies, and copious amounts of inebriants are often involved, in our case, historically.
Background music - Sugar Magnolia, Grateful Dead, Europe ‘72
Southern Culture on the Skids at Skipper’s
Posted on February 28th, 2008 by Chris.
Filed under: Florida Living, Friends, Music, Weird Nights Out.
My first SCOTS show…. amazing! Skipper’s Smokehouse is an intimate little venue with a few bars, heated chiki-huts, and barnyard style seating for smallish shows, though I’m sure the place can pack up pretty well. Southern Culture on the Skids is an amazing band, and we got to chat briefly with them after the show. I LOVE small venues for reasons like this. The Demolition String Band was the opener, and they rocked pretty good, too!
Citrus Bowl - Florida Loses in Tight Match
Posted on January 2nd, 2008 by Chris.
Filed under: Chris' Stuff, Florida Living, Picture stories, Sports.
Well, it was our first Bowl Game experience. It wasn’t what we had hoped, unfortunately, and the reason only occurred to us after the fact, after we’d wondered what was missing. The game took place in Orlando — not Gainesville. Had we been in the Swamp, the game would’ve likely had more of its desired, characteristic craziness, that thing we’d been longing to experience. Overall, we had a good time, but next time it’ll be in the Swamp, with REALLY LOUD Gator fans.
Same sun, different day
Posted on December 18th, 2007 by Chris.
Filed under: Florida Living, Sunsets.
It never gets old.
Front Yard Sunset
Posted on December 17th, 2007 by Chris.
Filed under: Chris' Stuff, Florida Living, Picture stories.
Perfectly late picking up the mail from the box this evening, just in time to pause for a moment to enjoy a beautiful moment at dusk.
Honey, what’s for dinner?
Posted on October 1st, 2007 by Chris.
Filed under: Amazing Shit, Chris' Stuff, Florida Living, In the Wild.
As I wondered earlier what to have for dinner, I’m glad I didn’t ask THIS lady, who was hanging around in our carport after hours.
Bats
Posted on September 24th, 2007 by Chris.
Filed under: Chris' Stuff, Florida Living.
I let the dog out just now. It’s 7:45pm, and the sun has just dipped below the horizon. The sky is a shade of steeled blue, gradually fading from a soft powder, zigzagged with telephone wires strung from poles, up to a nighttime brand of grayishness. There’s been weather lately — the intense, wet kind. This cool, slightly breezy dusk has me standing in the backyard looking upwards, as usual.
I’d seen them before, the bats. Every once in a while I’d see something zip across the evening sky, and I thought it to be a bat. But I haven’t lived here all that long to know whether I’m seeing things or not. In Gainesville, there was an official “Bat House” run by UF on their campus to house several trillion bats that had heretofore been living inside the cavernous vaulted ceilings of the football cathedral, terrorizing the fans. I was expecting to see bats in Gainesville. Sarasota… I didn’t know.
But tonight (tonight, whoa-whoa ~Phil Collins) they are everywhere. Zigging and swooping and divebombing and careening and chirping their little sonar blips of “where’s the bug” as they come out for breakfast. Dozens of them. These little rubber birds (much like moths are dusty butterflies) that live somewhere else, who knows where, overlap my life in the briefest of fleeting moments. It’s this little window, when the light is right, that we cross paths. And it’s nice.