Happy Birthday Kevin

Today started out early with a trip to "A Perfect Day Cafe" in North Vernon, IN.  Not all of Dar's
Army Wife group could make it, but they were very nice and welcoming.  Chase, the 18 month old was very well behaved and enjoyed his blueberry muffin.  I had a banana nut muffin and the worlds hottest cappuccino.  Yes, I burned my tongue...alot...it still hurts. Ignoring the third degree tongue burn, it was a charming little coffee house with friendly staff and good coffee (once I could taste it).  I have to say that the muffin was your typical pre-packaged buy in bulk muffin.  Not bad, but nothing special.  My sister really enjoyed her caramel macchiato and croissant with cinnamon butter.

After breakfast/coffee we headed off to Wallyworld to buy a turkey and the other Thanksgiving necessities  It's also my brother in law Kevin's birthday, so we got gifts and cupcakes.  I got him a jar of peanut butter (my sister says he's a big fan of my least favorite food on the planet).  He actually seemed pretty pleased with it.

Then, home for lunch and naptime.  Aunt Donna actually pretty much also made use of naptime by going upstairs and watching the Food Network.  I ended up dozing a bit until my phone rang.  Apparently, my glasses are ready for me in Lynchburg, VA.  Yeah...gonna be awhile before I'll be picking them up.

Kids got home from school...insanity...insanity...get dressed to go out because it's dad's birthday!  Dad chose Mexican, which was too bad for him.  The kids insisted on the full birthday treatment

Well, they insisted on MOST of the full birthday treatment...the wife insisted on the rest of it

Torture by cheap tequila.  Of course, put a funny hat anywhere near the kids...

Which led to other general silliness

Once we got home, there were cupcakes and over excited dramatic sugar highs.  Perfectly normal night pretty much.

I found out that my sister's taste in TV hasn't changed much over the years.  She DVR's 90210 and she loved the original as a kid.  It was just like old times...LOL

Tomorrow...outlet shopping!

On the Road Again

So, here we are on the teeny tiny netbook with the teeny tiny keys sharing an adventure.  This one not as exciting, but an adventure nonetheless.  I am visiting the Mayes family - my sister, brother-in-law, two nieces and nephew in a small town in Indiana.  The BIL is a military guy and is stationed nearby. I am here for the most family-ish of all holidays...Thanksgiving (commonly known in my family as Turkey Day).

First of all, let's just skip yesterday. Over 8 unrelenting hours of the most boring highway in the U S of  A...I kid you not.  First of all...West Virginia...wild and not so wonderful.  And it was offseason for the Bluegrass of Kentucky.  I started calling random old friends just to talk and keep me awakeNext Sunday should be loads of fun too.

I got a little lost at the end thanks to Gremlin the Garmin and Google Maps not agreeing on directions.  I think it may be time to replace Gremlin.  We've traveled down many roads together and he's kept my butt on the road home...but he's a bit old and doesn't know his way around new addresses.

Anyway, got here and just relaxed a bit. My nephew thought my camera very interesting, so I showed him how it worked

So we took a picture of his sisters horsing around on the couch.

 I am not going to get the chance to sleep in much this trip...my sister has a fun filled itinerary planned for me.  This morning I was up for a breakfast of bagels and coffee and we hit the road to Nashville....that's Nashville, Indiana. Basically, a quaint little town with lots of cute, historical homes that have been turned into shops selling everything from antiques and crafts to candy and t-shirts.

A lot of the old buildings were neat old Victorians, but there were some funkier buildings too...

  

And we all know how much I love old churches and whatnot...so I had to take a picture of this one:

It was a chilly, drizzly day but sis and I are both big fans of the shopping and had a great time.  I even managed to get a Christmas gift.

Darlene made Mom's mac and cheese for dinner.  We had fudge for desert (she's a horrible influence and I got a pound as well.  mmmmmmmmmm fudge)

Afterwards, Chase decided to play in his favorite kitchen cabinet.  After cleaning it out of containers, it makes a great place for hide and seek!

Ok, sleep time.  I've got to get up early for coffee with the Army wives.

And I'm Home

I actually followed my schedule today for a change.  Got up on time, showered, finished packing, packed up the car, did the last bit of straightening up and headed over to the diner for breakfast by 9.

