The End at the Beginning, Vegetarian (Not!) and The Beginning after the End

• The End at The Beginning

For those of you who didn’t know, or couldn’t guess from the pictures on Friday, Mark and I had the chance to go to Key West and stay for a few days during Kayla’s Spring Break, since Kayla wanted to spend Spring Break with my mom in Florida.  Key West is a long way from Alabama, so we finally got down there last Monday.  The very first thing we did once we got there was to drive to the end of U.S. 1.  This is a picture of the sign marking the end of U.S. 1.   It gave me quite an unreasonable sense of accomplishment to have driven to the end of U.S. 1, but doing so,  and traveling by car down the entire length of the Keys from Miami to Key West, are two things I have always wanted to do, and I finally got to do both on Monday!  Hence, the title:  at the end of U.S. 1, our vacation began!

• Vegetarian (Not!)

As with any good trip, the journey to the destination had its moments, also.  The funniest came on the first leg of the trip, when we met my Mom and Kayla ( who were driving back to Mom’s house in a separate car) for lunch at the Cracker Barrel in Tifton.  Because St. Patrick’s Day was approaching, Mom decided to have corn beef and cabbage, which Cracker Barrel usually only sells during the first part of March.  Kayla finished eating before the other three of us, and was looking at what Mom was eating, so Mom, deducing that Kayla would not be interested in the corned beef or the cabbage, asked her if she would like to try some of the potatoes or carrots that came with the corned beef and cabbage.  Kayla looked at her and said emphatically, “I am NOT a vegetarian!”  Mark and I had to laugh!

• The Beginning After The End

We reached home Saturday, and so yesterday we spent just kind of catching up on things.  While we were gone, pine pollen season arrived in Alabama.  Pine pollen season is extraordinary; a fine yellow-green dust covers everything that is standing still!  For example, here are two pictures of one of our cars from Sunday.  It is a black car, and had no pollen on it when we arrived at the house on Saturday.  After only one night of sitting outside, this is what it looked like:

Pollen Close-up

The plus side of pine pollen season is that it also means that the roses in front of our house have started blooming again.  For someone like me, who has a brown, not a green, thumb, (It’s the watering part that I fail at – as well as the weeding once the temperatures around here reach the mid to upper 90’s and stay there until at least September) the roses around the front of our house are a dream come true.  They are called Knock-out Roses:  they need no work (I know this because I have done nothing with them the entire time we have been in the house, except to have the  man who works on our yard for us to trim the bushes in the fall) and they bloom profusely all but about two months out of the year!

It was nice to have the roses greet us when we got home!

I have a lot more to say about Key West, and will spend several days saying it, but for now, it is time to get ready for work.  

Have a great day everyone!

Nancy