Lingering Miami

I'm in my last weekend in Miami, my last stretch in the race to get out of here. In the last few weeks I have been oh so determined to cross the few things off my list that I wanted to do or see before I left. Miami and South Florida aren't lacking for things to do, it's just that they're not always that easy to get around to doing when tropical storms and work threaten, looming over you.

I had my late nights in South Beach until 4am, interesting in that I've basically gone as straight edge as I can or want to: no caffeine, one drink only when I go out. It never gets old to watch people get drunk, though. We went to Ted's Hideaway, The Room, and the Shore Club, so dark that I had to lead my nightblind friend around so that I could tell her who we were talking to. Entertaining, though, in that people kept falling in the pool.



I had my last lay outs on the beach which really is lovely. Reid came to visit again and we tried to go snorkeling in Key Largo and got rained out. Instead we headed for Alabama Jack's--a place on the edge of a mangrove swamp in the Everglades.



We went to the actual Everglades, to try to catch a glimpse of an alligator, where instead we saw a lot of rain (the curse follows me!), some weird seaweed, and all of the inside of the guide center, where the guide told us a story about a pet python that was released in the Everglades and, not having experience with predators, swallowed a 5 foot alligator. Once inside, the alligator opened its jaws. Both died. Crazy snake.

The sky on our way in to the Everglades:



Embracing the curse as the rain pours down:



After the Everglades we stopped at an apparently famous fruit stand called Robert is Here. In the back they had goats, donkeys, turkeys, chickens, ducks, and more all living somewhat harmoniously. Expect the goat who was butting his head against the wall. I feel you.





One day was sunny and we headed to South Beach and found the famous Nikki Beach, a Miami scene if ever there was one. The middle of the day, a DJ blasting music, lounging mattresses everywhere, and even a stiltwalker.



I showed Reid Old Coconut Grove, one of my favorite finds (besides a great Cuban restaurant called Las Culebrinas). New Coconut Grove, where I'm staying and working, is a mishmash tourist attraction of vomit-smelling bars, chain stores and restaurants, and random buskers. Old Coconut Grove is a bohemian enclave which was at its height in the 70s, now just a relaxed old-hippie neighborhood with narrow streets full of tropical foliage and wildly striking trees with roots that hang down all over, and small cozy-looking colorful and sometimes sparkly houses and people where this wannabe-Bohemian feels right at home. No tourist attractions or commerce there. Just a sense of the rightness in that the locals embraced the tropical green rather than mowing it down as everywhere else in Miami. A true sense of place and of harmony.





Okay, I'm just a hippie at heart, but this nomadic bohemian is on her way to the heart of hippieland when I move to Boulder, Colorado on Tuesday. I've enjoyed the pseudo-tropical feel, but will not miss Miami. Hello, Boulder, hello mountains, hello altitude and healthy living, here I come.

I fired a cannon, hee hee

Question -- What induces more giddiness: firing a small cannon over and over, or riding a small tractor? I've had the pleasure of testing both and have come to a firm decision. CANNON wins by a landslide. Though tractor riding ain't too bad.

Welcome to Texas! Land of the free! Home of the neighbors who fire their own cannons back at you!

Yes, we fired the cannon a few times, both blasts and projectile explosives, and then the next door neighbor fired back at us. Yay, Texas!

The cannon's scale can be measured by the glimpse of the foot in the frame.

I heart the cannon. Okay, I also heart the tractor.



I went to Texas for the fourth of July weekend and am now sure that I am cursed. It hasn't rained all summer in Texas, except of course the days I was there. The cannon pic is from the day I left. I have left San Francisco to escape the evil evil summers of teasing and fleeting moments of warmth followed by weeks of chilling fog and have been haunted by pouring rain in every other part of the country, from Florida to Texas to Colorado.

A good time was still had, of course, even in the rain. I met Reid halfway through the country, in San Antonio, and he showed me the times on the town, from the outdoor Mexican market, to the bars, to the best grocery store ever, HEB, to the Comal River, where medium-sized fish and regular-sized beer cans swim beneath you (I'm kidding, Reid, it was great), and a chute in the middle of the river takes you for a swirling bumping ride, to the simple Texan pleasures of grilling, firing a cannon, riding a tractor, swimming, and ringmaster. Ringmaster is an addictive game where you swing a ring attached to a tree by a rope and try to latch it on a hook on the tree in so many swings around.

I liked San Antonio and I want to go back.

