Weekly Wilson

We’re on the road again. This time, we’re driving to Nashville for the Labor Day holiday.

The husband has purchased a brand-new Hyundai Tucson. He seems quite taken with it. I would have kept the Cadillac. I have found one nice thing to say about it: the color he selected looks nicer than it did online where it looked horrible.

We drove for 4 hours and are in Effingham, Illiinois.

You have to wonder, if “Effing” a euphemism, as when ex-governor Rod Blagojevich uses it? If so, how do the city fathers feel about the co=opting of their name by Hot Rod?

We watched “Get Him to the Greek” on the in-room movies. Rather crass, but not much else worth watching, unless we wanted to venture into the documentary about Joan Rivers’ life or “Life in Wartime.” It was a compromise pick.

Tomorrow, on to Nashville, TN.

Grant Park flowerbeds.

When it’s a beautiful day in the neighborhood, you want to take a stroll to see what is happening in Grant Park, which happens to be in my neighborhood.

Besides gorgeous flower beds, there was a young man preparing to jump over a piece of park equipment on a small bicycle, for reasons that only he could explain.

Beginning of bike stunt in Grant Park.

Bike begins to go airborne.

He had no ramp, but he did have a friend ready to take pictures. I took a few of Trent, attired in his Burt Reynolds shirt, too, as he went airborne with his toddler-sized mountain bike.

Then there was the woman with the fat golden retrievers who, instead of walking the , was actually pushing them in what looked like a baby carriage. (And here I thought when people talked about how you have to “walk” dogs, they meant that the dogs would be actually walking.

And, last, but certainly not least, there was the giant eyeball, a sculpture positioned in Pritzker Park at State and VanBuren that stands 30 feet high and weighs 14,000 pounds. The downtown Chicago Loop Alliance commissioned the sculpture from Oak Park artist Tony Tasset, 49, and he used 24 pieces of fiberglass to produce a giant sculpture based on his own blue eye, but magnified over 1,000 times. The pieces of the sculpture, which was crafted in Sparta, Wisconsin, had to be trucked in on 13 trucks, according to the evening news.

Drury Design, Glen Ellyn, Illinois

On June 19th, the community of Glen Ellyn had its first book fair. I signed up to participate ($25) and was told (eventually) that my signing spot was the Santa Fe Cafe. I both called and sent literature to Olga Jimenez, the charming owner of the Santa Fe Cafe, a downtown eating establishment that has been written up in “Chicago magazine.

I then set about having myself put on the free “Daily Herald” calendar, saying I would be at the Santa Fe Cafe and I sent some hand-outs to Olga, asking her to post same. She did so on her front door.

Less then a week before the June 19th event, I learned that I was being moved to Drury Designs, a kitchen and bath remodel store on the outskirts of the town. I was to share time/space with a writer of romance novels. I mentioned that Olga and I had already agreed that, since she doesn’t open till 11:00 a.m., I would sign from 11 to 2, rather than 10 to 1, and I was told that I couldn’ t do this because it “wouuldn’t be uniform.”

Actually, many other writers were signing at places around town in connection with the book fair at times other than 10 to 1, including J.A. Konrath, who signed at the downtown pub at night, and John O’Donnell, who had Randy Hundley of the Chicago Cubs come in as a celebrity to help him sell his baseball book.

I also learned that the “keynote” speaker was going to be speaking at a gym, which is not near the downtown, and that tickets were being sold for the speaker. However, none of we less-well-known writers were invited to have a table at the back of this gym while the “keynote” speaker did her thing.

I protested that, having just helped run a book fair in Davenport, Iowa, not having the rank-and-file of writers near the keynote speaker (who is, let’s face it, supposed to be the one who will draw a crowd for the smaller fry) seemed somewhat unfair to those of us stuck in the boonies. And, since I had already made some small efforts to advertise my presence at the Santa Fe Restaurant, moving me at the last minute to a place much further away from the action didn’t seem wise. The response was that the committee wanted to “draw people into the downtown stores.”