I got seated at the same booth as yesterday and got the pecan pancakes, with a scrambled egg on the side and a bottomless cup of coffee.  While last night's dinner wasn't bad..it paled in comparison to the yummyness of this morning's breakfast.  I recommend always getting breakfast at the 4 Corners Diner whenever you are in Atlantic Beach....even if you are there for dinner. My waitress from last night was the hostess this morning and we had a nice talk as her post at the cash register was right next to my booth.  She is from West Virginia but hates visiting as driving on the winding mountain roads scares her.

After I left the diner, I stopped at the Atlantic Beach Seafood Market again and got another pound of those yummy shrimp along with some flounder...as I had brought along my cooler.  Had 'em packed in ice and I hit the road.  I took a slightly different route as I used the causeway from Atlantic Beach to Morehead City rather than the one at the other end of the island...which is the way I had arrived.

I saw a lot more of what Hurricane Irene had done as there were tons of trees down everywhere along the route.  Most had been cut up already in stacks of firewood, but the stumps and exposed tree roots were everywhere.

And back to the 5 hours of cotton balls and tobacco flowers...

I got home around 4pm to an ecstatic cat and a chilly house.  Looks like we had some cold nights while I was gone.  I unpacked the cold stuff from the cooler and divided up the seafood into freezer bags.  I cooked some  (steamed) shrimp and some (baked) flounder for dinner, which I had along with my cole slaw...yummy.

I'm mostly unpacked and cleaned up the kitchen.  Citizen Kane is on TV and I think I'll go to bed early.  Got to get up early and go to work tomorrow.  All good things....

A Reenactment and Saying Goodbye to the Beach

I finally got it together and headed out to Fort Macon to catch some of the Civil War battle reenactment.  I actually missed most of it as I believe I heard some sort of gunshot noise when I was arriving...and that was all I heard of THAT.

They were still there for the next few hours going about their business of pretending to be Blues and Grays with a bit of lecturing thrown in there.  It does appear that they were pretty authentic and had camped out overnight at the fort.  I wandered about trying to sneakily take candid shots of them...while trying not to include the small crowd of us modern folks.

This is a small group of Confederate soldiers congregating at the entrance to the fort.

A union soldier on the parade grounds cleaning his rifle

A group of Confederates socializing.  There were quite a few women playing their parts.  Most wore simple dresses, but this one lady had a very lovely dress with some interesting green and purple trim.

I also managed to discover new parts of the fort I'd never explored before having mostly stuck to the parade grounds previously.  Here's a model of the fort that is in the visitor's center

As you can see, the parade grounds are in the center, then there is the main part of the fort...outside of that is a moat-like area with another structure around that.  There are more places to explore in that outer ring.

When you take the steps down from the main entrance, this is what you see when you round the corner...a mysterious room in the outer wall.

Inside, there are a series of rooms like this one.  Nothing in there but some water...and no signs explaining what the rooms were used for.

I wandered about a bit and tried to stay out of the mud (it had rained overnight and was still drizzly on and off).

This is the secondary entrance that leads from the parade grounds to the moat area. Anyway, I was diggin' the fort as you can see...but I think I saw all that I could.  However, this time the gift shop was still open.

I got a Christmas tree ornament and a cobalt blue "onion" bottle, similar to the ones they found in the wreckage of the Queen Anne's Revenge. Then, it was off to do more shopping...well, only a little more.  All of the cheezy surf shops around here are having "end of season" sales, so it's my chance to buy cheezy souvenirs.  I didn't get much and managed to get a couple of Christmas gifts while I was at it.

I did eat dinner out at the 4 Corners Diner here in Atlantic Beach.  I had breakfast there once with my mother and it is EXACTLY as I remembered it.  Same blue and white tile floor, same yellow tables and fake wood booths.  I got one of the dinner specials of a bowl of their homemade clam chowder and a sandwich.  For my sandwich I chose a shrimp burger (which basically means a bunch of fried shrimp on a hamburger bun.  The chowder was really good...as were the hush puppies I ordered.  The shrimp burger was ok.  The shrimp had not been de-veined which, fried or no, affects the taste for me. Still the waitress was awesome and it was a cool place.  I brought most of my hush puppies back with me.

I got back to the condo and decided to head out to the beach.  It is another chilly, windy day, so I got my hoodie and kept the sneakers on.  Grabbed the shell bag and camera and headed out to say goodbye to the ocean.  It was freakin windy!