Reid at the source of the Comal River


Mexican Market


Deer everywhere


Where else can you find huge aloe vera leaves and peppers of all the colors of the rainbow in the regular grocery store?



I flew out of Florida in daylight for the first time, and saw the Everglades, dark and watery below. I have two more weeks in Miami and I will get out there no matter what. The lines through the bottom of the photo are the main road through the park, I believe. I hear that high mesh fences line the road to keep the alligators off. I will go.



The following weekend I went to Boulder, Colorado, to find my new home. It was pretty and Berkeleyx100, and interesting. I found a place I'm happy about and can't wait to move out there. Sunday morning I went to breakfast with another relocator at Lucille's, the best damn creole breakfast ever, in a cute house to boot. I proclaim that it shall henceforth be a Sunday tradition, and the destination for all out of town guests.

Snorkel and Prom

Last weekend the weather cleared up enough for me, Nicky, and our friend, Taylor, to go snorkeling on a reef off of Key Largo. There were so many fish. It was such an unusual and euphoric feeling to be weightless and surrounded by fish of all sorts of colors, especially a group of yellow and black striped, palm-sized fish that simply accepted your presence and surrounded you. Something about it reminded me of flying dreams. Those are the best dreams.

We ate beforehand at a hole in the wall called the Crack'd Conch. Conch fritters and key lime pie-yum.

That Sunday we had a bbq at the Residence Inn, home sweet home for the last month and a half--one more month to go. There are a lot of new hires and therefore a lot of people there. Even people who had "graduated" to actual homes came back for the bbq and pool games involving a single tennis ball. Who knew a motel could handle such a good time?



This weekend we had planned to kayak through mangrove trees near a nudie beach but the weather would not allow it. Only two more weekends in Miami and I have a list to get through--the weather needs to give a little help, here!

We did, however, go to Prom on Saturday night. A designer from our work held a party at his house and invited the whole agency. Tiaras, limos, and miller flowed freely.





Sparkle the unicorn purse was a big hit by an intern who allowed her babysitting charges to dress her for the party. She had some nice pink goggles and a tiara, too.





Later we headed to a hotel to go swimming on the 8th floor with a nice view of--not a whole lot. It was fancy, silly, and very Miami.

I'm heading to the big state of Texas for the 4th of July. We'll see if their supermarkets can beat the pre-packs of fireworks that they have at the supermarkets here. With rainbow colors and fancy fonts and cellophane wrapping, I might just have to buy some myself.

Big Sky

My grandma used to live in Florida and all that I remember about Florida from the trips to see her besides the alligators and air conditioning is how huge the skies seemed; so much bigger than anywhere else with giant puffy clouds high up in the atmosphere. Texas might be called Big Sky Country but, to me, Florida's tropical skies outdo what I saw on the drive through Texas. What I remember from childhood still holds true; the sky here makes you feel miniscule and beyond that, has incredible power to unleash wild weather on you.

Rainbow over the Marina in Coconut Grove.


Tropical sunset (generally over land though, part of being on the east coast now--gotta get used to that)


Last weekend my belongings finally arrived and I salvaged my bike from going into storage. I had time on Sunday to bike to the Venetian Pool in Coral Gables, a historic pool built out of a rock quarry with waterfalls and lots of pseudo-Spanish architecture. Really beautiful and relaxing.


Then on my ride home I was caught in a cloudburst. I now know the true meaning of that word. To go from gorgeous skies like you see over the pool to rain like below in less than half an hour is what happens pretty much every afternoon. 45 minutes later the rain will subside and the gutters will be overflowing onto the sidewalk, simply unable to contain the flash flood that falls from the sky.


Today I was supposed to go snorkeling in Key Largo but the plan was foiled yet again, this time by the bad weather we've had all weekend. My first full weekend not working and I wasn't able to really get out! I spent today watching the world cup games in different bars (all with babies in them--lots of babies in bars, it seems) with Nicky, an editor who started work the same day as me, and her visiting friend.

We are determined to go. It will happen before I leave Florida!

work work work

I work from 8am in my hotel room to 9am and then go in to the agency and stay until 11:30pm, then come home and write more emails. Then I try to sleep. If I can just work it out to NOT work on Sunday, I'm going to go snorkeling in Key Largo.

Portrait of someone from my work: treo in one hand, cigarette in the other, bags under eyes with distant look in them, smile often on face. Really.

I live in Florida?