I certainly have no argument with drawing people into the downtown stores and I, personally, did my part, buying $80 of dresses for the 17-month old grand daughters, but I do think it (the notice that I must move to a different location than the one I had just told the newspaper) came sort of late in the day, and the reason given (“wouldn’t be uniform”) was bogus.

The romance writer and I saw exactly one woman who was not a committee member, during our 4 hours at the Drury Design, which is a lovely award-winning store. There were 3 other people who came in during the 4 hours, but they had appointments about their kitchen or bathroom remodeling jobs. Jim Drury, the owner of the establishment, was kind enough to buy one thing from each of his 2 authors, which was very nice of him, and I, in turn, said I would post an article about this lovely shop.

I also noted that all 35 to 40 authors could have been fit inside the Drury Design, and the downstairs has a place (separate room) where the keynote speaker could have spoken, although admittedly it is not the size of a school gymnasium. I hope you enjoy the pictures of my set-up inside a kitchen display. The lonely ghost welcomes the readers who did not come to the “Ghostly Tales of Route 66.”

Author  to Sign Books in Drury Design  June 19^th from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. During First Glen Ellyn Book Fair

Author Connie (Corcoran) Wilson will be signing 6 of her most recent book releases within Drury Design from 10 a.m. until 1 p.m. on Saturday, June 19^th, as part of the first Glen Ellyn Book Fair. Nearly all of Mrs. Wilson’s books are priced at (approximately) $10, (with the exception of her 80,000 word novel.)  Three  form a trilogy of true ghost stories, including pictures taken during a 2,800 mile journey along Route 66 in November of 2008 that took the author on the Fort El Reno (Oklahoma) Ghost Tour, the last tour of the Fort’s season.

Connie will also be at Table #164 (Quadrant #2) on Saturday, June 12, from 10 to 2, and on Sunday, June 13th, from 2 to 6 p.m., at Printers Row in Chicago, downtown on Dearborn Street.

Wilson is a long-time writer (54 years) of both nonfiction and fiction, with a teaching career spanning 41 years  spent as adjunct faculty at 6 IA/IL colleges. She has published 8 books covering many genres. There’s literally “something for everyone” in her books published by 6  small independent publishers since 2002.

She began writing at age 10 for her hometown (Independence, Iowa) newspaper and continued writing in high school, college and beyond, while studying at Iowa, Berkeley, Northern Illinois University and the University of Chicago..

Connie attended the University of Iowa on a Ferner-Hearst Journalism Scholarship and graduated as an English major with a Journalism minor. She taught writing both to junior high school students and  to college students  in  writing classes at every college in the Illinois/Iowa Quad Cities. She has also interviewed many famous writers for publication, including Kurt Vonnegut,  John Irving, David Morrell, Anne Perry, William F. Nolan, Frederik Pohl and Joe Hill. Recently, she attended the Hawaii Writers’ Conference and she will be at Table 164 at Printers Row on June 12 and June 13. On May 8^th she helped head up the First Annual Quad City Book Fair in Davenport, Iowa.

Wilson’s early writing was primarily for 7 newspapers, including 15 years (1970-1985) spent serving as the film and book critic for the Quad City Times (Davenport, IA) while employed full-time as a teacher at Silvis (IL) Junior High School. In 1987 Connie founded the second Sylvan Learning Center in the state of Iowa (Bettendorf, Iowa) and in 1995, she founded a Prometric Testing Center. She served as CEO of both businesses while also writing humor columns for the Moline (Illinois) Dispatch and raising 2 children with her husband of 43 years, Craig.

Today, she writes regularly for 7 blogs, including Associated Content, which named her its Content Producer of the Year for her political coverage during the 2008 presidential campaign (AC is a Top 50 blog and was recently bought by Yahoo). She also has her own blog, www.WeeklyWilson.com. You can find more information about the author at www.ConnieCWilson.com.

