New iphone

It has been five days since my new iPhone arrived and I’m so in love. I’m writing this blog on it! It has improved my productivity so much. I’ve gotten everything on my to do list done and actually got to bed early twice this week. There are a few features the I just haven’t figured out yet, bit overall it is super easy to use.
So easy that is making me consider throwing my vista laptop out the window. Are macs this easy? If so, I totally get why mac users are such big fans.

This is for those who don’t live in Hurricane prone areas

I’m a born & raised Floridian who did a few short stints in a couple of other states (two were hurricane prone areas too!) so I’ve dealt with hurricanes all my life.  Today we were under a “tropical storm watch”. 

Let me tell you how it really goes.

A storm shows up on the radar somewhere in the middle of the Atlantic and the meteorologists start mentioning it.  As soon as it gets within 5 days away from a possible hit, they start covering little else.  They will run the little 5 second spinny shot over and over.

Once it gets within 3 days of possible landfall, they break into television shows about every 20 minutes to give you the latest coordinates.  I don’t watch much television so I’ve had a couple of storms sneak up on me (like where you find out 24 hours prior) but really, you’ve got to be under a rock to be anywhere in the POSSIBLE area that a storm might hit and not be aware of it.  Scares the tourists to death.  When I hear non-hurricane people talk about how bad they are, I point out how many other natural disasters are way worse because they don’t get the advance notice.  Tornadoes, flash floods, Tsunamis, mud slides, just to name a few.

Don’t get me wrong, I am well aware that there are thousands and thousands of hurricane victims out there and they have felt real pain, but I’m mainly talking about the majority of folks who go through these things.

Ok, so, back to the build-up.  The day prior to the storm they pretty much quit broadcasting anything other than hurricane stuff.  Here is where people go nuts.  There are three kinds of hurricane preparation:

A. The doomsday folks.  They run out and buy up gallons and gallons of bottled water, fill their gas tank and about 40 gallons extra, buy up an entire grocery cart full of canned foods, cut down half their trees and talk non-stop about how bad things are going to get.

B.  The nothings gonna happen folks.  They do nothing.  Well, they might stock up on beer.  This type usually tends to be big drinkers.  Or, if they do anything at all it would be to host a “hurricane party” during the storm and dare one another to run outside.  ( must admit, I’ve done this once or twice… actually got stuck in a bar once, police made us all spend the night)

C.  Realistic people (or hurricane veterans).  They are well aware of when hurricane season starts and ends and are pretty much ready all the time.  Now this doesn’t mean ready like group A, it means realistically ready.  They will have extra batteries and candles on hand all season, maybe even a few extra cans of food in the pantry too.  They will monitor the storm, bring in their patio furniture & potted plants, put the shutters up if necessary, fill up their car’s gas tank, make sure they have gas for the grill and stay home.  Prepared but calm.  (most of the recent storms this has been me)

I’ve been through about a dozen hurricanes and I’ve had some property damage but thankfully, I’ve never been hurt or ended up homeless.  Most times they hype them all up and they turn out to be nothing.  This is good but bad at the same time.  Good because it gets people aware and everyone knows exactly what to do.  They do enough media coverage that the rednecks at the bar sound like trained meteorologists when they talk to one another about this stuff.  Bad because when storms shift and go elsewhere or end up to be not very strong by the time they hit you, it makes people feel let down in a way.  Like they did all that hurricane prep work for nothing.  The bad part is when sensible people turn into dumb turkeys and quit getting ready.  That is when people get most hurt.

The current storm that we were threatened with has taken a turn and left us with just two days of heavy rain.  Great.  I’m happy for that.  No broken windows, downed trees or loss of power.  However, there were all kinds of idiots in my neighborhood that did nothing to prepare.  It is a shame that the insurance companies don’t refuse to pay for broken windows for homes that have hurricane shutters installed but have home-owners too lazy to close them. 

current predictions

 It is 11:20PM and this is the current projections from weather.com and I’ve taken the liberty of adding a little red X to indicate my location.   Good for me, bad for Disney.

JP’s beach bar (formerly Bu’s)- good & bad experience last night

Last night I met up with a few friends on Hollywood Beach and bar hopped a little.  We started at O’Malley’s Ocean Pub (love that place… worked there for years so it is like home to me) then wandered down to Tucan’s then JPs.  Tucan’s was fun, we got the spot right by the door which is great because it is the best place for the breeze but bad because you cannot hear your friends because the band is up your butt.  It is comical that the bass player had to move out of the way every time someone needed to come in or out of the door.  Then we went to JP’s (formerly Bu’s) to see the band Loose Cannon.