Fark.com has a specific heading for Florida posts. For example: http://suntimes.com/output/news/cst-nws-cat22.html

Florida photos to come as soon as I find my camera cord...but I'm pretty much at work all the time and my new job has strict rules on confidentiality--even what can't be blogged. So, limited photos and information, coming soon!

I pretty much work all the time. I had to ask for Sunday off last week. Reid (o mysterious X!) came to visit me and we drove halfway down the Florida Keys before we escaped the mass of memorial day traffic and found a little scrappy scrap o' beach.

It was hip-hop-weekend-at-the-beach in South Beach and I was intrigued at being one of the only white people on the beach on Monday. Miami and my workplace are the most diverse places I've ever lived and worked. It's so different, but not really.

However, I will be moving to Boulder, CO in August for yet another change of scenery and to work at a new office opening there. Having never been there, I think I will probably enjoy it. I don't have time to think during the day but at night when I'm not usually obligated to be working (though this is not consistently true) I've started to have dreams about the people I love and worked with. Although I am meeting some great people here I'll be leaving most of them behind when I head to Boulder as the office is splitting.

Hurricane season started today. I responded by buying one jug of water. I've got two cans of tuna, too. I'm so prepared.

I live in Miami! Holy crap.

The first thing I heard when I got off the plane in Miami was a news report that an alligator had attacked a jogger, dragged her into a river, and dismembered and eaten her. They caught the alligator and found two arms inside. I live here now. Is this a sign?

My old roommate, Kathy, also a surprised transplant to Miami 7 months ago, took me on a grand tour of the area on my first real day here so I could check out the sights and see where I might want to live. She and her boyfriend, Wes even fed me delicious cuban food they cooked themselves, in their adorable apartment.

One of the things we saw was the beautiful Venetian Pool, a public pool built in the 30s to make good use of a quarry. I am going back there as soon as possible. I am on a mission to find pools and hopefully a pool with an apartment, and not the other way around.

We also toured a crappy apartment in an art deco building that probably used to be a nudist colony. It had a GREAT pool, though.

Kathy in front of Key Biscayne. I can't wait to go there. You can walk out in the shallow water and fish will swim around your legs.



Me, pale and about to get sunburned, on my first day in Miami.



I start my new job today. Holy crap.

Goodbye San Francisco

End of the Journey, End of the Line

Nicole and I on our last day together on a relaxing urban planning boat tour of the DC waterfront.

Before I have a chance to finish writing the post, here are some of the rest of the photos from our trip.

Things have been nutty lately, as I made the sudden decision to move to Miami for a job. Anyone who glances at this blog will know how much I love my life here in San Francisco--my roommates, my friends, the natural beauty and quirks of the city and area. It's going to be a tremendous change, and a sacrifice for a secure future. It is absolutely not that I am not contented with what I have now. I know what I have, and I appreciate it and do not take it for granted. This is not an easy change, but a necessary one. You won't complain to see pictures of blue skies and white beaches though, will you? :)

A common sign throughout the south. Seriously, though, would you be at Texaco?



Raccoon Mountains in Tennessee. We camped there for a night and when we woke up I thought that was where "Where the Red Fern Grows" was set. I was wrong, but it definitely seemed like the right kind of place.



The Ocoee River. I want to go back. It was so beautiful. Around every turn was a whitewater opportunity, which I've never done before. Even at 60 miles an hour, the south struck a chord with me. A different culture from my own, and very different visually and naturally as well.



Nicole preparing one of our trip staples--peanut butter and grape jelly sandwiches. I'm addicted, officially. We didn't eat fast food once on the trip. Except the near-daily starbucks run, if you can count that. Or that one chocolate milkshake. Come on, cut me some slack. I'd eat KFC in a second. But the grape jelly was too good.



The Great Smoky Mountains



Nicole celebrates tulip season when we reached Virginia.



One of many striking sunsets.



Cute house in Abingdon, Virginia.



Gratineed scallops at an old restaurant in Abingdon called the Tavern. Built in the 1700s (?), the floors are slanted and the place has a presence all its own.



Exterior of the Tavern. The moss growing down the roof isn't quite visible here.



A real campsite we stayed in in Virginia along the river. We were the only non-RV campers. Canadian geese were honking over head all night. A lady in an RV from New England offered us some coffee and then told her husband in a stage whisper laden with a new york kind of accent that we were "gutsy".



Prettiest gas station rest stop ever, where we frolicked. There's video to prove it.



Dogwood in bloom in Virginia.



Picturesque farmland.



The 19th century garden cottage where Nicole will be living. SO cute.



Photos from my 30 hour first trip ever to NY.