Turtle # 6

Well our newest visitor got away from us much quicker than I was expecting last night. Kinda like a Ninja….. in and out quick. Do not fear dear reader — I did get a couple of more pictures for you before she managed to slide out in the glow of that big pretty moon last night. I was wanting to get some video of her and her journey back to the sea, but by the time I finished my cupcake and shot of milk and got back out there – she was at the waters edge…… and once those big ole girls hit the water, they are gone~! It’s amazing to watch those big ole girls plod so ungainly across the sand and then turn into speedy graceful pictures as soon as they become buoyant…….. I estimate last nights visitor to have been between 125 and 150 lbs. I ask my bride to kneel down beside her for a bit of reference — I think it’ll help you all understand just how big these beauties are~~~ So while I didn’t get the photo’s and video’s I was hoping for – I think you’ll enjoy these shots. Every time we go out for a smoke now, we anxiously scan the beach for more visitors  🙂

Most of our day today was pretty tame as we enjoyed the capability to not do a damn thing unless we feel like it. I told my bride, I need to get some Spark or something as I have been experiencing a major lack of motivation these past couple of days. I have good intentions, of kayaking, walking and all those other kind of healthy things – but am suffering from a severe case of lack of get up and go. I’m sure I’ll come out of it and eventually get sufficiently motivated. It got to be 16:30ish and my Queen said she was getting hungry. Neither of us felt like cooking and she said she wasn’t up to waiting for an hour or so for something ordered (and ‘an hour or so‘ is optimistic) so we loaded up into DD and headed for Blues – where the company is always good, the beer is always cold and the food is always quick, good and hot.  My bride got her a fish sammich without the bun…… and I got me a brisket sammich [with the bun] — MMmMMmm good~! We had 2 or 6 drinks before settling up and heading out.

Now back at the condo, we go out to smoke and I now take my flashlight with me to look for more new visitors~!! None yet, but the night is early. At the pace we’re going, we should have baby turtles hatching almost the entire month of October – so if watching turtles hatch is something you’d like to experience and you’re thinking of coming to visit us – Almost any time in October would be prime time. I was thinking of taking off for 3-4 days to St. Thomas for my Queen’s birthday, but believe now we’ll wait until November so we don’t miss the opportunity to see bunches of little turtles popping out of the sand~! We can’t wait~!!!!!!!!!!

Good night Ya’ll —– Thankx for stopping in~!

 

Fun end to a slow day…….

I was gonna get on here and say that we did absolutely nothing today and that I was just gonna leave it at that and some pictures……. was…….

I actually slept in a little bit this morning (07:15) and finally got that good nights rest that I was wanting. I did my morning thing, and then settled in on the laptop and got a bunch of small odds and ends taken care of that I had let go for the past week. I kinda had the place to myself and it was nice and quiet – so it seemed like the perfect time to do it. I guess Saturday finally caught up to my Queen as she slept in until almost 10:30~!

The rest of the day was a bite to eat, some coffee and a lot of laptop / phone screen time for both of us. I finally quit just in time for Judge Judy. Watched an hour of her and Angie decided she wanted to eat. I offered to go up to the place down town that has oysters in celebration of getting our funds from the sale of the house, which she was all for – but then we looked it up and the place is closed today and tomorrow 🙁  We’ll go Wednesday~! So she heated up some left over KFC and noshed on that. Not sure what is up with me, but had no appetite and weirdly did not go ahead and eat anyway~~ We watched some American Pickers switching over to Modern Family during commercial breaks. They’re all re-runs and it was too late to start a movie, so I came to do my evening stuff on here. Just as I cleaned up the spam messages that I get everyday on my web site and checked to see how many hits the previous post got – I opened up a new page to tell you that we did absolutely nothing today and that I was just gonna leave it at that and some pictures. I thought before I do that…. I’ll go burn one first and maybe have a thought pop in. Standing out there under a still mostly full moon, our neighbor next door asked if ‘that thing is moving out on the beach’? I went and grabbed my flash light and low and behold — we have another turtle digging a nest….. awfully early – but we sure are happy to see her~! She is just getting started and I didn’t want to spook her with lights and flashes, so I snapped one quick picture and then left her to do her thing. Neighbor agreed to leave her be as well. You can bet I will spend the rest of the evening watching her though and will get a couple more pictures once she is done~! Can’t wait as we will get to watch the entire sequence now under the glow of that big gorgeous moon~!! More of the story tomorrow~!!

