We Snuck Away

While Terry had a couple of dental appointments this last week, I don’t believe I had been out of the house except to check the mail or check on our citrus trees all week. This allowed me a lot of writing time on my new book, but sometimes I reach the point where I just have to get away from things for a little bit. Yesterday was that day, so we snuck away.

As I’ve said before, I think I want to get an Oculus Quest virtual reality headset, and like I do with most purchases, I have been doing a lot of research online. But nothing beats actual hands-on experience, and I remembered that a few years ago they had demo units of them on display at Best Buy in Daytona Beach. So we decided to go check them out.

On the way, we stopped at Circle K for gas, at $4.19 a gallon. Would I prefer to be paying $3.50 or $3.09, or even $1.99? Sure I would, but I didn’t whine and complain and stomp my feet, because nobody is dropping bombs on me or shooting missiles at our local schools and hospitals. And because no matter how much of a hissy fit I throw, the big oil companies who are raking in record profits could give a rat’s butt what I think as long as I stick my credit card in the pump and buy their gas.

When we got to Best Buy I was disappointed to find that not only did they not have a demo unit of the VR headset, they did not have one for sale in the whole store. An employee said they were on order and didn’t know when they would be getting any in. So I guess if I want one I’ll just have to order it off of Amazon and try it out, and if I don’t like it, send it back.

From there we drove to Leanh’s Chinese Restaurant, one of our favorite places, for an early dinner. I love their shrimp fried rice, and Terry had a spring roll and pan-fried steam dumplings. And we had enough leftover to bring home for another light lunch.

A while back someone who reads the blog reached out to tell me that they had read how much we enjoyed going to Josephson’s Smokehouse in Astoria, Oregon for their smoked salmon, and told us to check out Port Orange Seafood. He said their smoked salmon selection may not be quite as good as Josephson’s, but he thought we would enjoy it.

The small shop is tucked away on a side street, and there was a big white egret sitting on a post out front that seems to be a fixture of the place. He didn’t seem to mind us passing him so closely as we went inside, and Terry and I were both immediately pleased with what we saw. Besides all kinds of locally caught fresh seafood, they had smoked salmon, smoked mullet, smoked mackerel and smoked amberjack, as well as several kinds of fish dip and other goodies. Unlike Josephson’s, they don’t let you sample the different varieties, but we decided to buy some of the salmon and the amberjack, and Terry got a container of their spicy fish dip. I’ll let you know what we think of it. We also got a couple of Key Lime tarts to take home and have as a snack in the evening as we watched TV, and they were pretty darn good!

Today is your last chance to enter our Free Drawing for an RV camping journal donated by Barbara House. Barbara makes several variations of these, and they all have pages where you can list the date, weather, where you traveled to and from that day, beginning and ending mileage, campground information including amenities at RV sites, a place for campground reviews, room to record activities, people met along the way, reminders of places to see and things to do the next time you’re in the area, and a page for notes for each day.

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 this 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 – Jogging feels great unless you compare it to not jogging.