JP’s is a raunchy kind of place but can be fun sometimes.  The band was great, lots of high energy music and my girlfriend and I danced and danced.  The bar, very dissapointed.  So dissapointed that I woke up thinking about it and it still makes me angry.  The bartender was garbage and I am certain that I was severely overcharged.  My bill came to $51.00 and all I had was a couple of domestic beers.  Myself and two friends were on one tab together and we were only there for an hour and a half.  The beers are $4.00 a piece (WAY too much for a domestic in a dive bar!) so we would have had to have drunk 12.75 beers in order for it to come to that amount.  Huh? how are we supposed to have had a .75 of a beer?  Plus, my other friend bought us a round.  You have got to be kidding me to think we could have possibly drank that many beers in that amount of time.

I kick myself that I didn’t say anything about it (of course, she didn’t give me any reciept other than the slip that I sign for on the credit card) but it is all those years of being behind the bar that made me suck it up and keep quite.  Now, more “clear-headed” (aka: sober) I hate that I didn’t speak up.  I just pictured all of those drunks who would get their tabs and accuse me of over charging them when they had been sitting there for hours and hours on end pounding drinks & shots.  I couldn’t bring myself to say anything.

It is unfortunate that people do that.  They’ve now lost a customer in me.

I will never buy a beer there again.

I’ll go there if my friends go, but I will not give them my money.

What the crap? This stupid hurricane is going to ruin my plans… and it is named after me!

I’ve always thought it would be cool to have a hurricane have your name.  Well, at the beginning of the season when I saw that there was a hurricane Faye I was tickled.  I’m really Shelley Faye, but hey, this is the closest they’ve come in my lifetime.

Bummer though because we had a grand day planned for Monday (when it is supposed to hit us).  My friends and I always plan to go to the water park the day before school lets out or the day that school lets back in.  Well, Monday is the first day of school so me and all my friends took re-arranged our schedules so we could go.  It is great on those days, no kids and us adults can run around like crazy kids, no lines. 

poo.

I bought an iphone, why does it take so long to arrive?

I’ve been wanting an iphone, blackberry, or any sort of gadget thingy that would allow me to access my stuff from anywhere, so I finally broke down and bought one.

I got an iphone 3G and I’m so super excited about it.  But, annoyed too.  Why do I have to wait 7 to 10 business days?  10 business days is two full weeks!  Last weekend we went down to the keys and my hubby drove, I could have been doing stuff for 4 hours.  Instead, I just had to listen to country music because that is all they get on the radio there.  Next week I’m going to Vegas for work, sure would love to have my iphone.  Nope, it is expected to arrive the day AFTER I leave! 

What they hell apple?  why would you sell a product that you don’t have?  just to annoy your customers?

I guess in the mean time I’ll be shopping for iPhone Accessories on eBay

Kayaking in Marathon Key

I’m sitting here crispy and tired after a day of kayaking in the keys. It just seems like no matter how much sunscreen I wear, I still get burned.

I love to kayak, some day when I’m rich and have my own keys house, I’m going to have to make sure that I get a couple of kayaks too.  We had to trade off because the baby is still too little to go with us.  I got the second shift and started at the beach and ended at the marina.  I was glad to have this shift because we were headed into the wind, and I like to get as much excersise out of my fun as possible.  

We saw some amazing homes along the water along the way.  We also saw a ton of boats anchored where people are living on them.  The keys are such a unique place.  You will see a huge yacht anchored a few yards away from a rigged up raft.  Same thing on the land, a huge mansion with a run-down trailor next door.   

We took a couple of trips into the mangroves and tooled around a little.  There were these cool little jellyfish that were this grayish color.  One side looked like seaweed and the other looked like the typical mushroom top.  The odd part was that they had the mushroom looking part on the bottom.  Sometimes if they sat a little sideways they looked knida like a snake, black & gray striped. 

Wish I had time for another day on the water tomorrow.

The ocean this time of year

In years past I used to live on the beach.  I absolutely love the beach and wish I could still afford to live there.  Back when I was single it was ok to live in a teeny tiny little apartment.  Then, once I got married, two incomes and no kids affords some really cute beach places.  Now, working from home (both me & the hubby) and having a kid, there is no possible way that we could fit into anything that we could actually afford!

Looking back I remember that this time of the year the water started to get really yucky.  The seaweed would be thicker and the water was so warm that it isn’t even refreshing anymore.

Now that I’m older and wiser (or maybe just more sober) I realize that it wasn’t the water that was the problem, it was the TIME of DAY that I was getting into the water.  If you go to the beach early in the morning (or anytime before noon) it is absolutely perfect.  The water is calm and clear and it is still a little cool.  As the day goes buy the water gets rougher and warmer.  I don’t mind the waves, it is just that they kick up the seaweed and muck.  So, if you go when it is calm, you can see the fish (and your own feet!) and don’t get gross stuff stuck in your suit.

If only I could go back in time and tell my old self that if you just get your lazy butt out of bed earlier than you can actually enjoy the beach late summer.