Good night Ya’ll —– Thankx for stopping in~!

Newest turtle digging her nest~!

Full Moon through the palms

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A day of R & R…..kinda….

Didn’t sleep in like I would have hoped and the rest I wanted just didn’t happen for me last night, even though I rolled out of bed with minimal pain. I guess my brain just wouldn’t let go of the day from yesterday’s event at Blues. I’m hoping after a mostly down day today, I will get the rest I missed out on last night. My Queen said she slept like a rock – so that made me happy. She earned it. We took it nice and easy for the bulk of the day. Angie made us a nice big breakfast and we lounged and watched the idiot box as we ate. I did the dishes and cleaned the kitchen up before rejoining Angie on the couch for some movies.  Watched a couple of different mostly non-descript movies before my Bride said she was getting hungry. Neither of us felt like cooking, so I offered to go pick up some KFC. She liked that idea so I took off. So much for the relaxation part of R & R….. Good Lord, I swear – these people on this island must practice being slow…. and I dare say some of them have mastered it. There were 3 people in line in front of me when I walked in to KFC.  65 minutes later, I walked out with our supper…. frustrated don’t even touch where I was at when I left. Home less than 10 minutes later and we settled down for one more movie while we chowed down on our chicken. At least it was hot~! We both ate too much and laid back to finish the rest of the movie…. another non-mentionable show even though it was packed with big names…..hmmm, can’t even think of the name of it now. That’s about right. Now I struggle to find 500 words…….

Did have another turtle visit last night~! But no nest….. I guess she couldn’t find a patch of sand she liked….. she came up, made kind of a heart shaped loop around our patch of beach and headed back into the water. (I am getting fairly adept at reading their tracks) Oddly, it is the only picture I took today – so you can see her path. I’ll put up a few more from the past that you may have missed — or I may have missed. Not sure what tomorrow brings…… but hoping again for some rest tonight…. I think my brain may have finally slowed down.

Good night Ya’ll —– Thankx for stopping in~!

 

Fishing with Vets Corn hole Tournament~!

What a awesome, awesome day……. my Queen and I both slept in a bit this morning (almost 07:00 — Woo-hoo~!) so we missed our beautiful sunrise…. we rolled out to a small rain shower and some clouds, but per usual, 15 minutes later we had gorgeous blue skies…… it was nice to sleep in a bit and take it easy instead of adhering to some kind of schedule. We each made us a small breakfast in anticipation of a long busy day……. man oh mighty did we under estimate that… we stopped and picked up a slug of ice for the event at Blues today, pulled in, unloaded said slug of ice, then I left and went and got some more ice as we figured we grossly under estimated what we would need for the day.  Wound up bringing 180 lbs. of ice and as it turned out, it was almost the perfect amount. I wish there was some way to let you all experience the day we had today other than my feeble attempt to put it into words. I am going to guesstimate at one time there was probably 200 or so folks for the event. There was every size shape and color you could imagine…… and everyone was enjoying everyone’s company. One of the biggest masses of folks getting along and having a wonderful time I have got to see in quite some time. There were no arguments to speak of, good music in the form of a DJ and a couple of local artists playing all day. Other than one random rain shower (It’s the islands ‘Mon’….) that lasted all of about 6 minutes, the weather was absolutely gorgeous (hotter than a by-god for about an hour or so) but absolutely wonderful. My Queen and I were support staff for the two bar  tenders (Eddy & Tim) keeping beer cold and stocked along with mixes and keeping the 4 trash barrels around the yard emptied. There was also the occasional serving a beer or water here and there. Tim & Eddy kept us hopping for a solid 5+ hours or so.