Today, Connie continues to  review film and television for www.GetYourGoodNews.com , an online newspaper in the Quad Cities, and she has written for www.blogforiowa.com (archived); www.speakaboutit.com (archived); www.JollyJo.com (second coming stories); and www.helium.com (archived). On March 20th of this year, Connie was named the Writer of the Year by the (Davenport, Iowa) Midwest Writing Center, receiving its David R. Collins Memorial Award.

With the sale of both her businesses in 2002, Connie (Corcoran) Wilson has turned her attention to writing longer works. She has published 6 books since 2002 and 8, total (none of them self-published).

Her most recent release is the third book (Volume III) in a trilogy of true ghost stories set along Route 66, entitled Ghostly Tales of Route 66. (www.GhostlyTalesofRoute66.com). The books are PG-rated, small and amply illustrated, beginning in Chicago with Volume I and moving along the Mother Road as far as Oklahoma. Volume II picks up in Ft. Smith, Arkansas, site of an earlier version of the route, and takes the reader to Arizona. The final volume (Vol. III) goes from Arizona to California and was just released on June 4th.

On May 27^th, Connie was at  BookExpo America signing copies of her short story collection Hellfire & Damnation (www.HellfireandDamnationtheBook.com), a collection of short stories with the unifying theme of  the sins punished at each of the 9 circles of Hell in Dante’s Inferno. With an introduction by William F. Nolan, the 15-story collection has been widely praised and is nominated for the Horror Writers’ Association Bram Stoker Award this year.

In 2004, Connie collected her previously published Dispatch humor columns to produce Both Sides Now, a collection of David Sedaris-like humorous essays. In December of 2008 Lachesis Published her first collaborative novel, a romantic sci-fi thriller entitled Out of Time (www.OutofTimetheNovel.com), which was pitched to the producer of the Transformers movies in Burbank, California in June.

By August, ARCs (Advanced Reader Copies) of It Came from the ‘70s: From ‘The Godfather’ to ‘Apocalypse Now’ will be released from a small Rhode Island publisher (The Merry Blacksmith). The book is a 250 page nonfiction compilation of 50 movie reviews Connie wrote for the Quad City Times between 1970 to 1979, with an illustration every 3 pages, major cast, and interactive trivia (“Who did the studio really want to play Rocky in the movie of the same name?” Answers are upside down on the page; no fair cheating.)

As she said of the book, “Each review is like a tiny time capsule; the book could never be written this way today, as the reviews were written when  movie classics like The Godfather, Star Wars, Close Encounters of the Third Kind and Alien were new. It might mention that Sally Field was on Johnny Carson that night, talking about Alien, for instance.”

Stop by Drury Designs and get a signed copy of Connie’s books. The ghost book trilogy, if purchased as a set of 3m receives a $5 discount from the individual price of $9.95. Check the blogs above, as video trailers appear there for  Hellfire & Damnation and Out of Time.

Since 2004, Connie has also been the owner of a condo in the Central Station District of Chicago (Lakeside on the Park), keeping her in touch with her 14-month old twin granddaughters, who live with her son, Scott and his wife, Jessica, in Bridgeport.

BookExpo America is ending. It is Thursday, May 27, 2010. I’d be barraging you with facts, but I boxed up my notebook and sent it home with my leftover books, from my signing from 2 p.m. on at the HWA (Horror Writers’ Association) booth. I’ve been to this for about 5 or 6 years now. I remember that the first one I attended was in Chicago and my book Both Sides Now was coming out, so that would have been 2004. I took my daughter-in-law (Jessica) that time and we ended up meeting one of the founders of Lightning Source and I arranged a book tour of the Hastings Bookstore chain.

Then, the event was held in Washington, D.C., one year, and this allowed my spouse to accompany me and visit various monuments while I trolled the aisles of this largest-in-North-America book event.

It was held in New York City most times, and, because the publishing industry is here, it was finally decided that it would remain here permanently.

