A Perfect Day???

Allan wrote...

After all, what is a PERFECT day?  Is it one where everything goes right? Where everyone you meet loves you? Where you love everyone else?  I don't know. I suppose a "perfect day" is different for every person.  Yet for me, today was indeed perfect.

These guys have everything. From tackle to bait to advice.

Up at 6:30 AM and off to the bait store where I bought a bunch of live shrimp.  A quick stop at BK for breakfast -- eating fast food is something I rarely do, but it just seemed like a good idea today. I wore my old sneakers, a shirt and a bathing suit. With my son's remarkable, collapsible heavy duty spinning rod and reel outfitted with 30-pound test mono-filament line, plus a dozen live shrimp from the Fishing Headquarters (along with some advice on where to fish, how to rig the line and what's been running lately), I headed off to Jupiter beach.

There was NO ONE on the beach at 7:30AM today. I waded out to waist deep water with a 1.5 ounce sinker at the end of the line, a two-hook rig about two feet upline from the sinker and casted -- oh, maybe 20 to 30 yards out into the surf. I noticed the waves break at a couple different places, each due to various sand bars beneath the water. According to what I'd read it's best to cast between the sand bars because that's where the fish hang out, waiting for the "rip" current to carry food to them.  And there was food a-plenty.  Minnows were darting around me in gigantic schools. "Hey," I said to myself, "this is the place and the day I'm gonna catch some fish."

Nothing like getting out into the water about waist deep
and waiting for that big one to bite!

The guy at fishing HQ said I should cut up the live shrimp and put about one-third of a shrimp on each hook, just enough to cover the bottom of the "J." OK.  He said, "Don't worry, just toss your line out there and you'll definitely catch some fish this morning. The tide is right and the time is right.  If you wanted to catch snook you're about an hour late, but you'll get all kinds of pan fish.  No problemo."

I did cut up the shrimp. I put them in the leftover Burger King coffee cup, which I stuffed into my shirt pocket so I wouldn't have to go back to shore each time I needed to re-bait the hooks. I casted. Re-casted.  Jigged the line. Tossed it out to deep water. Tossed it parallel to the shore. The fishing prognostication at weather.com had said the best time to catch fish in Jupiter waters was between 7AM and noon, peaking at around 9AM.  With no fish biting I finally waded back to shore to check my iPod: It was 11AM.  Not a bite. No fish. And now the bathers were everywhere, laughing, playing, surfing and having fun.

The June pier is 990 feet long. Four bucks and you can fish
from it all day long. Locals say the snook hang out beneath
the pier but I've yet to see anyone catch snook in spite of
all the talk about them.

"Hey, it's still early. I'll go to the Juno pier."  So I did. It's about five miles down the road and costs $4 to enter and fish from the pier. Done. There were about 8 or 10 other people fishing at that hour. A couple guys at the end of the pier were all excited about snook, but never did catch any. A woman from Massachusetts (my best guess based on her accent) pulled a tiny fish out of the water. After a couple hours of trying this side of the pier, the other side of the pier, the end of the pier, the part of the pier where there were big shadows cast upon the water, casting my line under the pier as best I could -- I finally met my objective when a 10-inch fish grabbed onto a shrimp and allowed me to haul it 20 feet from the water up to my tackle box. "What's that you pulled out?" asked a bystander.  "I don't know, but I hope he'll send his big brother along soon" I replied as I tossed him back into the water.

The "fisherman's eye view" from the Juno pier. Nothing
but blue. Water and sky. Beautiful!

Hey. I caught a fish. I'd been on or in the water now for about six hours. The sun was blazing down on me and I kept adjusting my hat to keep that burning feeling off my forehead.  Ain't life grand?  I don't care if I catch fish or not. It's just about being outside in the sun feeling the breeze against my body. The water washing me in/out/in/out with each wave that comes to shore.

Finally around 2PM I headed back to the car and drove over to Rosetta's Produce where I picked up an amazing amount of food for $10 and change. Then to the ABC store for a bottle of Menage a Trois for Becky and a spiced rum for me.

Back to the house and it's time to build a rollup with all the wondrous veggies Rosetta sold me. For me there are few things that taste better than avocados and tomatoes. Toss in some jalapenos and onions and it's Heaven on a tortilla.

Rosetta's Produce store, just down the road, has got the
BEST veggies around. Tomatoes are sweet and soft and
ready to eat. Brussel sprouts are gigantic. Jalapenos are
available in green or red, along with many other peppers.
This whole load of veggies was just $10 and change. 