Prizes for the tournament were awarded, all the raffle prizes handed out, bellies were full and the drinks continued to flow right up until closing time. The entire time, not one cross word, hurt feelings or anything along that line. Just a whole bunch of people, having a whole bunch of fun and having a real good time to help support a very worthy cause. One of the multiple reasons we love this island~! I heard at the end of it as everything was wrapping up – the Fishes with Vets organization made a little over $ 1500.00 to put toward supporting the veterans on the island… I call that a good day~! I could go on and on about the wonderful day that we had today – even though we are now both worn completely out and enjoying the effects of alcohol and aspirin to ease aching backs, knees and feet — but it was so, so, so, so worth every single second of it. I took a bunch of pix during the course of the day today. Haven’t looked at any of them yet – so excited to see what I wound up with….. I hope you enjoy them.

Good night Ya’ll —– Thankx for stopping in~!

 

BIG, big night and day………

Well that long peaceful uninterrupted night of sleep that I was hoping for last night didn’t happen…… but it was oh so worth it. My Bride roused me from a really good sleep a little before 01:00  this morning to say she thought we had a turtle on the beach.  I jumped out of bed and grabbed my camera and flash light. Oh what a treat we got when I lit up my flash light……. TWO turtles, less than 15′ off of our patio…… both laying eggs~! I tried my best not to disturb them while I took pictures and videos. At that time of the morning it was very dark – even with an almost full moon, so lighting left a lot to be desired, but I think I got some decent shots. 1 turtle was smaller, I’m guesstimating maybe a hundred pounds….. the other turtle was a dandy~! I am conservatively putting her at 300 lbs. – yes, I said 300 lbs. She was huge! and BEAUTIFUL~!! I just hope my pictures show her beauty and her size. We sat out there for well over an hour and watched those beautiful animals doing what they have been doing for countless years, all the while battling mosquitoes and other biting little insects doing what they have been doing for countless years…. worth every. single. bite~! After the turtles had both laid their eggs and trudged back into the sea…… we happily fell off back into a bite ridden, awe filled slumber.

06:00 rolled around all to soon as we rolled back out to head up to Blues. After an AWESOME night we were treated to another SPECTACULAR sunrise~!  My Queen was thankfully, feeling almost her regular self, so she made her a bite to eat and after coffee and waking up we headed up to Blues. We spent the next 3 hours doing odds and ends getting the place ready for the [hopefully] big day tomorrow. I filled DD up to the brim with old stoves and just a lot of other crap that needed hauled off to the local dump. That out of the way – I came back and we sat and had a couple of drinks and chatted about what is on the slate for tomorrow. After 3 or 4 drinks and a bite to eat for my Queen and a 6-pack for me….. we came back to the condo for some conditioned air and some much needed rest. Those 2 hour interruptions of sleep in the middle of the night require a little more effort during the day for us ‘older’ folks  😉  We just got good and comfortable, when I got a phone call from the title company working on our house sale. They ‘just sent’  22 pages of stuff that required a lot of signatures, so I spent the next hour or so, printing, signing, scanning and sending mucho documents, then jumping back into DD to get to the local FedEx office to get said documents in the mail (the title company has to have the hard copies as well). Nerves a bit tattered and worn out, finally back to the house to relax. Wasn’t an hour or so before we got a text from our realtor saying everything went smooth at closing and as of 16:00 Evansville time….. OUR HOUSE is officially  SOLD~!  Didn’t get quite as much as we would have liked out of it, but at least we are out from under it now and hopefully can take what we made on it and start to travel now to some of our Sister Islands~!  Woot-Woot~!!!!!

Needless to say we are drinking a little bit – but trying not to get stupid – as tomorrow promises to be a long, tough and hopefully, fun day~!

Good night Ya’ll ….. Thankx for stopping on~!

 

100 Lbs +

easy 300 Lbs~!

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Almost full moon through the palms

Another beautiful sunrise~!!

Turtle nest and tracks!

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Blues Back Yard BBQ

Our condo is the white building on the lower right

 

Wrapping it up……….