Last year’s BEA was very dismal and scaled-back. People were cutting down on all unnecessary expenses and the entire mood was blacker. I helped man (woman?) the BEA booth and heard Captain Sullenberger. Our booth this year was in a much better, more heavily traveled spot, and I had a signing time from 2 p.m. to 3 p.m. I wondered if anyone would know me or know about my book.
For whatever reason…(and most said it had to do with reading the BEA information in the programs provided online)…I had an abundance of signers. I haven’t counted yet, but I think I easily had at least 50 people come asking for my book, and I got the e-mail information of all but a handful, so they can be notified of future books, which, in my case, will be the third volume of Ghostly Tales of Route 66: Arizona to California, coming out any minute, and, after that, It Came from the ‘70s: From The Godfather to Apocalypse Now. From now on, all dedicated blogs will have PayPal capability, because one never knows if one’s publisher has distributed the book as widely as one would like.

While here, I managed to take in the play “Fences” with Denzel Washington. I was in the middle of the second row and the production was amazing. (It received a standing ovation.) I will write more about this, but not until my boxed-up-and-mailed-home notes are back in my possession.

After schlepping my books to the Jacob Javits Center and dropping them off at the table on Wednesday, I arrived this morning with my trusty dolly (for eventually moving the remaining books to FedEx) and my bookmarks, business cards and post cards, plus the piece I put together that will go out in a mailing to the active, voting members of HWA some time in June. (Probably after the Printers Row Book Fair and the Glen Ellyn Book Fair.)

Because the time was condensed from what used to be a 5-day event, there was not enough time to hit museums, but I did get in a play (see above) and I attended the Breakfast and Lunch today, in addition to signing for 2 and ½ hours.

The breakfast featured Jon Stewart introducing Condoleeza Rice, who has written a new book that focuses on her family and upbringing. I have many notes of the witty things Stewart said, but those will wait until I recap same back in the Quad Cities. John Grisham was also on the panel, as was the writer of Water for Elephants. Her new book features apes that are being communicated with via sign language and computers at the Ape Institute in Des Moines, Iowa, so I’m going to be interested in reading this one. (Water for Elephants is being made into a movie now.)

The afternoon M.C. was the very same comic that Sean Leary has done articles on recently, the co-star of “King of Queens” Patton Oswalt, who appeared at the Hilltop Theater and was accused of (allegedly) using other comics’ material. I noticed that, this year, instead of an entire book, we got a chapter, at best. Jon Stewart provided a chapter only. Likewise, Patton Oswalt provided only an autobiographical chapter that dealt with his appearances in a comedy club near Vancouver, where the owner tried to stiff him on paying for his hotel room. It was not riveting reading, and I have read all of it, since it was only about 10 pages long. (Last year, we were given South of Broad by Pat Conroy, and I still haven’t finished that huge book, one year later.)

At the noon luncheon, Patton Oswalt introduced Christopher Hitchins. I had just entered the stairwell with Christopher Hitchins, who was holding a drink of something at the time. (It reminded me of the time I ended up in an elevator with Mickey Rooney and his 8^th wife, because Mickey took the wrong public elevator on his way to speak.)

Hitchins, who writes for “Vanity Fair” recited limericks. Yes. Limericks. He comes across as a bit of an effete intellectual snob, and apparently this is the way he wishes to be viewed. I do read his stuff, and I occasionally enjoy it. I remember one particular piece about vacationing in Iraq (one particular part that is “safe”) and I remember thinking, “Yeah. That’ll happen…….not!”)  Hitchins left rather quickly to “catch a plan to London” and we were left with a very bright fellow who, in writing about the future, invented the term “cyberspace,” supposedly, and had such a monotonous, droning delivery of what I’m sure may well be a brilliant book that I gave that book to table mate Ellen Datlow

I did keep the ape book and Christopher Hitchin’s, which is entitled “Hitch 22”, but I’m not in the same hurry to read it as I was to read the sequel to “1,000 Splendid Suns,” the author who spoke at least year’s BEA.