Now, fully fed and ready for another adventure, it's off to the pool.  No one is there. Wonderful! Jump in to deliciously warm water, swim around for a while then migrate to the shallow end a meditate for a long time. The sound of my breathing is all I can hear as my ears are under water, my eyes are closed and only my prayers and thoughts exist.

Now...mellowed out...communing with All That Is...I return to the house to find Becky has returned from a phenomenally successful shopping trip where she bought me a new shirt and SEVEN items of apparel for herself for just over $20.  What a shopper!  Designer labels and not even a dent in the budget.

Tomato, avocado and jalapeno. Nothing better, especially
where everything is fresh, locally grown and just ready to eat.
Nothing left to do but roll it up and chow down!

I guess this day teaches me that for guys it's all about getting out in the wild, catching wild things -- while for the ladies, bless their hearts, it's about finding beauty, finding bargains and sharing them with their loved ones.  Ain't life grand?

My sweet Becky bought me a new shirt today!
I love it :)

Memorial Day Weekend

Allan wrote...

We began this long weekend on Thursday by reconnecting with Jim and Jill D, old friends from Atlanta back in the 1980's when Jim and I both worked at that amazing computer company, AST Research.  It was really great to talk with them again. Jim suggested we eat at Guanabanas and I'm so glad we did. It's exactly the kind of restaurant we had been looking for in vain since we arrived in Jupiter. It has no windows; it's open to the air; it serves seafood; it's got live music in the evenings (Julian Marley, son of Bob Marley, played with no cover charge on Friday night!)  Just an amazing place.

Jim and Jill - we reconnected after almost 20 years.

This restaurant looks like it's in the rain forest somewhere,
and that's exactly the feel we'd been looking for. 

No windows. no doors either! It's all outside just as it "should be" in a
tropical setting like Florida.

The have live music almost every night, often with no cover charge.

Outdoor seating for everyone

It's right on the intra-coastal (on A1A) in Jupiter.

Cool place !

Friday we rode over to West Palm Beach to meet the homeowner who wants a house sitter for six weeks in late November through early January. We thought it would be nice to come back to South Florida in the winter season and spend Christmas here. We met the owner, a very nice and interesting guy who will be going to the Philippines with his wife for those six weeks. We enjoyed our time visiting him, touring his property  and meeting his dogs, but decided to forego that assignment.

Saturday was not memorable except that we worked on our computers much of the day. Sunday, however, was a gorgeous day that reached 90 degrees, so we decided to go to the beach. The parking lot at Jupiter beach was overflowing so we drove down to the pier in Juno, pitched our umbrella and soaked up the sun.  Beautiful.

The 990-foot pier at Juno Beach, just south of Jupiter. Memorial Day weekend brought everyone to the beach.

The condos in the distance rent for about $1700/month if you live here all year long. Some are rented only during
the winter season and can go for as much as $5000 per month! Apparently the snowbirds from New England, New
York and other places where the snow falls fast and heavy find those rates affordable.

Fishermen on the pier were catching panfish all afternoon.

 As I was jogging the beach I came upon a group of people standing at water's edge screaming, "Shark, get out of the water!"  I looked and, sure enough, I could see a dark shadow just a few feet off shore. It wasn't a big shark -- maybe three feet long -- but within about one foot of the shark a little girl, maybe 5 years old, was splashing and playing, oblivious to the screaming or the shark.  I jumped into the water, grabbed her up and put her on dry land.  Then, looking at the shadow in the water, I realized it wasn't a shark at all; it was a manta ray flapping his "wings" in all his glory, looking like a giant, beautiful bird floating through the waves.  I hollered out, "It's a manta, not a shark" and suddenly everyone wanted to get close to it.  Funny how the fear turned to excitement and big smiles appeared on everyone's face. I followed the manta along for about a hundred feet, watching as his "wing" broke the surface over and over again. Finally he headed out to deeper water.

On Sunday the first tropical storm of the season, Beryl, made landfall near Jacksonville. By Monday morning, as I write this, the storm has traversed about half the width of Florida, heading West, and is weakening. Here's a half-hour video of its path as it ambles toward Tallahassee.

So today is Monday, Memorial Day. We have no plans but will probably go to the pool later. I've been reading "Spirit Junkie" by Gabrielle Bernstein and might finish it up today. It's about her life and how it changed when she began studying A Course in Miracles. Becky is reading a book about a man's life with his Sheltie; she said it brings tears of happiness and remembrance to her eyes because it reminds her of our wonderful Sheltie dogs we loved for 13 years.

Our beloved Sunny Rose and Bonnie Blue