Woke up a couple of minutes before 06:00 this morning….. normally don’t like getting up that early any more since I retired…. well, actually, never really like getting up that early unless I was going fishing or something else fun like that…. but I was heading up to Blues and have found out that as I am aging a bit more – I require a little more wake up time. Well, not actually wake up time, I have to allow time for extra trips to the bathroom…… I hate it, but trust me when I tell you, it is a necessary evil……. Looking for a bright spot in the early morning scenario [pun intended]….. Waking up to the sun rises we have from our patio, is pretty darn hard to beat….. and for multiple reasons will never get tired of seeing them, I might be a tad prejudice – but the ones we have here are absolutely beautiful~! I got all my bathroom trips out of the way, caught up on mail and FB…. think I have a ‘stumper’ in process on the FB music trivia I put out. 🙂 Angie was supposed to go up to Blues with me, but she had a tough night with what had to be a mild dose of food poisoning, so I let her sleep cause I knew she needed the rest. I grabbed my cooler, wallet, phone and drill and headed out the door.

Nothing special needed done at Blues when I got there, so I started in to try and finish up my fence project. I got the entire length fully screwed on and had one 8′ section that I still needed to flip the boards on, so I went ahead and launched into that. I am happy to report, the fence work is now 99% completed. I have to run by the lumber yard and pick up a couple of pieces of wood to replace a couple busted pieces, but for all practical intent — DONE~! I also want to paint or stain it, but that should be a cake walk compared to the work that has been done on it. Cleaned up my mess and sat and had a couple of beers with Jim, before heading back to check on my Bride. She was up and moving when I got home but still movin’ slow….. I coaxed her into eating a little bit and then again later on in the evening I got her to eat a little more. She says she is now feeling considerably better….. Yay~! We are supposed to be up at Blues again in the morning by 08:00 – so hopefully an early night for both of us filled with peaceful uninterrupted sleep. I know I am hauling off a bunch of junk for Jim tomorrow, plus moving chairs and setting up the yard for the big Corn hole tournament. Not sure what else Jim and Deb have in store for us for the day. Guess we’ll see. Until then……

Good night Ya’ll —– Thankx for stopping in~!

Before

After

Before

After

Pelicans diving for dinner off of our patio

Banded coral shrimp

 

 

Easier day today…….

Slept in a little bit after another lack luster night of sleep. I got up and my Queen was already out on the patio watching our gorgeous sunrise. While the sun rise was pretty, the very first thing I noticed was another large turtle nest – only about 15′ off of our patio. From the size of the tracks, I’d say she was probably every bit of 200 lbs. An easy 30″ across from flipper tip to flipper tip (tracks in the sand) She must have hunted for the perfect spot a bit, as her tracks show she came up, circled one of the palm trees before laying her eggs then heading back to the water. There were also some small tracks in the middle of the nest that I suspect are mongoose tracks. It looks like it must have got spooked though because there was no dig marks in the nest. That’s a good thing – as I am told they (Mongoose) love to eat turtle eggs. So that makes 3 big nests we have now within 50′ of our patio~! Hopefully we time the hatching well enough to see it~! More on that in about a month and a half~!

After a bite to eat – we headed up to Blues – we both decided today was going to be a non-work day unless Jim or Deb had something specific they needed done. They didn’t so we took off to get a couple of things done that we needed to get done. House sale paperwork that needed signed and witnessed by a Notary, needed more band-aids 😉 and couple of other odds and ends. In an effort to find a short cut around a real congested part of the island — I wound up on a new road we have not previously scoped out yet – it is South of the refinery (on the South shore of the island) and actually got me down to a part of the island I was wanting to check out. I have seen it several times from the mountain tops, and always wondered how to get there. I found that out today~! After we left the refinery port area, we spent the next couple of hours driving around the island knocking those chores out before coming back to the condo to suck up some conditioned air and watch the boob tube. We watched a couple of non-descript movies and a couple episodes of Judge Judy before making us a bite to eat. I had a small bowl of Mac-n-cheese with a couple of cheese filled hot dogs cut up in it. My bride had a bowl of Bean with Bacon soup and a grilled cheese. Apparently something was not right with her meal, as she has spent the last hour and a half running to the bathroom. Sure hope she didn’t get the same bug I have/had….. which thankfully seems to have about ran it’s course…..