I’m at a Holiday Inn on W. 26^th Street that is brand new and very nice. My only complaint: no bathtub.

After I boxed up my unused books and the new ones mentioned above, I took the lot to FedEx to mail home. Then, I went to a nearby McDonald’s and ate a burger, since I couldn’t get a cab for an hour. The cab delivered me back to my room and, after going from 6 a.m. till now (11:00 p.m.) I’m calling it a night.
More later from home.

http://edelweiss.abovethetreeline.com/ProductDetailPage.aspx?audienceGroup=6098&sku=1935590073

 Follow that link and read about the book I’m taking to the BEA, “Hellfire and Damnation.” I’ll be signing on May 27th at 2 p.m.

In the film Letters to Juliet, Amanda Seyfried (see previous article on Associated Content) comes of age as the bride rather than always the bridesmaid. Cast in most films as the best friend, Seyfried portrays Sophie Hall, a young “New Yorker” fact checker who travels to Italy with her boyfriend (Gail Garcia Bernal) and finds true love. The true love she finds is not her boyfriend, however, as any veteran moviegoer will suspect is going to be the case.

The title refers to the practice begun by Ettore Solimani in 1937 of replying to the love letters for advice left at the Juliet memorial in Verona, Italy. As many as 7,000 letters come in, and, in real life, twelve secretaries answer them. (2 are men). It’s even possible to send them by e-mail at info@julietclub.com or to snail mail them addressed to “Juliet, Verona, Italy.”

In the film, Sophie Hall (Amanda Seyfried) and her soon-to-be husband Victor (Gael Garcia Bernal) take a “pre-honeymoon” trip to Italy, since Victor is soon going to be opening a restaurant in New York City. Victor is the kind of fiancée who seems like he has serious ADHD or some other ailment that renders you overly effusive. No matter what the comment, he would exclaim as though it was the Second Coming. He was very irritating after about 10 minutes. One wondered what Sophie’s character found so charming about him, especially since his workaholic tendencies immediately manifested and he was off to this wine auction or that vineyard, leaving Sophie to amuse herself in gorgeous Italian locations like Siena, Tuscany, Soave, and Verona, where Sophie follows the girl gathering the letters to Juliet and discovers the fact-checkers (reduced in number for the film version, and all female).

As luck would have it, Sophie also discovers a letter long-hidden behind a loose brick, which turns out to be from Claire Smith (Vanessa Redgrave) of England. Sophie answers Claire’s letter, which is 50 years old, and Claire and her grandson Charlie, whom she raised, come to Verona looking for a love of Claire’s life whom she knew when 15.

One of the flaws in the film occurs when Sophie is asked by the letter-writers if she is the English translator, since all of them seem to speak perfect English. Another is trying to pass Vanessa Redgrave off as being 65, when she is actually 73. Redgrave is more than equal to the task of portraying Claire, being the only actress to win an Oscar, an Emmy, a Tony, at Cannes, a Golden Globe and a Screen Actors’ Guild Award, but she does not appear to be 65 years young. Her grandson, Charlie, as played by Christopher Egan, who resembles a younger Ryan Philippe may look good, but he moves gracelessly and has about as much charm as a pet goldfish.

If Victor was annoying in his effervescence, Charlie is equally as unlikable in his cold fish British way. There is even a line when Charlie says of his Grandmother Claire, who raised him,  “She took the angry obnoxious young man I was and turned me into the simply unpleasant type I am today.” I couldn’t have said it better, and I’m still wondering why Sophie, with her double major from Brown with a minor in Latin, her writing talent, and her good sense didn’t dump both of these Lotharios.

The thing that makes the film fascinating is watching Vanessa Redgrave reunited with Franco Nero, her real-life husband since 2006. Since most of the film from the point that Claire and Charlie show up involves Sophie riding with them to find the love of Claire’s young life, whom she lost 50 years ago (should have made it more like 60 years ago), we know that eventually that individual will be found. The fact that it is Franco Nero, now a handsome, well-preserved 69 years young, just makes the film ring truer.