Nice hairdoo huh?  I walked about a mile in the direction of the defunct fishing pier...which means I ended up in Pine Knoll Shores, which is more beach houses and less condo resorts.  Although it was pretty windy, the surf wasn't too rough and the waves were breaking close to shore.

The beach was pretty deserted except for the birds.

It started to get pretty dark, so I headed back quickly.  Back in the room now and gotta finish this up so I can pack, do some cleaning up, and get to bed.  Gonna try really hard to get an early start!

I doan wanna go homeeeeeeeeeeee.

I Went to the Beach for This?

I am still in my room.  Well, truthfully, I have left the room but only to go to the laundry room. Unfortunately for me, I wasn't the only person with the laundry plan today and it's taking me awhile to get that done and get outta here.  While my stuff is in the dryer, I am having lunch...A.K.A. cleaning out the fridge.  I think I will eat out again tonight.

Laundry should be done soon and I think I'll head down to Fort Macon to check out the reenactment.  Maybe a bit of shopping after that?

Ahoy! More Friday Fun.

I had a few good hours left of the day, so I decided to head to Fort Macon.  Best known as a Civil War era fort, it was actually in use in WWII.  It is now in a state park all the way at the far end of the island on the other side of Atlantic beach.

There have actually been a lot of changes since I was there last with Mom.  There is a huge visitor's center now (no pics of that, not that thrilling) where the store is located (closed before I got there).  I got there a little late and didn't get to do a lot of exploring...

This is the entryway to the main part of the fort

These are the only two original cannon still on the grounds of the fort

This is the view from inside one of the barrel shaped rooms of the fort looking out to the central parade grounds.

Some of the rooms they had set up with creepy mannequins to show how the rooms would have looked while in use.  This one is a WWII setup... 

This is the stairway up to the higher battlements where most of the cannon were.  The railings are pretty ornate and, interestingly enough, are replicas of the originals.  

This is the view from the fort.  I'm pretty sure that is Shackleford Banks we're looking at out there in the water.  Those semi-circles are where the cannon were mounted.

The State Park is raising money to buy cannon like this one to replace the missing armament of the fort.  I found out that there is going to be a Civil War reenactment this weekend...I may try to stop back tomorrow to check it out. 

The Fort closed at 5:30, but the park closes at 7, so I decided to check out the beach.  This is a strolling along the beach place only as the water is very treacherous.  I decided to keep my sneakers on and headed out across the dunes.  It had gotten quite cold by now, and windy...I was glad I had headed back to the condo after going to Beaufort to pick up my hoodie. 

I soon found that this was also an excellent shelling beach

Since there was no swimming, surfing, wading....there was fishing.  Where there is fishing, there are seagulls

't

It was actually kind of funny as there were a line of seagulls watching the surf and the fishermen. Just a little army of gulls. 

Now it was almost 7 and time to get home and eat.  I had the crab cakes I got the other day, so stopped at the grocery store to pick up a couple of things and popped in to the cheezy beach gift shop next door as well to pick up the ubiquitous salt water taffy to bring back for my co-workers.

I mention the taffy because my day doesn't end well.  The taffy was on sale as it is the end of season, so I got a couple of boxes and decided to quality control it.  Yeah...it pulled off one of my crowns.  I brushed my teeth really well and rinsed and jammed the thing back on and it seems stuck on there pretty good.  I may need to pick up some Fixodent tomorrow just in case...darnitall. So...Boss, if you are reading this, I will need to visit the dentist when I get home to get this glued back on. 

Anyway, I made a baked potato with my crab cakes...which I pan fried. Served up with some of my cole slaw.

MMMMMmmm...good stuff.  Crab cakes were good and the slaw has been marinating the exact right amount of time.  

Tomorrow, I need to do laundry and start packing up.  Leaving Sunday...booohoooo.  Hopefully, I will have time for a bit more shopping and maybe check out the show at the fort tomorrow. OK it is late...it is tomorrow...gotta get some shut eye

Talk Like a Pirate Friday Adventures

Aaaaaargh...Ahoy me mateys!  Unfortunately, it appears that no one in Beaufort knew to talk like a pirate.  It was a gray, cold, intermittently drizzly day.  Not a day to plan a beach trip and a perfect day to go to the North Carolina Maritime Museum in Beaufort. I mostly went to see the artifacts from the Queen Anne's Revenge, Blackbeard's flagship that he grounded (most say on purpose) not far off the coast of North Carolina right near Beaufort. Again, we love the post busy season visiting as parking was easy...and there is never an admission fee.

