A great pair of Sarasota legs!

There I was, shivering in the winter wind wearing only a wool suit jacket when I was accosted by these great looking pair of legs! What else could a girl do but stop and gawk? and whip out the camera for some fun fiddling? It was a sunny afternoon with nice contrast and my belly was full from a yummy lunch. I could ignore the cold for a five minute photo shoot! and those legs were waiting and so willing...

The sculpture sits in a square facing the Selby Public Library with a Starbucks on the other corner which I have been known to haunt on occasion.

Isn't pool cool?

It is in the winter time. Here's a shot of pool at the Porpoise Pub.

Coming home

So.  Lee Pons can play the keyboards. The timer on my camera works.

It's beginning to look a lot like winter

Like the scavenger birds on the beach, I was busy poking my camera in the grasses and other debris left behind on the beach in winter. I came upon this expired horseshoe crab and was fascinated by a close-up. You can thank me for excluding the smell. And no I didn't salt it - that is sand!



This is a magnified picture of the tidal debris and the sand really does look like salt here. There are grasses but also egg sacs and other soggy, smelly stuff I don't care to identify. And even though it smells rank, the jumble intrigues me. The beach has its seasons and winter brings storms that pull up live shells and dump them at the tide change and clumps of jumbled grasses that slowly get buried by sand.

Boca Ciega Millenium Park

A recent trip to Boca Ciega Millenium Park, a quick bike ride from my house, shows Florida in its own muted, powdery colors. I grew up in the tri-state area of New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Delaware where greens are lush, flowers a dizzy flash of bright colors and seasons in stark contrast. Florida is not like that. Think soft pine needle beds, bright flowers mingling all year round and lots of softly muted colors born of drought resistant characteristics. Seasons seem to fade in and out of each other without fanfare. One month the birds are in a wild fish feeding frenzy at the beach and the next month a morning walk begs the question, "Where are the birds?"

I like the calm pace of the weather, the bright sunlight and the wickedly wild diversity of plants. I took the grandson out for a walk in the stroller around an apartment complex and stopped and stood gaping at the beautiful complexity of a flowering plant growing idly in the landscaping. Florida does a good job of keeping me amused...and out of trouble!

Killing me with Kayaks



Down in the mangroves at Weedon Island Preserve, Rich and I went wandering about in our neon green double kayak from Sweetwater Kayaks. For the first two hours it was sweet indeed. But the tide was on its way out making paddling a whole heck of a lotta work. After our four hours we were TIRED.

We wandered the kayak trail deep into the tunnels of the mangrove roots. We took our paddle apart and each took half when it became too narrow for anything else. Later we had to get out and walk because the water was too shallow. At first we were delighted with the jumping fish. Big fish! Boing! boing! boing! leaping out of the water over and over again. Then deep in the mangroves we saw a family of raccoons playing at the water's edge and climbing the mangroves across the water above us. We noticed the very small crabs hanging out on the broken roots just above the water too. But coolest for me were the birds.

We have yet to identify the bird in the picture. Do yo know what it is?

The birds we know about were:

• brown pelican
• great blue heron
• little blue heron
• tricolored heron
• more white ibis than I care to count
• American red oyster catcher
• double breasted cormorant
• anhinga

My arms will be sore for a week, but I'd go back in a heartbeat - at HIGH tide!

Music makes magic

I bought this little boom box from the flea market to play music while I hula hooped with friends on the beach. Six "D" batteries later it plays the CD but stops in the middle of the second song and won't start again. It turns out that the only music stations that tune in on the beach are the Latin dance ones. AM comes in the strongest. Okay. Great beat.