A little history:  Vanessa Redgrave was married to Director Tony Richardson from 1962 until 1967, but he left her for French actress Jeanne Moreau. Vanessa met Franco Nero while playing Queen Guinevere in 1967’s “Camelot” and the two produced a son, Carlo Gabriel Nero. However, their paths drifted apart, and Vanessa Redgrave was with Timothy Dalton (of the ’87 and ’89 James Bond films “License to Kill” and “The Living Daylights” from 1971 through 1986.) It was only after 37 years, in their case, that Vanessa Redgrave and Franco Nero rediscovered their great romance and married on New Year’s Eve of 2006. In fact, it was Franco Nero who gave away the recently departed Natasha Richardson when she married Liam Neeson.

It is perfect casting to have the two reunited lovers played by two real-life reunited lovers when lines like, “People want to believe in love” and “I didn’t know that true love had an expiration date” resound throughout the film, courtesy of screenwriters Jose Rivera and Tim Sullivan.  Gary Winick directed the film and Ellen Barkin was one of the film’s producers.

For me, the gorgeous scenery, very reminiscent of Diane Lane’s “Under the Tuscan Sun” or Keanu Reeves’ film “A Walk in the Clouds,” was a great treat, and the female leads were fine (although I do have the previously noted comment about Redgrave trying to play 65.) However, both of the male leads were lacking. Hugh Dancey was originally supposed to play the Victor lead, and I’d never seen Christopher Egan, who plays Charlie, before. Not only does Charlie come off as stiff and unlikeable throughout, there is almost no reason to believe that the two will fall madly in love, when they have only one chaste love scene.

The use of “Love Story” (Taylor Swift) in one park scene is great for music selection and the phrases, “When we’re speaking about love, it’s never too late’ and “If what you felt then was true love, why shouldn’t it be true now?” will probably spice up some high school reunions this season. The main reason to see the film, however, is the scenery and the performance by Amanda Seyfried,  finally coming into her own as a leading lady.

The old saying is: “Let sleeping babies lie,” and we don’t mess with that when on vacation here in sunny Mexico. Ava Wilson…surely a dead ringer for the Gerber’s baby…is dead to the world, with finger strategically placed on left cheek. And that’s exactly the way we left her until she woke up, poolside.

Elise Wilson, (Ava’s 14-month old twin), has that clasped corpse-hand thing going on as she sleeps on her side of the double stroller. All that fresh air will do a girl in, especially if she’s as fair as Elise, who is the blonde to Ava’s dark-haired beauty. (Check out the “Dora the Explorer” hats!)

This blonde is a slightly older model, wearing bunny ears on Easter. I read somewhere that it was “all the rage” on Easter for cute girls like this one to post such pics on Facebook and elsewhere. This one’s just to say, “Come on in! The water’s fine!”

And Happy Easter!

Thirteen of us descended on Cancun for the (annual) trip to the Royal Sands and Royal Islander properties.  Some went to Coba (pyramid site in the jungle) today, but I contented myself with falling down on my way into the pool and watching “American Idol” in Mexico, courtesy of a Michigan station. Here are some pictures of the trip. The first one shows the drop off to the water from the beach, caused by the resort’s putting in $40 million of new sand after the beach was severely damaged, both by weather events and by erosion. This was done after the Hurricane in 2005, but it has become necessary, again, and the drop-off to get to the water is about 5 feet.

Ava (in hat) is 14 months old and was completely fascinated by the parrot that was being “posed” with various tourists (here, another little girl). She could not quite figure out what was going on with that bird on that little Asian girl’s head. The men with the bird did not want anyone else to take a picture of their bird without paying pesos for the privilege, but we “papparazzi” have to get pictures of the small fry in our party when and where we can.

Cousin Hannah Nelson takes Ava for a swim in her “floatie.” Ava’s twin, Elise did not take to the floating toy quite as readily, but Ava was up for birds or water or sand or whatever you threw at her.