I'll be honest, I'm not hung up on boats.  Ok, watching them can be pretty, and I like boat rides, but I'm not interested in learning a heckuva lot about them.  So, let's get right to the artifacts:

This is one of the two bells found.  This one has no foundry marks, like the other one, but that one was on a turntable that spun around and the light was low....so, this one it is.

Some nifty navigational instruments...

If you're looking for pirate treasure, this is about as close as you're gonna get.  The little glass vials contain gold dust.  Remember, the theory is that Blackbeard ran QAR aground himself and would have had plenty of time to strip everything of value off of the ship.

Here is one of the cannon found in the wreckage.  It has been cleaned and conserved...last time I saw it, it looked more like this:

While this isn't a picture of the exact "blob" of stuff that the cannon was originally embedded in, most of the artifacts are located in these mounds.  They have to be X-rayed first to see exactly what is in there before they can be separated and conserved.  The Blackbeard exhibit was a lot smaller last time I was here.

Here are some bits of window from the ship.  Those dark skinny things are bits of the lead came that held the panes together (similar to what you would see in stained glass windows)

Here are the bits of a pistol...of course, the wood bits are gone.

Here is a little ship model of the QAR that was in a display.  I am surprised this picture turned out so well as I couldn't use a flash and the little sucker was spinning around.

The rocks are from the ship's ballast.  In the foreground are actually parts of the wooden hull.  Only a teeny part of the hull still exists...salt water is not good for wood preservation.

There was more, I could post all day.  I'll upload the rest of them to an online album when I get home. At this point, I was getting hungry and there was still the gift shop to visit (I got a mug that had pictures of several different pirate flags in case you are wondering...).

Leaving the museum, I set off to find lunch in downtown Beaufort.  I walked up to the place named after the ship whose remains I just visited (um...remember the photo from a few days ago of the sign?  The Queen Anne's Revenge?) but there wasn't anything on the menu that looked like something yummy for lunch.  I continued my search.  I ended up back across the street from the museum at a quaint little place called The Spouter Inn. One of the specials on the sandwich board outside drew me in.  Even though it was cool and breezy, I opted to sit outside for the waterfront view:

Andddddddddddd....they had Yuengling on tap!  How cool was that?  Time for a pint with me lunch matey!

Doesn't that look yummy?  It's a crabcake and grilled portobello mushroom on a bed of salad greens.  Yeah, I know the mushroom seems invisible, but it's there.  The waitress recommended the citrus cilantro dressing and I give her kudos for that...good choice.  The crabcake was yummy and crabby...and the salad was good too.  Of course, I had to get my Yuengling in the picture...LOL.  Desert was apple crumble with a bit of vanilla ice cream.  What a lovely lunch!

The day is only half over here and I have more to get to.  Give me a few and I'll continue in a new post as blogger is choking on this one.

Thursday is for Shackleford Banks

 Shackleford Banks is one of the main reasons I came to this area.  My mother and I discovered it a few years ago when we stayed at a timeshare through her timeshare membership.  The place we stayed was further up the island, on the other side of the causeway.  Anyway, we heard about the horses on the island and decided to go.  Never saw a horse, but fell in love with the shelling!  The local claim is that this is one of the best places for shelling on the East Coast, and I totally believe it!

So, my goals for today were to see the horses and to find a Scotch Bonnet seashell.  The ferries out to Shackleford don't start until 10am this time of year, so there was no rush to get up early.  Also, I didn't want to fight the possible crowd for the first ferry, so I was planning on 11...it ended up being 10:45...which was cool as that is the time I got there. There are several ferry services, all charging $15 for the trip and I took the first one I happened upon and the easiest to spot Outer Banks Ferry Service which is right next to the Maritime Museum.

Captain Jim took our half full ferry out to the island, pointing out landmarks as we went along.  As a part of the Cape Lookout National Seashore, there is no dock and you just jump off the front of the ferry.  We got there at 11 and I had reserved a return trip on the 3pm ferry.  Luckily, I had slathered myself in SPF 30 before leaving the condo this morning. In my backpack I had water, food, my sneakers, beach towel, 4 different sunscreens (face, hair, lips, and body) camera, cell phone, and a couple of net bags for gathering seashells. I was wearing my water shoes and had decided against a bathing suit...so it was shorts and a t-shirt.