Next couple of mornings I will be hanging out at Blues for final preparation for the big day Saturday…… I’ll try and get some more current pictures and we’ll see where it goes from there.

Good night Ya’ll —– Thankx for stopping in~!

I suspect these are from a very large sand crab

Mongoose tracks ? 

Mongoose tracks ?

 

 

Last long day……

Rolled out of bed not quite so easily this morning…. but I think part of it was due to a less than desirable nights sleep. Muscles were sore and fingers hurt a little bit – but nothing that I considered out of the expected. My bride followed me as she was helping out again. Today was the last day Blues is closed for renovations and we had a full plate of things to do when we got there. I put lattice back on a couple of gates Angie painted, I installed the light for the flag pole and then started painting. Scraping, wiping and painting….. and I did it for the rest of the day, along with Angie, Deb and Jim. There was a new a stove installed in the kitchen, there was power washing and painting…. and painting… and some more painting. If it stood still for very long – it got painted~!  I couldn’t hardly light my lighter because of cramps in my fore arms. It really weirds me out a little bit how fast you lose muscle tone or whatever it is called when you don’t use those muscles for a while. I mean seriously — I did that kind of work for most of my life, I would have thought I would retain at least some of them…… I heard or read somewhere, that getting older ain’t for the weak – boy that ain’t no fluff~! Kinda like bad weather I guess…. ain’t a friggin’ thing you can do about it (getting older) and yes Daughters and Sisters – I could work out and exercise, but seriously….. who are we kidding  😉

That’s about it — we get to go back to sleeping in – Yay~! I will probably wind up at Blues for a couple of hours each day though to try and get the fence finished up and what ever odds and ends need done – but when I’m working up there on ‘open’ days, I usually try and quit by the time they open for business (11:00), so they’ll be shorter easier days. Some more pictures of the goings on…. and maybe some beach pictures depending on how many ‘work’ pictures I have.

Good night Ya’ll —– Thankx for stopping in~!

 

 

 

 

 

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Day 2 ….. manual laboring~

Woke up this morning to the beckoning of my alarm….. sure don’t miss that~! Rolled out of bed with a lot less effort and pain that I was anticipating…….. washed my face, brushed teeth and combed my few remaining hairs and stumbled out onto the patio to greet another sunrise. We had overcast skies and it was drizzling a bit, so didn’t have one of those wow sunrises. Still pretty to look at over that gorgeous water though~~ My Queen joined me (she was helping out at Blues today as well) — we both spent the next hour or so, waking up, drinking coffee and getting a bite to eat. (I learned my lesson yesterday)  😉 before heading out the door to Blues.

Before I go into the day – let me preface this with: All my Daughters, Sisters and Nephews….. Thank you for your concern for me and my welfare. I want you ALL to know – I have no intention of dying of heat stroke or heart attack from my efforts at manual laboring. I have worked 1000’s of hours in heat and humidity far greater than here, and while I was younger and arguably in better shape then – I learned how to recognize all heat related issues. Jim will vouch for me, that I did not hesitate to set my happy a$$ down in the shade and drink a bottle of water, catch my breath and cool off whenever I felt the need to. So while your concern is appreciated – you need not worry….. I’m older, not stupider.. I think.. hell I don’t know – but worry not. ( I also kept a close eye on my Queen to make sure she did not over do it today either~!)

