New House

We closed on our Wimauma house on Monday. We hosted an open house on Tuesday for the campers at the Masonic Campground. Shrimp, cheeses, and Carol Curry's vegetable tray were complimented by a good selection of Oak Hill Wine ($2.97 per bottle at Walmart). The pinot grigio was the taste test winner.

















The next day we put in a security system. I got a quote for a fancy aluminum one for $3600 but choose the do-it-yourself method and did it for $200.




















Last task was to get the yard shipshape. Mowed the weeds with a riding lawnmower we bought from the previous owners and moved a lot of Live Oak leaves with my new leaf blower - Oh the joys of home ownership.














Tomorrow we head North with one stop in South Carolina to see if we can finish fixing brother Walt's computer so we should be home late Sunday or early Monday. See you then.

Red Sox Game

I haven't posted a blog recently because we haven't done much for a week or so.

We went with the Curry's to a spring practice game where the Red Sox were visiting the Pittsburgh Pirates. Nice field and the Red Sox won.

I really haven't followed the Red Sox much lately but I think this was Ted Williams hitting a home run (or was it Carl Yastrzemski.)

The game is over and we have to decide on where to go for dinner. My suggestion is Hooters - for the free beer of course.

We went to the Fish House for the works - fish, scallops,

clams, fries and cold slaw.

St Patty's Day

These are pictures that Paul took at the St Patricks Day party at the Masonic Campground. Everybody wore some green.











Some people really went green.

















We had a delious corned beef and cabbage dinner.














This is my dessert plate - I've gained a few pounds.

Sunken Gardens

Carol Curry's sister came down to St Petersburg to get away from the snow and see their favorite team in spring training. Guess who is who.














We went with Paul and Carol to visit them. We met at the Sunken Gardens in St Petersburg.




Only a three acre garden but they pack a lot of stuff into it. Bird of Paradise in bloom














There we saw a Komoto Dragon eating a Boa Constrictor.














One problem on getting out to St Pete and back are the bridges

Cape Coral

We drove down to Cape Coral to see Ann and Wendell Snell. Last December they bought a beautiful house with a huge swimming pool in Cape Coral and have since moved down. The area where they bought has a small owl that digs a burrow in the ground to raise their young (hence they are called the Burrowing Owl). They have 200 of the 400 remaining nesting pairs of owls. Ann and Wendell watch as they hatch their eggs and raise their young.

They also took us out to Sanibel Island and we toured through the "Ding" Darling Wildlife Refuge. It is loaded with all kinds of birds a few choice ones are shown below.

New Pictures of Our House

We got some new pictures of the house we are buying. The first is a front view - we decided to name our new homestead "Ca d'Zan"

There is a drainage culvert in front of our lot but the bridge may be a little overdone - I don't know whether everyone will pay the $2 toll. (I hope I haven't got these photos mixed up with other ones I took of the Ringley Museum and the Sunshine Skyway Bridge).

Party, Party, Party

We had a family reunion in Florida - Jeannie and Paul came down for a weeks vacation to Sanibel Island, Sandra & Gary live on Holmes Beach, FL and we are in the Mansonic Campground in Wimauma, Fl. We all met at the Fisherman's Village in Punta Gorda.









We had a lot of laughs, shopped a little and had a good dinner.









During the cold months a lot of groups come down to winter in Florida. One of them is the Royal Lipizzan Stallions. They are originally from Austria where they were the war horses for the nobility. Now they make love instead of war and put on a great show which during the winter is free. They are located out in the middle of nowhere in Myakka City, FL.









On the way back from the Lipizzans, the Currys took us to Hungry Howies. Its a pizza buffet with a salad and soup bar for $5.99. The pizzas cover the gambit from regular to the unusual - chocolate (yeah, a pizza with melted chocalate on it), cherry and apple. I went back four times and could barely move by the time we left.