I immediately headed to the the southernmost end of the island, which is where I remembered the best shelling to be.  Unfortunately, the recent hurricane had done a number on the dunes and beaches on Shackleford Banks.  Captain Jim had pointed out the dunes at the ferry landing, which were now tiny bumps through which we could view the ocean side of the island.  Apparently, before Irene, they were over 20 feet high and completely blocked the view to the other side.

Still, there were shells...lots and lots of shells.  I rounded the point of the island and wandered about a half mile up on the ocean side picking up shells as I went along.  There were a bunch of surfers there, so I plopped down on my beach towel and had a snack.

This was the view from the spot I plopped down at.  I also re-applied the sunscreen as I had been wading through the surf to find seashells.  I surprisingly found a lot more sand dollars this time...

The surfers were too far out to really get a good photo of, but there were quite a few and the surf was ideal for them (too rough for swimming really). I packed back up and decided to walk further...took off the beach shoes and went barefoot for the rest of the day too.

Although it was quite breezy, the sun was bright and strong, so it was still pretty hot.  Luckily, I had my big brimmed sun hat and by superdark sunglasses.  I walked at least another mile or so up the beach before I decided it was time for a break...and lunch. I immediately attracted an avian stalker

This one seagull watched me eat...and kept edging closer and closer.  Some idiots actually feed the gulls and they can get a bit aggressive.  Luckily, I finished my peanut butter and jelly before he got brave enough to challenge me for it.  I re-applied my sunscreen again and relaxed for a bit.  I happily discovered that I had a cell signal on my Blackberry, and posted a pic there.  Whipped out the camera and took a few more...

Packed up my beach towel again, and walked a bit further.  Thought this driftwood looked kinda cool...

By this time, I had decided that I didn't feel like putting on shoes and heading inland...the thought of more mosquitoes kind of put me off the idea too (I don't have any insect repellent with me on this trip).  So, I accepted at this point that I probably wouldn't be seeing any of the Shackleford Banks horses.  Not that they don't come out to the beach, but not mid-day and not with so many people around.

So, I slowly made my way up the beach, focusing closely on the many shells along the waterline.  I found lots of really cool shells, most of them broken...but a few neat whole ones too.

At 1:30 I turned around to head back and began focusing on the surf.  The sound made by the surf here is something I've never heard anywhere else.  It's like windchimes....the tinkling sound of the shells hitting each other as the surf advances and retreats.  There are sections of beach that aren't sandy...but shell-ey.

These are the areas where the tink-ly, wind-chimey shound is the loudest and most musical.  Sometimes, big conch and clam shells dig in and cause everything else to eddy around them...

Some places on the beach show the most interesting textures where the water carves out actual ridges..

I got to the end of the island around 2:30, which gave me a bit of beachcombing time and splashing about...more pictures too.  Unfortunately, no Scotch Bonnet either...so neither goal accomplished.  Still, some cool shells found and a lovely day accomplished

There is a state port in nearby Morehead City, so a lot of ships were visible on the horizon...this is being towed by a tugboat it seems.

I got to the ferry landing with 10 minutes to spare.  I was hot and sweaty and tired.  Good time to take a photo of myself

Actually not as bad as I feared and happily lacking a sunburn.

The return ferry was completely full and Captain Jim stopped on the way so we could see a pod of dolphins play in the water.  I decided to stick with my sandy beach shoes as the line for the rinsing hose was so long.

The original plan was to wander around Beaufort...but I was sticky, sandy, and hot and realized I'm coming back tomorrow anyway...so back to the condo I went. I dumped everything right inside the door and headed into the shower.

I was thrilled to wash off the salt, sand, and three layers of sunscreen.  After relaxing for a bit, I headed out for a drive in search of an ice cream parlor.  It was a longer drive than I planned, but I had a hot fudge sundae with praline pecan ice cream.

Back to the condo for more relaxing and last night's leftover shrimp for dinner.

Tomorrow is "Talk Like a Pirate Day" so it's back to Beaufort for the Maritime Museum and the visitation of the salvaged bits of Queen Anne's Revenge...maybe lunch on the waterfront in Beaufort too.  We may have rain tomorrow...so it might be an inside kinda day.  Maybe Fort Macon too?