A Non-Event

Thank you to everybody who expressed concern for our safety in the last couple of days, but as we expected, Hurricane Elsa was pretty much a non-event for us here on the central Florida coast. Sometime in the very early hours of Wednesday morning I woke up to the sound of rain coming down pretty hard and drifted back off to sleep. When we woke up later, the sun was shining and there was no indication anything had happened at all. Unfortunately Elsa, which had been downgraded to a tropical storm, did leave some damage in its wake in other parts of the state. The news last night said that somebody was killed by a falling tree up in Jacksonville, and they showed video of several RVs that had been overturned in the storm.

Terry had an appointment in Port Orange yesterday afternoon for her annual mammogram. Due to COVID-19 restrictions, only the patients are allowed in the facility, so I dropped her off and then ran to the post office to mail off a bunch of books. I must have timed it pretty well because when I got to the post office there were only two people in line ahead of me, but by the time I was finished the line was stretching out the door.

I got back to Port Orange Imaging and parked, figuring I could knock out a chapter or so in my new Big Lake book before Terry was done. As it turned out, I was only able to dictate about 50 words into my Sony digital recorder before she came out. More good timing.

For her birthday a couple of weeks ago, we had planned to have dinner at a great seafood place call Aunt Catfish on the River, but when we called we found out that there was a 2½ hour wait. No thanks, we did something else instead. The restaurant opens at 3:30 in the afternoon, and it was a little before 4 when Terry was finished, so we decided to give it a try again. It was less than a ten-minute drive to the restaurant, but when we got there the parking lot was almost full, and somebody getting in their car to leave told us there was an hour and a half wait. It’s obviously a very popular place, but we didn’t feel like standing around in the heat for that long.

Instead, we went to Lowe’s to pick up some items we needed for a project here at home. That was a frustrating experience because lately it seems like everybody who works at Lowe’s is just there to get a paycheck and doesn’t really care about helping the customer.

We needed some special 3¼ inch long bolts to attach hardware for some hurricane shutter panels we are putting up, and according to their website, they had 232 packages of them in stock at that store. But the only ones we could find were 2¼ inches. I had to walk around a while until I finally found a sales associate who looked at what they had and told me those were what I wanted. I pulled up the item I wanted on my phone from their store’s website, and he said, “Yeah, that’s what these are.” Terry and I both tried to explain to him that there is a difference between 2¼  inches and 3¼ inches, and he shook his head and said, “No, they are the same thing.” We both told him that there was a one-inch difference, and he insisted no, 2¼  inches and 3¼ inches are the same thing. I think somebody slept through math class when they were in school.

We finally gave up dealing with him, found something we hope will do the job, and left. All the hardware came to a little over $1,000, and that was after my 10% veterans discount. What the heck, it’s only money, right? Buy books, people. Please buy books. ?

On our way home we stopped at Dustin’s BBQ for dinner, and though it wasn’t the seafood we had planned on, it was still very good.

Today I’ll be back at it, working on my new book. I’m aiming for another 5,000 words, but we’ll see how it goes.

And finally, here’s a chuckle to start your day from the collection of funny signs we see in our travels and that our readers share with us.

It’s Thursday, so it’s time for a new Free Drawing. This week’s prize is an audiobook of  The Ghost from the Sea, book 8 in my pal Bobbi Holmes’ popular Haunting Danielle mystery series about an Oregon seaside bed and breakfast with a resident ghost of a previous owner who has been dead for almost ninety years. To enter, click on this Free Drawing link or the tab at the top of this page and enter your name (first and last) in the comments section at the bottom of that page (not this one). Only one entry per person per drawing please, and you must enter with your real name. To prevent spam or multiple entries, the names of cartoon or movie characters are not allowed. The winner will be drawn Sunday evening. Note: Due to the high shipping cost of printed books and Amazon restrictions on e-books to foreign countries, only entries with US addresses and e-mail addresses are allowed.

Thought For The Day – You get what you work for, not what you wish for.