Dad Scott holds Ava…who gives the camera a winning smile…at dinner at La Dolce Vita on Easter Sunday.

What’s a little sand among friends when you’re only 14 months old?

Elise laughs out loud, while Ava plays with her foot on the beach at the Royal Sands, Cancun, Mexico.

Polly want a cracker….and $6 dollars US for a picture with the blue bird perched on one’s head or shoulder or other portions of one’s anatomy.

Parrot Entrepreneur holds parrot preparatory to collecting cash for the purpose of posing with the blue bird.

Elise makes some adjustments to the sand on Ava’s shoulder, while they share the beach outside the Royal Sands on Easter break.

When you’re outside all day and you have duties with parrots and sand and keeping your sister out of trouble, it takes it out of a kid. The girls are totally flaked out poolside in their stroller.

Sister-in-law Wendy (Wilson) from St. Louis and I share a smile as we

debark from the van, where Wendy was loaded in like luggage. (That’s

what happens when you are trying to transport 13 people at a time!)

Fort Lauderdale, Florida, southernmost tip of the United States. Never gets below 48. Yearly annual temperature of 77. Never gets above 98. Or so say the guide books.

So, what’s the temperature here? Uh…well….it was in the forties yesterday, but it has risen to the fifties and sixties. But, tomorrow, it may get up to 78 degrees…….!……And rain.

We have checked into Parrot Key, a very cool brand-new place that I scoped out online. I’m only sorry I didn’t book it online, as I would now have enough www.hotel.com bookings (after our trip across the Southwest on Route 66) to give us one free night’s rental.

This place has a 96% approval rating, and it’s easy to see why. For one thing, it’s new. We have a 3 bedroom, 3 and 1/2 bath house, with a private little sandy backyard area which will be great if it does get up to 79 degrees tomorrow. There are 4 pools, I’ve read, and I’ve actually seen 3 of them. There are palms and ferns surrounding us on all sides.

I have now read, aloud, 200 pages of “The Dome.” It take me approximately one minute to read one page, so the trip has yielded 200 pages of an over-1000 page novel by Stephen King, his newest. So far, Stephen, we’re both liking it, although we’re both concerned that the new Sheriff has sworn in Junior as a Deputy. But nevermind about that. Let me return to our trip here from Fort Lauderdale, through places with names like Key Largo (remember Bogie and Bacall in that one); Plantation Key; Windley Key; Upper Matecumbe Key; Lower Matecumbe Key.

Somewhere near Islamorada and a place called Wilson Bay we stopped to have lunch at a place that had boats and pelicans galore.  We pulled into a rustic-looking ramshackle bay area where you could rent boats (for $500) with a name like “Woo Woo’s,” a place called Whale Harbor. The lobster/shrimp bisque was absolutely delicious. I also ordered the shrimp salad, thinking it would be like chicken salad. It was more lettuce in a bowl, with mandarin oranges and a shish-ka-bob inserted in the bowl with 6 shrimps. The bisque made up for my misunderstanding of the term “shrimp salad,” which, for me, indicated, as with tuna salad and chicken salad, that the shrimp would be diced and mixed with other similar ingredients.

I took the pictures of pelicans that you see here during lunch.

Then, we took off through Fiesta Key, Long Key, Duck Key, Grassy Key, Seven-Mile Bridge, Boot Key, Vaca Key, Big Pine Key, Little Torch Key, Middle Torch Key, Big Torch Key, Summerland Key, Upper Sugarloaf Key, Saddlebunch Keys, Big Coppitt Key, Stock Island, Boca Chica Key (my personal favorite) and, ultimately, Key West, the southernmost point in the United States, home to Mallory Square and the Duval Crawl and cheering when the sun goes down and, hopefully, warmer weather tomorrow than we have had, to date.

It sounds like tomorrow is “the day” to try to catch some rays. There may not be many to catch before the rains move in, but at least we’re not experiencing Snowmageddon back in Illinois/Iowa.