Thankfully, did not get recruited to help with the concrete, so I was left to work on the fence. Lots of small issues, but for the most part – have it 3/4 done now — and NO MORE post holes to dig~!!!! I stopped working on the fence around 13:30 (that’s 1:30 pm for all you civilians out there) I waited until the very large concrete truck left before I started on the flag pole – so once I had my stuff put up from the fence – I worked on the flag pole. While I was tickled to death the flag pole place shipped it to me with free shipping, I was more than dismayed to find out there were parts missing, wrong parts and damaged parts. I improvised enough to get the flag pole up (wanted it up for the big shin dig this weekend) but will be much happier when replacement parts get here so I can ‘complete’ it. Didn’t think to take a picture of it –duh — or my fence project –duh– so I’ll get some tomorrow. My Queen managed to snap some photo’s of the work going on, so those of you that are lucky enough to have visited our little home away from home, will be able to see some of the improvements being made. It was quite the busy day. We had a couple of drinks (I had beer Alex) 😉 with Jim and Debbie before we loaded up and came home. (and no additional injuries today~!!)

I finally heard from the title company [for our house sale] so I had some phone calls to make and some paperwork to do for that. With that out of the way, we have had our showers and relaxing. Got to get rested for one more day of ‘work’. Looks like tomorrow will be mostly painting.

Good night Ya’ll —– Thankx for stopping in~!

This things tail was 4′ long if it was an inch~!

Jim hard at it~!

See….. taking a break~!!!!

Rapping with Eddy~!

“Island” contractor…. 😉

 

 

Ouch……..

Got up bright and early this morning ready for my first ‘long’ day toiling away at manual labor for the first time in well over a year….. before I get in to that, getting up that early allows a chance to watch our beautiful sunrise. I was about 15 minutes late, but still managed to get one decent picture for you. Still battling that stomach thing, so I thought skipping my breakfast would be a good idea…… huge mistake. I forgot just how much energy I require to keep my big a$$ moving, especially when I am manual laboring. Turns out I don’t do that near as good as I used to. DAMMIT EMMIT~! I started out just a couple of minutes after 07:00 by digging a post hole. Now normally I don’t struggle very much with that task (other than not being able to breathe)….. but let me tell you what……. That was the second toughest hole I have ever dug with a post hole digger….. it took me 45 minutes to dig one 24″ deep hole. I have torn up concrete that wasn’t as hard as that hole was~! Whilst battling said hole…. I managed to tear the skid off of two fingers – because my hands have softened up from non participation of such events in quite some time. I stopped and wrapped those fingers (and three others) with electrical tape – in an effort not to make them any worse. The hole is for a flag pole I’m putting up there at Blues. Another 15 minutes and I had the base for the flag pole set. Now just need to wait for the concrete to set up.

Next task was to tear down a couple of sections of fence and rebuild it. It’s a good thing the fence was dang near falling down, because I was spent – that post hole digger whooped up on me something awful. My arms were cramping, my fingers hurt, I could barely hold my hammer….. it was pathetic and painful….. Then I had to dig another post hole….. : -(   I have never dreaded anything so bad in my life. I was pleasantly surprised to find out, the ground was giving way fairly easy to my pain riddled efforts to drive the digger into the ground. Woo-Hooo~!!! Maybe this won’t suck so bad after all!!  Nope – that lasted for about 3″ into the ground….. and got progressively harder as I went down….. for another 25 painful inches. I stayed at it, taking multiple cooling off, trying to breathe, get something to drink breaks, as the sun was getting up there by then and I was dealing with a 98° feel like temperature and not a spot of shade anywhere near where I was working. Once again though – I got her done even though that became the toughest post hole I’ve ever dug. Time to start re-assembling the fence~! Rebuild went much more difficult that I imagined simply because I couldn’t hardly hold anything in my hands. Factor in one instance while trying to drive in a screw, the screw fell over and I drove my cordless screw driver bit into the side of my thumb. The hole it created didn’t hurt near as bad as the force of the driver going into my thumb. More electrical tape~! I got the fence up – but there is some touch up work, but it was 15:30 by then and I was so tired, I didn’t know my own name….. I’ll get it tomorrow after I get the flag pole up. I also understand I may be recruited to help pour concrete tomorrow…… oh goody~~~

Finally back at the house, showered, and patched up, my Queen got me some Mickey D’s for supper. I think my body temperature is almost back down to where it needs to be. Gonna put up some pictures for you and hit the sack. Will hopefully wake up feeling at least good enough to get up out of bed.

Good night Ya’ll …… Thankx for stopping in~!

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