Month: November 2009

Faded Florida

Florida TrailWe are spending the next two nights at the Lakeside Inn in Mt Dora, FL and while the place is nice it would probably have been in its prime several decades ago.

Today it took us only 147 miles to go the 136 Google told us it would. We stopped several times to do some geocaching, finding 7 of 8, and walking along several trails of the Ocala National Forest.

Started up, went down, went up, back down, back up, down again, up again, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 489

Church On Sunday

Emperor Goes To ChurchThere is a sign on US17 in South Newport, GA that proclaims “The Smallest Church in America.” With our love of Roadside Americana we would have stopped to look at it even if there hadn’t been a cache nearby. Donna went inside and read a sign that said you can have your wedding here, it had better be a small party as it would be a tight squeeze with just preacher, bride, groom, best man and maid of honor. At 10′ x 15′ it is pretty small and I’d have a hard time fitting the Miata inside, but someone has found even a couple more churches littler – Smallest Churches in America.

We didn’t do a lot of extra driving today, Google says it is 197 miles from Pooler, GA to Lake City, FLORIDA and we only took 244 to get here. It was raining when the day started and for most of the trip it varied from drizzle to downpour until we entered the Sunshine State. Then true to it’s nickname the skies cleared and within a few miles we had the top down. Found 7 geocaches today, including our first one in Florida, DNF’d only one and that was another Florida first.

Started up, went down, went up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 483

100,000 UFOs

100 GrandJust shy of Bowman, the Emperor, Donna and I split a candy bar in honor of his latest mileage achievement.

From Aiken, SC to Pooler, GA it is 136 miles as the Google flies, but we traveled 288. Along the way we visited an honest to God (pun intended) Abbey with real monks and stuff to look at 47 different nativity scenes in media that varied from rolled newspaper to stainless steel. We geocached in 3 different counties, finding 5 and DNFing one. We had Japanese for lunch, American for dinner and we are spending the night in a hotel that doesn’t have ice machines.

Tomorrow we cross into the other world where you can’t get sweet tea to drink, but you can get a paperweight made of a baby alligator head encased in lucite, the glorious Sunshine State, Florida.

Started up, went down, went up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 481

How Long Does It Take You To Drive 514 Miles?

Over the bridge and through the swamp to Donna’s sister’s house we go. It’ll take us 4-1/2 days. No, we are not riding the tandem. Five hundred and fourteen miles is the most direct route down I-95, which we hate and avoid like the H1N1 virus, so we will spend most of the trip on two-lane back roads and beating back thorny bushes looking for Army surplus ammo cans full of Happy Meal toys.

The route back home will be 582 miles, half Florida Turnpike, half Georgia state routes and it will take us about 14 hours.

Started down, went up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 479

Slowing The Posting Pace

 

Sure hasn’t upped the quality here….
Augusta National Morning

Taken April 17, 1995 at a Master’s Tournament Practice Round. The sureal look is courtesy of Seattle FilmWorks. You mail them a roll of their film, they develop it and send you back prints. For a few dollars more they digitize the photos and send them to you a 3-1/2 floppy disc.*

*Not anymore. Seattle FilmWorks stopped doing this kind of thing around 2001 and then changed their name to PhotoWorks. In 2008 American Greeting bought PhotoWorks and now they are like any other company that lets you upload photos and have them developed or turned in mugs for gifts…

Started up, went down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 478

Unfriend

In honor of unfriend being chosen as 2009’s Word of the Year by the New Oxford American Dictionary, I just did it to everyone I had previously “friended” on Facebook and MySpace by deleting my accounts on both services tonight.

So long, farewell, I hardly knew ya (sometimes literally.)

Started down, went up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 477

How Was Your Day Dear?

Can you say root canal?

I did not watch this evening’s episode of House. I will plan on downloading the torrent, so I can watch it in HD tomorrow. I understand tonight’s episode has something to do with a sick porn star and absolutely nothing to do with her having a root canal.

Same deal for Castle, don’t watch and download the torrent, their first suspect has airtight alibi, turns out he was having a root canal done at the time of the murder.

I need to buy a Nestle’s $100,000 Bar 100 Grand Candy Bar soon as the Emperor currently has 99,864 miles on the odometer. I’ll be careful to chew it up on only the right side as I wouldn’t want the soft, chewy caramel to pull out the temporary filling from my freshly root canaled tooth.

Modern dentistry is awesome, the hardest part of getting a root canal these days is holding your jaw wide open for 45 minutes straight, well maybe the second hardest after you see the bill.

Started up, went down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 476